left behind the movie review

Left Behind

A movie about the rapture starring Nicolas Cage should be wackier than "Left Behind." It should have more smoldering panic bursting into full-blown freak-outs. It should have more passion, more intensity. It should have more bees.

Yes, Cage's howl-inducing remake of ‘The Wicker Man" from 2006 actually feels like a legitimately good time compared to this dull groaner about the end times. It's a remake too: a version of "Left Behind" starring Kirk Cameron quickly came and went from theaters in 2001, followed by a couple of straight-to-DVD sequels. All are based on the apocalyptic novels by Jerry B. Jenkins and Tim LaHaye.

Christian readers and audiences are the base here, but it's hard to imagine that this incarnation of the story will persuade anyone else to find the Lord unless they're sitting in the theater praying for the dialogue or special effects to improve. This is essentially an " Airport " movie with an Evangelical spin, but it lacks the self-awareness to turn such a wild concept into a guilty pleasure.

Director Vic Armstrong , a longtime stuntman making only his second feature (and his first in a couple of decades), had a larger budget than the original's, and a more established star in the lead. None of that shows up on screen. The "big" set pieces look small and chintzy, the lighting is hard and flat, and the pacing is a monotonous back-and-forth between an airplane in the skies across the Atlantic and the chaos on the ground below.

But the more serious disappointment comes from Cage's performance. As the awesomely named Rayford Steele, a philandering airline pilot who sees the light as the end is nigh, Cage needed to bring the wild-eyed, full-bore crazy. This has been his bread and butter of late, and it's been a thoroughly enjoyable career shift. Instead, he's oddly inert as the movie's voice of reason. Looking distractingly rubbery with a helmet of fake, dark hair, he seems to have been Photoshopped into the film. His presence is so strangely awkward and unconvincing.

Then again, the script from Paul Lalonde (who also produced the original "Left Behind" movies) and John Patus doesn't exactly give him or the rest of the cast much to work with. It's full of flat character types and blandly expository dialogue.  At the film's start, Rayford's daughter, Chloe (the perky Cassi Thomson), has come home from college for the weekend for her dad's birthday. But Rayford got a last-minute assignment to fly from New York to London overnight, which will keep him away all that time. At least that's what he told his wife Irene ( Lea Thompson ), who's no fun anymore now that she's found Jesus and is urging everyone around her to do the same. (The camera lingers as Irene tosses her gardening gloves on top of her ever-present Bible.) His real plan is to seduce a hot, blonde flight attendant ( Nicky Whelan ) over the weekend, beginning with prime tickets to see U2.

This is actually a vaguely intriguing premise: What happens to a marriage when one spouse undergoes a religious conversion and the other does not? It seems similar to what happens when one spouse gets sober and the other keeps drinking. What sort of wedge does this create? How does the family survive? But these aren't the questions "Left Behind" cares to ponder. Armageddon is on the horizon.

Anyway, Chloe and her dad have a brief, stilted conversation in the airport waiting area between her arrival and his departure. Being the skeptic that she is, she also has a confrontation about religion with a woman who's just bought a book about God at the bookstore. Chloe also finds time for a long chat with hunky, hotshot TV news correspondent Buck Williams, who happens to be a passenger on Rayford's flight to London. ( Chad Michael Murray takes over the role Cameron played in the original. I'd say that's an improvement.) There's a lot of sitting around and talking in "Left Behind."

But then! Out of nowhere, God starts calling the pure of heart to heaven: children, mostly, but also people who have the words BIBLE STUDY written in their calendars in big capital letters. At first, no one realizes this is God's doing. People just disappear, leaving their clothes and belongings in a pile where they once stood, including Chloe's little brother and (of course) her mom.

Pandemonium ensues as millions go missing worldwide–or at least, implied pandemonium. This includes a school bus driving off an overpass and a small plane crashing into a shopping mall parking lot. There is zero finesse to these supposedly dramatic images. Mostly, Armstrong gives us a lot of people running around, flailing their hands in the air.

Meanwhile, up in the sky, folks start disappearing, too–including a flight attendant and Rayford's second-in-command. (Guess this means God really is his co-pilot.) The barely sketched-out passengers in first class start panicking and bickering, including a Texas businessman, an Asian conspiracy theorist and a drugged-up heiress. Former "American Idol" winner Jordin Sparks fares poorly as a paranoid, unstable mom who somehow smuggled a handgun on the plane. Worst of all is the consistent yammering between a kindly Muslim and a surly little person. The movie cuts to them repeatedly for comic relief, but it's painfully unfunny every time.

"Left Behind" finally edges toward an enjoyable level of insanity as it reaches its conclusion. I wouldn't dream of giving away the details–mysterious ways, and all–but I will say that it involves the petite Chloe driving a steamroller in the dead of night on a deserted stretch of highway that's under construction.

Still, for a movie that spells everything out, it's unclear why God chose this particular moment to inflict his wrath upon the masses. Was it because Rayford tried to forsake his wedding vows with a flirty flight attendant at a U2 show? Still, if you're a true believer, it's a beautiful day.

Christy Lemire

Christy Lemire is a longtime film critic who has written for RogerEbert.com since 2013. Before that, she was the film critic for The Associated Press for nearly 15 years and co-hosted the public television series "Ebert Presents At the Movies" opposite Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, with Roger Ebert serving as managing editor. Read her answers to our Movie Love Questionnaire here .

• Martin Klebba as Melvin Weir
• Cassi Thompson as Chloe Steele
• Lea Thompson as Irene Steele
• Jordin Sparks as Shasta Carvell
• Chad Michael Murray as Buck Williams
• Nicolas Cage as Rayford Steele
• Nicky Whelan as Hattie Durham
• Paul Lalonde
• Vic Armstrong

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Movie Reviews

A man, a plane, a rapture: 'left behind'.

Mark Jenkins

Nicolas Cage stars as airline pilot Ray Steele in Left Behind . Courtesy of Stoney Lake Entertainment hide caption

Nicolas Cage stars as airline pilot Ray Steele in Left Behind .

The world is ending, billions will die, and hell is, literally, coming to Long Island. But the rebooted Left Behind doesn't want to alarm you.

Fourteen years ago, as a new millennium's arrival failed to extinguish our doggedly persistent universe, the first Left Behind movie introduced a slithery Antichrist — a U.N. official, of course — and the prospect of global war centered on Jerusalem. Just last month, The Remaining treated the fundamentalist-Christian notion of "the rapture" as a horror movie, littered with the corpses of born-againers whose souls had been called to heaven.

The second attempt to create a successful movie franchise from the 16 best-selling Left Behind novels takes a gentler approach. The departed abandon only their clothing, not their carcasses. And no demons are glimpsed in a tale that focuses tightly on the family of airline pilot Ray Steele (Nicolas Cage). As Ray tries to land a disabled jetliner whose co-pilot is now chilling with the man upstairs, his challenges derive less from the Bible (1 Thessalonians 4:17, in particular) than from such moldy disaster flicks as 1969's Airport .

For those who missed this particular end of the world the last time it didn't happen, Left Behind is based on a series of sectarian thrillers by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins. Adapting the books to the screen began in 2000, but the movies didn't click even as straight-to-church-auditorium fare, and stopped at three. The producers of the latest round of adaptations have also promised three, not a full 13.

The revamped but still clunky saga begins as Ray prepares to fly from JFK to London by removing his wedding ring. He's estranged from his wife (Lea Thompson) since she became a rapture-ready Christian, and is hoping to spend some time with a sexy flight attendant once they land. This carnal design has so warped his judgment that he has decided to skip a family reunion with daughter Chloe (Cassie Thomson), who has returned from college just to see him.

Chloe visits her dad briefly at the airport, and while there meets famed daredevil journalist Buck Williams (Chad Michael Murray), who will also be on that flight to London. Then she takes her little brother to the mall, where break dancers bust some moves that are as fluid as the dialogue is stiff. This protracted setup moves about as briskly as the first three hours of Boyhood .

Finally, the righteous vanish and the rest are left to ponder their disappearance. Chloe searches for her sibling and mom, both of whom are no longer in this world; her dad flies the damaged plane while piecing together the religious significance of what just happened.

In first class, Williams deals with unruly fellow travelers selected for their comic-relief value. Among the passengers is a pistol-packing sports-star spouse played by American Idol champ Jordin Sparks, who sings the end-credits ditty, "I Wish We'd All Been Ready." Viewers will wish that director Vic Armstrong and scripters Paul Lalonde and John Patus had been ready, too.

The movie climaxes with Ray's attempt to land the plane, an utterly nontheological struggle. This section of the movie is adequately staged, if not exactly surprising. Its emphasis on real-world rather than supernatural threats is shrewd, but sooner or later the new Left Behind series will have to focus on its source's real agenda. At that point, the potential audience will evaporate faster than Chloe's kid brother.

• Cast & crew
• User reviews

Left Behind

A small group of survivors is left behind after millions of people suddenly vanish and the world is plunged into chaos and destruction. A small group of survivors is left behind after millions of people suddenly vanish and the world is plunged into chaos and destruction. A small group of survivors is left behind after millions of people suddenly vanish and the world is plunged into chaos and destruction.

• Vic Armstrong
• Paul Lalonde
• Nicolas Cage
• Lea Thompson
• Cassi Thomson
• 699 User reviews
• 173 Critic reviews
• 12 Metascore
• 5 nominations

Top cast 93

• Rayford Steele

• Irene Steele

• Chloe Steele

• Buck Williams

• Hattie Durham

• Shasta Carvell

• Dennis Beese

• Melvin Weir
• Venice Baxter
• (as Georgina Rawlings)

• (as Laura Swinney)

• Raymie Steele

• Pastor Bruce Barnes

• Chris Smith

• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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Did you know

• Trivia Nicolas Cage's brother Marc, who is a pastor, is a big fan of the novel and asked Cage to star in the movie as favor to him.
• Goofs Captain keeps saying he barely has fuel to go to JFK. However, there are at least five available airports on route NYC - London that are closer than JFK, Gander in Canada being the emergency airport on all transatlantic flights.

Hassid : [kicks the Midget Passenger down the escape slide]

• Alternate versions The UK release was cut, the distributor chose to reduce elements of stronger threat and violence in order to obtain a 12 classification. An uncut 15 classification was available.
• Connections Featured in Faithful Word Baptist Church: Left Behind Exposed (2014)

User reviews 699

When some other people walked out, we 'left behind' them..

• Oct 12, 2014
• How long is Left Behind? Powered by Alexa
• October 3, 2014 (United States)
• United States
• United Kingdom
• Official Facebook
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• Những Kẻ Sống Sót
• Baton Rouge, Louisiana, USA
• Stoney Lake Entertainment
• See more company credits at IMDbPro
• $16,000,000 (estimated)
• $14,019,924
• Oct 5, 2014
• $27,405,896
• Runtime 1 hour 50 minutes
• Dolby Digital
• Dolby Atmos
• 12-Track Digital Sound
• Dolby Surround 7.1
• D-Cinema 96kHz 7.1

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‘left behind’: film review.

A big-screen reboot of the direct-to-video, faith-based films based on the best-selling series by Jeffrey B. Jenkins and Tim LaHaye

By THR Staff

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The rapture won’t come soon enough for the unfortunate souls forced to suffer through Left Behind , the big-screen reboot of the direct-to-video, faith-based film series starring Kirk Cameron . Essentially playing like a spoof of ’70s-era disaster movies, this adaptation of the mega-selling books written by Jerry B. Jenkins and Tim LaHaye demonstrates that a bigger budget and a bigger star ( Nicolas Cage ) doesn’t necessarily make ridiculous material any more palatable.

After delivering its first Bible verse within the opening minutes, the film introduces us to its central characters: Rayford Steele (Cage), an airline pilot unhappy with his wife Irene’s ( Lea Thompson ) religiosity; his religion-skeptic daughter, Chloe ( Cassi Thomson ); and Buck Williams ( Chad Michael Murray ), a famous television news reporter who strikes up a flirtation with Chloe shortly before boarding her dad’s flight from NYC to London.

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Chloe has arrived from college to celebrate her father’s birthday, only to discover that he’s about to embark on a transatlantic flight. Exacerbating her anger is his apparent closeness with a sexy flight attendant who practically clings to him at the airport.

Read more   Faith-Based ‘Left Behind’ Books Returning to the Big Screen

Her suspicions are not unfounded, as Ray is indeed planning a dalliance with the comely blonde once they arrive in London, signaled by the U2 concert tickets he’s apparently arranged weeks in advance.

Not long into the flight, a bizarre event occurs. Numerous passengers, as well as a flight attendant and the co-pilot, mysteriously disappear, leaving behind only their clothes and personal belongings. We soon learn that the occurrence is happening across the globe, with millions of people miraculously vanishing, including Chloe’s mother and younger brother.

The film alternates between scenes taking place on the plane, with the left behind passengers understandably panicking, and Chloe desperately attempting to find her brother amid the ensuing chaos, which includes driverless cars and pilotless planes crashing all around her.

Read more   Satan is Promoting Nicolas Cage’s Newest Movie

Realizing that both the co-pilot and the flight attendant were devout Christians, Ray soon figures out that what’s occurring is the event which his wife has long been predicting, with only children and true believers falling under its aegis. When an errant airplane sans pilots clips his aircraft’s wing, he’s faced with the task of returning his plane to JFK Airport (played none too convincingly by one in Baton Rouge) safely even as his fuel supply dips perilously low, as if the film had somehow morphed into Airport 2014 .

Complicating his task is the motley assemblage of frantic passengers, including a devout Muslim (apparently only Christians get to go to heaven); the wife of an NFL quarterback who thinks that her husband has somehow engineered her daughter’s disappearance and begins waving a gun procured from a vanished air marshal; and an angry dwarf whose glowering outbursts seem mainly designed to provide comic relief. The only thing missing is Helen Reddy as a singing nun.

Meanwhile, Chloe, under the impression that her father’s plane has crashed, climbs to the top of a tower with the intention of doing herself in. But just as she’s about to jump she receives a cell phone call from her dad and Buck, who entrust her with finding a suitable place for the plane to land since all the nearby airports are closed. The plucky young woman goes about her task with incredible ingenuity, single-handedly clearing a debris-strewn highway and navigating the plane toward its destination with the handy compass app on her phone.

Awkwardly combining religious proselytizing with disaster-movie tropes, Left Behind , with its sub-par production values, howler-filled dialogue and terrible performances, fails miserably on every level. Cage, who in interviews has said he took the role at the urging of his pastor brother, seems virtually sedated throughout, even when his character is convinced that his plane is headed for certain doom.

The first entry of an intended franchise, the film only inspires hope that its creators will see the light before its sequels can be developed.

Production: Stoney Lake Entertainment Cast: Nicolas Cage, Chad Micheal Murray, Cassie Thomson, Nicky Whelan, Lea Thompson, Jordin Sparks Director: Vic Armstrong Screenwriter: Paul Lalonde, John Patus Producers: Ed Clydesdale, Paul Lalonde, Michael Walker Executive producers: Christopher Sean Brown, Bill Busbice Jr., Jason Hewitt, Willie Robertson, J. David Williams, R. Bryan Wright Director of photography: Jack N. Green Editor: Michael J. Duthie Production designer: Stephen Altman Costume designer: Abby O’Sullivan Composer: Jack Lenz Casting directors: Dean E. Fronk, Donald Paul Pemrick

Rated PG-13, 110 minutes

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Left Behind

Where to watch.

Watch Left Behind with a subscription on Prime Video.

Audience Reviews

Cast & crew.

Kirk Cameron

Buck Williams

Brad Johnson

Rayford Steele

Janaya Stephens

Chloe Steele

Clarence Gilyard

Bruce Barnes

Chaim Rosenzweig