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Not surprising: Seth Rogen, Jonah Hill, James Franco, Jay Baruchel, and other raunchy comedy standbys starring in a movie together.

The surprise comes when you run an eye down the cast list of the movie 鈥淭his Is the End鈥� and see the roles they're playing. Seth Rogen: playing Seth Rogen. Jonah Hill: Playing Jonah Hill. James Franco鈥� well, you get the idea.

鈥淭his Is the End鈥� follows a group of friends 鈥� the movie stars that you already know well from Judd Apatow-directed movies such as 鈥淪uperbad鈥� and 鈥淜nocked Up,鈥� as well as other films 鈥� as they suddenly find themselves in the midst of apocalyptic events. But, as noted above, all the movie stars are playing themselves, albeit fictionalized versions of themselves. Sort of.

Seth Rogen told the website Screen Rant that while the actors play themselves in exaggerated ways or do things they wouldn鈥檛 do in real life, much of the dialogue was improvised by the actors, who have become very good at needling each other offscreen.

鈥淚t鈥檚 so silly to have all these guys in a movie together and not let them riff off each other,鈥� Rogen said of letting the actors improvise. 鈥淵ou know, that was always our plan.鈥�

During the film, the actors get slammed by their peers for a movie that failed at the box office or a certain part of their public persona.聽

Is it an unusual film idea? Definitely. So far, reviews have been mixed. Variety writer Justin Chang said the movie is mostly entertaining.

鈥淭his directing debut for co-writers Rogen and Evan Goldberg offsets its slightly smug premise with a clever sense of self-parody and near-cataclysmic levels of vulgarity,鈥� Chang wrote.

Entertainment Weekly writer Owen Gleiberman loved the film, giving it an A grade.

鈥淵ou could sit through a year's worth of Hollywood comedies and still not see anything that's genuinely knock-your-socks-off audacious,鈥� Gleiberman said of the film. 鈥淏ut 'This Is the End' truly is. It's the wildest screen comedy in a long time, and also the smartest, the most fearlessly inspired, and the snort-out-loud funniest.鈥澛�

Others were less impressed 鈥� Todd McCarthy of the Hollywood Reporter called the film 鈥渦nlikable but weirdly compelling鈥� but noted that the unique premise may be enough to fill theater seats.

鈥淲ith everyone here officially playing themselves, the result is like a giant home movie and a reality horror show, different enough from anything that's come before to score with young audiences,鈥� he wrote.