First, I’d like to announce an upcoming surprise that will lead off my next article, hopefully within ten days. I’m saving it for then because that will feature a big movie. Spoilers for this movie, which won’t really matter. Back when Pineapple Express came out in 2008, I saw a clip where Dale and Saul, played by Seth Rogen and James Franco and I’m sticking with those names, are in a car chase. Rogen yells at Franco to drive faster, but he can’t see through the slushie covering the windshield. In desperation, he kicks a hole through it and yells in pain. We then cut to an overhead shot of a speeding car with Franco’s foot sticking out. And I laughed for a solid 5-10 seconds. That’s an eternity of laughing, and it’s really all you can ask from a comedy.
But I’ve discussed two other comedies that made me heartily laugh at least once, and I ended up not liking the Tenacious D and Austin Powers 3 movies. Though I did like that comedy I featured in comments once, Safety Not Guaranteed. Plus, there are a number of other movies I watched before they left Netflix, but hadn’t started writing these. I’ll list them in the comments below, and some excellent comedies are included. Pineapple Express does feature the team behind the very successful Superbad: writers Rogen and Evan Goldberg, and producer Judd Apatow. And an ace in the hole, acclaimed indy director David Gordon Green making his comedic debut.
Green confidently opens the film with an intriguing black and white scene. A lone old-timey car drives up to a hidden underground base. Military brass are there to observe a test subject who partook of the mysterious Item 9. I thought about opening with a gif of Rogen and Franco together, but those two are hit-or-miss. Everything Bill Hader has done has impressed me, up to and including banging Anna Kendrick for a year without needing to brag about it. I even liked The Californians. Hader is hilariously disrespectful, so the general shuts down the project (offscreen, you hear a friendly “I like that gun!” *bang*) and phones in his verdict: weed is illegal. Of course, we all know that’s not how things actually went down. In real life, the Nixon administration simply jacked up penalties for pot smoking to persecute blacks and hippies.
Now the writing ... okay, I looked up the original script and I didn’t recognize a bunch of dialogue. So I found a transcript, and even after two scenes, I found so many differences that I just closed the tab with the original. It’s an Apatow project, so you have to be ready for lots of rambling improv. This raises a couple red flags. One, much as I love Whose Line Is It Anyway, improv can get super unfunny and then stay that way for a while. Two, I’m a staunch advocate of movie comedies sticking to a running time of 90 minutes or so. Pineapple Express goes at least 15 minutes over that. Also, I have no great love for dumb weed comedy. Can this movie succeed despite these potential problems? Yes, and it starts with the Rogen/Franco relationship.
Rogen stretches his acting muscles to play a lazy stoner. While calling into a radio show all “Legalize it!”, he complains about the need to score from a dealer. Instead of quoting dialogue, I’ll turn things over to John Mulaney, for a bit that might have been inspired by this film and surely not John’s personal life: I more feel bad for weed dealers ’cause they’re about to find out that we only showed them a certain amount of politeness because they had an illegal product. And we don’t show that same politeness to people who deliver legal products. Like, when the Chinese food delivery guy comes, we don’t let him hang out after he’s delivered the Chinese food. And we don’t look the other way when he says weird shit to the girls we’re hanging out with… to try to preserve the relationship. And we definitely don’t give him some of the Chinese food. He’s never like, “Hey, can I get in on those dumplings?” And we’re like, “Yeah, we’re all friends.”
So now Rogen is at his dealer’s place, and he just wants to get his shit and go. No, Franco, he doesn’t want to watch ‘70s shows with you on old televisions. All right, he’ll try that amazing new strain that smells like God’s vagina. But only a few puffs from your triple-armed super bong, then he’s gotta go. Rogen would actually rather do his process server job than hang out with Franco; that’s how annoying he finds his dealer. He should have stayed and smoked. The Ted Jones that will get served is a ruthless, crazy drug lord. Of course Rogen witnesses a gangland murder. Naturally the roach he tosses is the rare Pineapple Express. Can it be traced back to him through Franco? Since Rogen doesn’t know he’s in a movie also called Pineapple Express, he has to run back to Franco to find out.
And so Rogen and Franco are on the run. Their combination of fear, stupidity, and natural state of being high makes this quite a trip. But the stereotypical paranoia that comes with smoking weed somehow keeps them alive. Henchmen crashed Franco’s pad not long after their panicked flight. While out in the woods, they freak out about phone tracing and proceed to destroy their cells in the dumbest ways imaginable. The crooked cop on Ted’s payroll who tracked their phones can’t believe what they did. Rogen stops by his girlfriend’s house to warn her and the parents that they’re all in danger, so check into a hotel under an alias. And don’t you worry about her still being in high school, okay? She’s 18 and mature (when compared to Rogen). The meet-the-boyfriend meal is still warm when the henches arrive. Through all this, Rogen and Franco bicker, bond, say things that can’t be unsaid, and finally reunite and declare their undying stoned bro love for each other.
Ultimately, this movie wins me over with its combination of ragged humor and over-the-top violence. After the movie, I honestly couldn’t remember that many funny jokes or lines. I just remembered smiling and laughing throughout the movie. Then I reread the transcript and it started all over again. The violence isn’t even that graphic, but its effects counteract the stoner vibes. Rogen and Franco survive through the grace of plot armor, but their bitching and moaning about their pain leaves an impression. Fellow drug dealer Danny McBride should be dead several times over, leaving behind a bloody, mangled corpse. And this is before the climactic fight in the same underground base/marijuana farm the movie started in. Thugs, guns, stoned everymen, bombs, cops, speeding cars, Asians speaking in subtitles, all converge for a glorious battle amongst the sweetest weed known to man. At the end, Rogen, Franco, and McBride breakfast and reminisce about their adventures. Then remember that they need to get to the hospital before they’re left permanently disfigured/dead.
Thoughts:
- The two perfectly-cast henchmen are played by Craig Robinson and Kevin Corrigan, both excellent comic actors who have great chemistry with everyone and also the needed hint of danger. Corrigan has gone from brutal goon to just wanting to get home to dinner with his wife, and Robinson is genuinely hurt by this change in his partner. It plays out like its own troubled marriage and does not end well.
- The dialogue for the Asians might be considered offensive, but “War is upon you! Prepare to suck the cock of karma!” is just a fantastic battle cry when you’re on a quest for vengeance.
- Bryan Cranston was considered for the role of Ted Jones, but Apatow didn’t think he could play an evil, scary drug lord. And then Breaking Bad goes and premieres months before this movie comes out. Still, I think this was a good call. Cranston would have been fine enough, and funny too. But Breaking Bad’s power came from Cranston’s long transformation from meek, beaten-down man to a monster. A villain role in a stoner movie couldn’t compare.
- Rogen and Franco’s paranoia serves them well, but Ted Jones goes the opposite way. Through a bunch of coincidences, his crazed mind gets the idea that he’s up against a professional assassin hired by the Asians, who’s also a master of disguise. He thought this of Seth Rogen! Yeah, that Seth Rogen!
- Look, Rogen, I know you were frustrated by that hot, charming high-schooler who flirted with your girlfriend. He’s obviously going to nail her in college next year, whether or not you’re still dating, and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it. But there is no excuse for saying “Fuck Jeff Goldblum.”
- Ed Begley Jr. plays the girlfriend’s father, and now whenever I see him, I wonder if I was the only one who thought he played that douche Kent in the great film, Real Genius. I mean, I spent decades convinced this happened. Anyone else?
- Rosie Perez blows Amber Heard away in this movie. I don’t mean like when her crooked cop shoots a bystander in the arm and speeds away with a quick “Sorry!” I’m talking sex appeal, despite a 20 year age difference.
Next up is ... a big one. This movie is so big, I upgraded my Netflix plan for a month so I could fully experience it in 4K Ultra HD. There is no price I won’t pay to satisfy my beloved readers!*
*maximum of $10
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