After millions of people all over the earth mysteriously disappear, the world turns to a charismatic man to lead them, the new president of the U.N. (Gordon Currie). A small band of believers in Chicago recognize him as the Antichrist and work together as the "Tribulation Force" to save as many as they can. The group includes a renowned reporter (Kirk Cameron),a formidable pilot (Brad Johnson),his daughter (Janaya Stephens) and the pastor of their assembly (Clarence Gilyard Jr.).

Released in 2002, "Left Behind II: Tribulation Force" is the follow-up to "Left Behind" (2000) with the same cast, which was remade in 2014 with a bigger budget and truncated plot.

The story is based on prophetic accounts of end-time events from the Bible, e.g. the "Rapture" based on scriptures like 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 and Luke 17:24,34-35. Of course the Left Behind series is a fictional story and you don't have to believe in the Bible whatsoever to enjoy the movie for what it is, a "What if the Rapture really happened" mystery/drama/thriller. I don't believe in powerful androids that time-travel from the future, but that doesn't prevent me from enjoying the Terminator flicks.

This sequel cost a little less than the 2000 film ($3.8 million) and is less busy story-wise. It has the confidence to take its time with convincing acting in challenging roles. I read the book and wondered how it could be made into a compelling movie because it's more dramatic than the first one; in other words, there's far less thrills until the last act, not to mention a considerable romantic subplot. The screenwriters did a great job of cutting out the fat and strategically adding some well-done evangelical bits, which aren't overdone. The apocalyptic ending of the book was obviously omitted because it would've added 20-30 minutes to the runtime and would've cost significantly more. The filmmakers did a good job of finding the right place to close.

Being shot in Toronto, I was wondering how they would pull off the Jerusalem sequences at the end, but they did a splendid job with the studio sets, particularly considering this is a low-budget flick.

The film runs 1 hour, 34 minutes. ADDITIONAL CAST includes Krista Bridges as the journalist's assistant and Chelsea Noble (Cameron's wife) as a flight attendant working for the Antichrist.

GRADE: B

The change of director and obviously higher budget did not harmed this film. However nothing really interesting is ever happening within this movie, which makes it for most part a quite boring one.

The movie basically starts of were the first movie stopped. At first I had hopes that this movie would show some more of the chaos that the world would be in, as often got talked about in the first movie and also in this movie as well but it remains an odd sight to see everyone going about their usual stuff when hundreds of millions of people had disappeared, including all the children of the world. I mean, literally everybody has lost some loved ones but no one seems concerned or angered about this. Guess the world just looks better when you belief in God...

All, well most, of the characters and actors from the first movie reappear in this one as well. They obviously star in this movie because of their religion and their faith in the project and strong believes that this movie could reach out to people. Well atheist will probably mostly laugh at this movie, while believers are being treated upon a pretty dull movie, with still some redeeming elements for them in it.

The story seemed liked it had some potential in it but yet they managed to not make the best of it. Why not just make this movie a bit more thriller and exciting like just for the cinematic value of it all. Guess the series works out better in its book form.

For most part too boring to consider this movie watchable enough but still it isn't as laughable as the first movie.

5/10

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The quartet of believers from the first Left Behind film are back again as the Tribulation Force. This is the name that Kirk Cameron, Brad Johnson, Janaya Stephens, and Clarence Gilyard have taken for themselves. Their mission is to frustrate the plans of the UN Secretary General, Carpathy who they see as the anti-Christ and to speed along the events spoken of in revelation.

This film concerns the two witnesses who appear at the sight of Solomon's second temple, looking very much like ancient prophets of old. It is my understanding that they are normally identified as Enoch and Elijah who according to the Old Testament God took to heaven without either of them going through death.

I don't think it's any accident that the Left Behind series bears a very intentional resemblance to the Star Wars Trilogy. It certainly is being marketed that way.

Brad and Kirk with no little subterfuge take on the job of making sure the message of the two witnesses gets broadcast to the world as Revelations says it would. Of course they get a bit of help from Elijah and Enoch when the two of them do a Godzilla number on the troops commanded by Carpathy.

As in the first Left Behind film, the best job is done by Gordon Currie as Carpathy.

Will it in fact be a trilogy, the third film is already out and I've not seen it.

As in the first film the view of any kind of internationalism is some how Satanic is if anything more prevalent here.

Islam frowns on the photographing of the human image. Otherwise they might be competing with Christianity with a film that supports their view of an Apocalypse that ends with the triumph of that faith. I don't think financing would be a problem.