The Rapture 1991

Sharon, Mimi Rogers, a young Los Angeles woman, leads a swinging, libidinous lifestyle. She comes into contact with an unnamed Christian sect that believes the Rapture is imminent based on the strange dreams experienced by congregants, interpreted as signs of the end times.

Over time, Sharon accepts this belief and becomes a born-again Christian. She starts living a pious life, eventually marrying and having a daughter named Mary, Kimberly Cullum. When her husband Randy, David Duchovny, is killed in a senseless murder, she begins to question the benevolence of God and wonders why such cruelty exists in a world she once trusted.

She believes God has called her to go to the desert to wait for the Rapture, and instead of leaving her daughter safely with friends, she decides Mary must come with her. Foster, Will Patton, a police officer, is concerned for their well-being after they are reduced to stealing food while they wait, but Sharon remains insistent that the end is near and that every moment brings them closer to judgment and salvation.

Sharon’s resolve deepens into despair, and at her daughter’s urging she decides to hasten their ascent to Heaven. She shoots Mary, a terrible act that shatters any easy sense of benevolence in her beliefs, yet she cannot bring herself to take her own life, fearing condemnation for suicide. She confesses to Foster what she has done and is jailed, a stark consequence for the choices she has made.

The Rapture finally arrives after an apparition of Mary appears at night, accompanied by two angels. The following day, as Sharon sits in her cell, a loud trumpet blasts across the world, signaling the start of the Rapture. Sharon and Foster, now driving out into the desert together, are suddenly pulled into a purgatory-like landscape where the rules of life above seem to fade.

Foster, formerly an atheist, is granted entrance to Heaven, while Sharon remains unable to renounce her anger at God for Mary’s death. Mary pleads with her to accept God back into her heart so she can join her and Randy in Heaven, but Sharon chooses isolation in the purgatorial expanse, rejecting reconciliation and remaining alone for eternity.