Continuing on in my quest to try and catch all of these summer comedies, I got a chance to see the latest from the Apatow factory; Pineapple Express. You'll forgive me though if my details and review are a little thin as I saw this last Sunday and my memory may be a little fuzzy. The premise for this comedy is about a process server named Dale who enjoy a little herb. While partaking in his favorite activity, he accidently witnesses a murder. The killer (played by Gary Cole) finds out who he is and chases Dale and his pot dealer (James Franco) trying to off them as well.
For a while, this follows along like most stoner comedies. As I watched it, I found some part to be very funny, but I also got the distinct feeling that there was an additional level of humor that I was missing out on by not being a pothead myself. This has been true of Harold and Kumar, Dude Where's My Car, and any other film from this genre. I can accept that and even appreciate it on a certain level. I know that there are a lot of people who don't 'get' the dry, subtle humor of a show like Arrested Development. Comedy certainly isn't universal, so we should accept all forms of humor. It's just that I may not rate those comedies as high as I would others.
Unfortunately for this film, though, it abandons that laid-back comedy styling and morphs into a violent action picture about half-way through. And when I say violent, I mean violent. The final scene becomes a shoot-out between all characters with everyone firing guns at each other with reckless abandon. Now I'm not some prude who can't take violence, but it just seemed unsettling and out-of-place here. It was the equivalent of watching a kids movie and halfway through seeing the kids begin to discuss the latest advancements of astrophysics.
Speaking of kids, young people have a bizarre presence within this film. There's one scene involving Dale and Saul (Franco) selling weed to junior high kids. And there's also a subplot involving Dale dating a high school girl and getting her involved in his mess. Both scenes, in theory, could have been used for laughs, but for the most part, they are played pretty straight, which ends up making them a little bit more unsettling. Dale's relationship with his high school girlfriend is particularly bizarre because there's absolutely no closure to that subplot. It makes you wonder what it's purpose in the film was.
In fact, for a lot of the film I began to wonder why they chose the direction they did with the story. The violence, the high school girlfriend, the nonsequitar scenes, none of it made much sense. The best I could surmise is that all of it seemed self-indulgent. These guys wanted to make the type of movie kids want to make when they are in high school or stoners want to make sitting on their couch eating FunYuns. I'd imagine that in every pothead lies an action hero waiting to burst out, if only they had the energy to do so. And every burnout thinks they can still attract hot young blonds.
On one hand, I can't completely fault them. Guys like Apatow and Seth Rogen have earned enough goodwill that they can be allowed to do something for themselves every once in a while. It's like Jim Carrey doing drama. Sure the movies typically aren't good, but you can't blame a guy for wanting to occassionally dream that he can still be a legitimate actor. Likewise, Seth Rogen is never going to be cast in roles meant for The Rock or Vin Diesel. So he went out and put himself in one. That's fine, it just didn't necessarily make for an enjoyable time at the movies for myself.
The sad thing is that one little fix could have made things a lot better. I think if at the end of the film it would have been revealed that everything we just saw was all in Dale and Saul's minds as a result of being completely baked, I think I could have tolerated it a lot more. And they certainly had a couple of opportunities at the end of the film to do so and didn't. Some may argue that ending the film that way would be a copout, but because everything before it was so over the top and unrealistic, I felt it would have been justified. Who knows, maybe that'll be an alternative ending on the DVD.
The one bright spot in the film is James Franco's performance as pot dealer Saul. He's able to rise above the dark tone of this film and deliver a fun performance. He finds a good balance of portraying a realistic pothead without venturing into stereotypes. I think I would have rather just had 90 minutes of watching him sit on the couch and watch a 227 marathon.
Pineapple Express does contain some decent laughs, particularly in the first half of the film. And if you come in expecting a violent action movie, then perhaps the second half will seem tolerably. But for me, this didn't do much. I just hope Rogen and co. got their jollies out with this film and can go back to producing the high quality comedy that we've come to know and love from them in the near future. Grade: C
No comments:
Post a Comment