These Final Hours is a movie about what people would do if there were only a few hours left before the end of the world–so naturally it starts with a sex scene. Shortly after the sex, there’s a healthy dose of drug and alcohol use. Having gotten the important things out of the way, James (played by Nathan Phillips) begins his journey of figuring out just what the hell it is he wants to do before the world engulfs him in a fiery maelstrom. The concept sounds incredibly shallow, but the ensuing self-revelations are surprisingly deep, even if they lack potency.

We learn pretty early on that James is a bit of a coward and a screwup. Fearful of the pain that will accompany the end of the world, James tells his mistress Zoe (Jessica de Gouw) that he’s going to spend his final hours on Earth getting mind-numbingly drunk with his real girlfriend at a massive rave. Who knows, maybe he’s also decided it’s bad luck to be caught at the end of the world cheating on your girlfriend. Whatever the reason, James hops in his car and heads for the party to end all parties. Swigging from his bottle of cheap liquor as he cruises down the highway, James witnesses people fighting in empty parking lots, an unfortunate looking couple fucking in an alleyway, and an abandoned car on fire in the middle of the road. Since the movie is set in Perth, Australia, it would be reasonable to assume this is all part of just another normal Tuesday. Thankfully, we have the narrator guy on the radio informing us that a giant meteor has just smashed into the North Atlantic ocean and there’s only 12 hours to live.

On his way to the rave, James saves a little girl named Rose (Angourie Rice) from two men that are preparing to rape her. It turns out Rose has been separated from her father and needs help finding him. James declines, but promises to take her somewhere safer than the rape dungeon she’s locked up in. And so begins the great 12 hour journey of our unlikely couple.

Throughout These Final Hours, James is confronted with the suicide of his sister, a cop trying to do the right thing by killing his wife and two daughters so they don’t have to suffer, an unlucky guy getting chopped up by an psychopath with a machete, a giant drug fueled orgy, and a not so great girlfriend that’s really scared of dying and really drunk (which is usually a bad combination).

The truth is, the situations that James encounters during this film are ones that should be emotionally gripping. I desperately wanted to feel the panic of James as he frantically drives from place to place, trying to find solace and purpose in the final hours of his life. I wanted to care when he visits his estranged mother one last time (who, fun fact, is literally the only person in the film that doesn’t do drugs. Instead she opts for a puzzle. And yes, this means even poor little Rose pops some pills). I wanted to be heartbroken for Rose when she finally locates her father only to learn he has already committed suicide. I wanted my pulse to race with anxiety at the prospect of James not making it back to his one true love in time (apparently he loved his pregnant concubine, Zoe, all along!) sprinting down the highway after his car breaks down, racing against the final ticking moments of Earth’s existence as the ground shakes and the skies darken. I wanted to get goosebumps when he finally finds her on the beach, holds her, professes his love for her, and the two embrace as the massive fiery cloud overtakes them.

But I didn’t. And I don’t know why.

Don’t get me wrong, this movie asks some very important questions like “what gives us purpose in life?” and “does anything really matter if we’re all going to die in the end?” I found myself nearly agreeing with James when he yells at his Zoe for telling him she’s pregnant “It doesn’t even matter!” he screams, which is kind of true isn’t it? I wish the movie had forced me to confront these thoughts. Instead I saw them lingering there in front of me before quickly fading away. For some reason, the film just didn’t take hold of me enough.

So what’s missing here? My soul? For starters, I couldn’t get over how miserable Perth looked. I mean it looked really, really miserable, even by incoming apocalypse standards. The strongest emotion I felt throughout the whole film was disgust for just how damn uncomfortably hot everyone looked. I think I actually started sweating out of sympathy for the characters. The blinding yellow haze of the Perthian (?) sun, the heavy dust-filled air, the annoying flies zipping around everyone’s faces, the sweat stained wife beaters and thongs (yes, those kind)– it all made me want to sit in front of a fan. To be fair, this was obviously done on purpose by the director (Zak Hilditch), but it was like trying to listen to a poem while watching a video of someone’s teeth being removed. I was too distracted by what I was seeing to focus on the message.

I think another problem is that most of the shots just weren’t very engaging. There are only two that stood out to me. I’ll upload them when I can get a hold of them. Having just watched Spring, which felt like every shot was straight out of a travel channel documentary, These Final Hours just made me shrug. I was never truly brought into this near-apocalyptic world.

I can’t decide if any of this is the actor’s faults. I’m pretty sure Nathan Phillips and Angourie Rice did a fine job for the most part. But their emotions felt forced because the rest of the movie didn’t make me care about any of what they were experiencing.

There’s a remake scheduled for US release, but I don’t have my hopes up for it. The movie didn’t fail because of a lack of money, special effects or any of that fancy stuff that I’m sure will be added to the US version. This movie didn’t work because it just failed to make me care– and maybe that’s one of those weird intangibles. I guess it’s worth seeing, especially cause it’s on Netflix Streaming. Maybe if I saw it again, I’d like it more. But tonight it just wasn’t my cup of tea.

I give it 2 out of 5 things.

What do you think? Did These Final Hours connect with you?