USA. 2007.
Crew
Director – Justin Jones, Screenplay/Producer – David Michael Latt, Story – Carlos de los Rios, Photography – Adam Sillver, Visual Effects – Tiny Juggernaut (Supervisor – Scott D. Wheeler), Production Design – Kurt Atlschwager. Production Company – Faith Films/The Asylum.
Cast
Rhett Giles (Jason Ellis), Jill Stapley (Ashley Ellis), Kristen Quintrall (Lindsay Ellis), Tom Nagel (Andrew), David Shick (Don), Amol Shah (Khalil), Shaley Scott (Amanda), Dean Arevelo (Tony), Jason S. Gray (Banker), Michael Tower (Dr Reed)
Plot
In Big Sur, park ranger Jason Ellis and his partner Don are witness as a meteorite strikes and wipes out Monterey. They immediately head to Jason’s estranged wife Ashley’s place to check on her. Don later mysteriously vanishes after going outside. An asteroid the size of Texas is discovered to be on a collision course with the Earth. Jason and Ashley decide they must set out to drive to Los Angeles to check on the safety of their daughter Lindsay. Lindsay meanwhile is taking shelter with her boyfriend Andrew. As outliers from the meteorite strike all around them, they try to stay alive amid the devastation and chaos. Through their journey, Jason and Ashley struggle with their Christian faith that has fallen away since the death of their son.
The Asylum has become a prolific low-budget production company since the mid-2000s. They produce a mountain of disaster and monster movies. The two niches they are most associated with is the gonzo killer shark film, having created the bad movie hit of Sharknado (2013) and assorted sequels and other works in a similar vein. That and their production of Mockbusters – films that come out with titles intended to mimic those of big-budget releases in the hope that people will mistake them or not look too closely.
Christian or faith-based films suddenly became a big niche market in the mid-2000s with the massive box-office success of Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ (2004), which was followed by other works such as The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (2005) and The Exorcism of Emily Rose (2005) that had marketing pitches that sold them directly to church audiences. The Asylum latched onto this fad and made a handful of films in conjunction with a production company called Faith Films. The Apocalypse was the first of these. The other films they made in collaboration with Faith Films consisted of Sunday School Musical (2008), 2012 Doomsday (2008), Countdown Jerusalem (2009) and Meteor Apocalypse (2008).
However, I am dubious about Faith Films and have some questions. The only five films that Faith Films ever made were all ones in partnership with The Asylum. The production credits for these films are all familiar crews that have worked on other Asylum films – The Asylum’s regular producer David Michael Latt even writes the screenplay for The Apocalypse. There are no familiar faces or production names from Christian Cinema. What I would accuse The Asylum of is that Faith Films is no more than a shell company and that what we have is not a faith-based collaboration but simply the same old Asylum taking advantage of a topical fad and marketing their product under a faith-based banner.
In most regards, The Apocalypse is simply a standard Disaster Movie along the lines of which The Asylum have churned out a good many of since then – indeed, The Apocalypse was the first of these. It follows the formula The Asylum that soon established in their disaster movies – the protagonists on a journey through the midst of the disaster to connect with family members in another location, the crazies and assorted other met along the way. All that is missing is the discredited scientist with the plan to halt the disaster. The Asylum’s effects were fairly poor around this time and there are some very shabby and impoverished CGI shots of meteor fragments falling and of a tidal wave engulfing Los Angeles. The film also confuses the difference between an asteroid and a meteor.
Of course, being the film with the pitch it has, The Apocalypse is a formula Asylum disaster movie but with the addition of faith elements. Jill Stapley is constantly seeing everything in terms of Biblical omens. As she and husband Rhett Giles walk through the devastated areas, they argue about their relationship and she berates him for letting his church attendance fall away. Meanwhile, Kristen Quintrall pays a visit to a church and explains to boyfriend Tom Nagel about her faith, which he comes to accept by the end. Various people ‘disappear’, presumably being taken up in The Rapture. The end of the film has Rhett Giles and daughter Kristen Quintrall reunited just as the meteor strikes. It should be noted that there is nothing in The Book of Revelations or any other Biblical prophecies about oncoming meteors or asteroids.
Director Justin Jones had worked as an assistant director and even occasionally an actor since the very earliest days of The Asylum. The Apocalypse was his first outing as a director and he subsequently made Invasion of the Pod People (2007) for them, along with Quantum Apocalypse (2010), Sorority Party Massacre (2012) and Mirror Image (2017) for other companies. He has also worked as a producer on a great many films for The Asylum and other companies.
Faith-based trailer here
Secular trailer here