A Slightly Stoopid "End"

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Frat Boy Frolics in “This is the End”

By Skip Sheffield

It was a choice of “The Internship” down at Aventura or “This is the End’ at Cinemark Palace right here in Boca Raton.

I took the easy way out, but from what I am told I missed the better film.

“Tell them it’s retarded,” a guy remarked to me on the way out of the theater. He pretty much hit the nail on the head. Opening June 12, “This is the End” is the very definition of sophomoric: foolish, self-assured and opinionated, though immature.

“This is the End” is the brainchild, if that is the right word, of Seth Rogen, who like a bunch of other young Hollywood actors, plays himself, and Evan Goldberg, who co-wrote and co-directs with Rogen.

The movie is a remake and expansion of a 2007 short film called “Jay and Seth Versus the Apocalypse.” Jay is Canadian actor Jay Baruchel (“Knocked Up) who co-stars as Seth Rogen’s best friend.

Jay’s character doesn’t much like Los Angeles. Jay dislikes the whole Hollywood scene, and who could blame him? Despite this, Seth convinces Jay to tag along with him to a big, dopey, boozy blowout party at James Franco’s mansion.

Franco and Rogen were in a hit 2008 stoner film called “Pineapple Express.” So was Danny McBride, who plays the world’s most obnoxious party guest. So was Craig Robinson, who plays a one-hit wonder rapper whose hit tune is advertised prominently on his T-shirt.

Playing against type of nerdy nice guy is another Canadian, Michael Cera, who parodies himself as an obnoxious, sex-crazed coke freak.

Obnoxious is the byword for this can-you-top-this gross-out flick. When the advertised apocalypse comes with all its CG flames, monsters and pits of Hell, it’s every man (or in the case of Harry Potter cutie Emma Watson, woman) for himself. Giving the doomsday scenario the slightest veneer of respectability is Jay’s character, who is familiar with the Bible and the Book of Revelations.

“This is the End” is aimed squarely at the party-til-you-puke Generation Y, with all kinds of self-referential inside jokes for those who think “Pineapple Express” a masterpiece. Admittedly it has a lot of laughs, but you will feel slightly soiled afterward. Or perhaps retarded.