Left Behind

          

          “Left Behind” came out like two months ago, and I wanted to review it then, but alas, I am not about to spend $10 of my husband's hard-earned money to watch a terrible movie starring Nicolas Cage and his Sad Face, and thus am dependent on Christians to illegally upload the movie to the Internet once they are done watching it. Since Christians tend not to be moral black holes, this can take awhile. BUT THE WAIT IS FINALLY OVER.

         Nicolas Cage, obviously hoping to deep-six his film career even further, stars as Ray-Ban, a pilot in charge of driving a plane full of empty clothes through the air, in a modern remake of the 2001 Christian blockbuster “Left Behind,” which was based on the 436-book series by Jerry Jenkins and Tim LeHaye, which is NOT based on the Bible, but instead features their vividly inaccurate imaginations of a non-biblical, but nonetheless pop-culturally significant, apocalypse. That was a long sentence, but if medical school has taught me anything, it's that you want to fit your case presentation into 2 sentences, but you don't want to leave anything out. Enter: run-ons.

         Before we get started, I want to assure you all that I have, indeed, read all 942 “Left Behind” books. Maybe (definitely) more than once. I was THAT person. I read Revelation from cover-to-cover, and when I was in middle school, I tried to write a fantasy book co-starring the Horsemen of the Apocalypse and the Lion of Judah. Unfortunately, I do not have a copy, but desperately wish that I did. Believe me when I tell you, I am EXTREMELY qualified to write this review. Errors, suspensions of belief, and any smidgen of accuracy will be noted as follows:

1. Jumpin' right in there with the Random Airport Christian and your Garden-Variety Apologetics, hopelessly outnumbered by the one-two punch of Ray-Ban's Clueless Daughter and Ruggedly Handsome Reporter's displays of rational thinking and sincerely-held-belief-bashing. Both of them are atheists, and are quite obviously quagmires of immorality.
2. Oh, Ray-Ban, I see what you did there – the disappearance of your wedding ring coincided exactly with the arrival of Hottie to the scene. However, if Foundations of Medical Practice has taught me anything (and it hasn't), it's that correlation does not equal causation.
3. Hottie's sexual attraction to Ray-Ban is evident in the way in which she eyes his backside with appreciation. Causation equaled, I retract my previous statement.
4. Ray-Ban wears his Ray-Bans inside. Because of course.
5. Clueless Daughter's use of “wacko” to describe her Christian Mom's belief system makes me think she's probably related to John “Wack-o Bird” McCain.
6. The sneak peeks of children on Ray-Ban's plane is not a subtle use of foreshadowing at all.
7. Hey, Ray-Ban Junior and Clueless Daughter, going to the mall is what the cool kids do........................ in 2003.
8. The sneak peaks of children in the mall is not a subtle use of foreshadowing at all.
9. Hey, Ray-Ban, Hottie, and Ray-Ban's backside, going to a U2 concert is what the cool kids do...................................... in 1989.
10. WHOA THAT WAS ABRUPT!!!!!!!!!!!! RAY-BAN JUNIOR IS JUST A PILE OF CLOTHES!!!! CLUELESS DAUGHTER IS TELLING A PILE OF CLOTHES THAT SHE LOVES IT!!!!!!!! THE PLANE IS FULL OF PILES OF CLOTHES!!!!!! THE MALL IS FULL OF PILES OF CLOTHES!!!!!!!! THE CO-PILOT IS A PILE OF CLOTHES!!!!!!!! A PILE OF CLOTHES IS FLYING THE PLANE!!!!!!!!! The whole plane looks like the floor of my college roommate's side of the room – PILES OF CLOTHES EVERYWHERE!!!!
11. Hey, Clueless Daughter, I'm pretty sure that Ray-Ban Junior is not inside of the backpack through which you are so frantically rummaging.
12. Um wow, I'm not a pilot at all, but I'm pretty sure that there is NOT a button on a plane that just SUCKS ALL THE OXYGEN OUT OF THE CABIN!!!!!!
13. Um, no, Ruggedly Handsome Reporter with a boss Nikon, you can't just take a picture out a dark airplane window of a dark airplane wing in the dark while flying in the dark and have it come out perfectly focused and perfectly lit without even a hint of shake. I am a photographer who owns a boss Nikon, I know these things. If I can't do it, you can't do it.
14. How is it that even though Ray-Ban and his backside on a plane that is only like 3 hours from New York, and Clueless Daughter is IN New York, why is it that it is completely pitch-black outside of Ray-Ban's plane, while Clueless Daughter is running frantically through the well-light daytime streets? Even if a plane is flying against the rotation of the earth, it just doesn't work like that. 
15. Clueless Daughter, does Ray-Ban Junior have a curious case of the Benjamin Buttons? Why else would you look for him in the nursery of a hospital?
16. Oh, all the babies and all the kids and all the nice people were taken, but the DOCTORS were left behind? You know why that is, right? We doctors are godless moral vacuums, that's why.
17. The dog sitting next to the pile of clothes is probably the saddest part of this whole stupid movie.
18. Whoa, Ray-Ban, does your mom live in the cockpit of your aircraft? She doesn't? Then maybe, as you are flicking casually through the pile of clothes that used to be your co-pilot, idk, maybe you want to be a little more neat about it, and not just toss things willy-nilly over your shoulder?
19. Christian “Wack-o Bird” Mom's Bible is open to Song of Solomon? For a woman who believes fervently in the Rapture, I would have expected a little more “abomination of desolation” and a little less “your breasts are like two fawns” from her daily devotional but hey, what do I know, it's not like I majored in Bible and Religion in college or anything.
20. Straight from the mouth of King Nicholas himself - “Either I'm going crazy, or the entire world is insane.” Truer words have never been spoken, especially by a man who (presumably) voluntarily chose to eighty-six his film career by appearing in his wretched screenplay, and is now deeply regretting that decision. True fact – those words were not in the original script – they were ad-libbed as Nicolas Cage realized what a mistake he had made.
21. WHOA, LADY WITH A GUN?!?!!?!? ON A PLANE?!?!?!? It's been a long time since I've held a gun (those darn pacifist beliefs!), but last I checked, they were made of metal. Metal that is detected by metal detectors, specifically set up to detect the guns made of out metal that crazy people bring onto planes. WHERE IS THE TSA IN ALL OF THIS?!?!?
22. Ray-Ban, telling Hottie that you have a wife is a very noble thing to do, but come on, time and place. I mean, no time like the present, but all hell is kind of breaking loose with the proles in steerage right now!
23. Hottie, if I were you, I'd be more upset about the steerage full of empty clothing than the fact that flirty-flirt Ray-Ban and his backside have a wife.
24. The look on Ray-Ban's face when he finds out that the entire planet has been affected is probably the same look Nicolas Cage wore at the premiere of “Left Behind” when when he realized that everyone would see him in this ridiculous movie. Sheer horror.
25. Wow, despite having demonstrated absolutely zero aptitude for original thought or talent of any kind, other than parroting John McCain, Clueless Daughter has suddenly learned to drive a motorbike! Her newfound skill at motorbike-driving does not extend to picking up a helmet, however.
26. Clueless Daughter's previously untapped reservoir of mechanical knowledge comes in handy in very quick succession – first a motorbike, then a stick-shift pick-up, and now a road-grader! I hope that someday, my vast knowledge of trees of the United States comes in handy in an emergency like this.
27. YEAH, GURRRRL, LIGHT THAT SH*T UP!!!!!! Good thing there is always a gas can available in an emergency.
28. The hug between Ray-Ban, Ray-Ban's backside, and Ray-Ban's Clueless Daughter is inspiring as all-get-out. Hallmark movie music plays, New York burns in the background, families are sobbing over piles of clothing that used to be children, but all is right in what remains of their little family.
29. The closing screen is of Ray-Ban's stunned face, as Nicolas Cage realizes what appearing in this movie has done to his career.

        My biggest beef with this movie is not the bad acting, not the lack of Kirk Cameron, and not even that it portrays a biblically-inaccurate event, but that the entire movie is just Nicolas Cage flying a plane while repeatedly assuring everyone that he would get to the bottom of “whatever-this-is.” Having read the “Left Behind” books, I can tell you that Ray-Ban flying a plane constitutes approximately 1/100^th of the entire series, and only about the first 30 pages of the 250-page first installment. WHERE IS THE ANTICHRIST?!!? In the White House, obviously, and unavailable for comment. 
         In conclusion, don't watch this movie. Rotten Tomatoes gave it a 5%, which is probably some kind of record. If you really feel like you want to hasten the arrival of Jesus, just keep on doing good things for people who need it, because nothing you do is going to speed up his return. Dude has his own timetable.