Review: Pineapple Express

Judd Apatow and his gang of comedic misfits have revolutionized the comedy genre within the past few years bringing out such instant classics as 40 Year old Virgin, Knocked Up, and most notably, the comedy that spoke to a new generation of film goers, Super Bad.  And while Pineapple Express contains some of the same charm and clever vulgar dialogue of the teams past productions it lacks cohesiveness and suffers from a much longer run time than needed.  Part of the blessing and the problem with Pineapple Express is director David Gordon Green.  He is a director of small independent dramas such as George Washington and All the Real Girls which have been instant hits with critics.  By bringing him onto this stoner buddy comedy the film gains a touch of class and at times realism.  But Green doesn't know how to counterbalance the stoner comedy aspect with the more outrageous elements in the film and with the constant switch back and forth from realistic situations to pure ridiculousness, it gets hard to handle.  The problem isn'tthat Green isn't a talented director, the problem is this is his first foray into this type of film and you can feel him floundering a bit.  He lets takes run on too long and lets the boys on screen indulge a bit too much in their high as a kite antics.  What he does do surprisingly well for someone who has no experience in this area is stage hilariously violent and over the top action sequences.  I'm assuming he either had an expert DP who knew how to shoot this shit on the set, or he spent a long hard time doing some studying and drawing up lots of storyboards (further investigation shows that the DP was Tim Orr who also has little to no experience shooting action).  But the action never feels staged, until the ending violent fight scene, in fact much of the time it feels sporadic and chaotic which only adds to the hilarity. 

Seth Rogen is a great comedic actor and though his work here is not half as honest as it was in Knocked Up, he is still able to make even the most outrageous situation seem plausible.  He's a great comic everyday guy and he is someone that is easy to relate to, plus his verbal skills onscreen always come through.  He's a lovable stoner, plain and simple.  The other leading man in the film is James Franco as the drug dealing Saul. Franco is a mixed bag in the film.   At times he is spot on with his characterization of a constantly high dope dealer.  But other times he gets a little self indulgent and that's when the picture starts to sag is when we have to sit through countless pot influenced conversations and antics that really lead nowhere.  It easily could have been a much more streamlined and cohesive picture if a good ten to fifteen minutes of unnecessary pot influenced scenes could have been taken out.  I'm sure pot lovers wont mind it much, but for an everyday audience member it gets old. I'm around pot smokers all the time and if I grow tired of them in real life, god knows I'm not going to be able to sit in a theater watching them act like retards when there is a plot I want to get to.  

And that's the other thing with Pineapple Express... there really isn't much plot which is why the film is filled with so much fluff.  It's essentially a chase picture with some interesting side characters.  But really that's all fine because it is an entertaining chase picture.  There are sequences in this film that had me laughing harder than perhaps I ever have, but then there were also scenes in equal measure that just had me shaking my head.  Pineapple Express is an uneven film, but it is funnier than almost anything else to come out this year and it is a welcome distraction after the heaviness that was The Dark Knight.  I recommend the film, but with some reservations.  This is definitely on the lower end of the Apatow comedy group's films, but it still worth a look if you need a good hearty laugh or two... or ten.