PINEAPPLE EXPRESS

Fast Times at RidgemontHigh makes me laugh. However, I have quite a few friends and workmates who smoke pot on a regular or daily basis, so I am quite familiar with the lifestyle and lingo. After all of these years of observation or participation, I can say quite clearly that pot is a gentle and relatively harmless drug. Besides a little forgetfulness, I cannot think of one way that pot has ever hurt anyone. Contrast that with alcohol, which kills thousands of people every year via accidents or health deterioration. If you want to kick back, relax, and enjoy a nice buzz, pot is probably the best way to do it. Which is precisely what makes the new Judd Apatow stoner film The Pineapple Express so frustratingly off. The film, which stars Seth Rogen and James Franco, wants to capture that spirirt of freedom and bliss, but instead devolves into a violent bloodbath that betrays pot's simple pleasures. Rogen plays Dale Denton, a process server with a serious marijuana habit. He spends his days serving court summons to unsuspecting victims while smoking copious amounts of weed between customers. He buys his shit from Saul Silver (Franco), a perpetually stoned goofball with a heart of gold. One night while out serving a summons and smoking a special brand of pot Saul calls Pineapple Express, Dale witnesses a murder. Soon, the murderer and his peculiar band of drug cronies trace the Pineapple Express back to Dale and Saul, and the chase is on. The acting - an especially important part of a film like this - is uniformly excellent. Rogen manages to make Dale likeable, no small feat since Dale is a pot-smoking, uninspired loser with an 18 year-old high school girlfriend. Danny McBride, long squandered in minor film roles, breaks out as the curious pot dealer Red; he is hilarious in several standout scenes. But the big winner here is Franco, who is revelatory in an inspired comedic turn as Saul. Franco has built a career out of being the good-looking hunk, but in this movie he uses perfect comic timing and his expressive eyes to imbue Saul with warmth and heart. His bonding scenes with Rogen are easy and unforced, allowing both actors the chance to shine. In a summer filled with some brilliant performances, it would be a shame to see Franco's work in this movie go unrecognized. He is the best reason to see this film. Unfortunately, the film takes a series of incredibly violent turns throughout that destroy any sense of timing or tone. The script, written by Rogen and his Superbad writing partner Evan Goldberg, drastically miscalculates the amount of sadism needed for a summer stoner comedy. Added to this inappropriate mayhem is director David Gordon Green's terrible choice to film it all like it was a drama rather than a comedy, which leaves some of the more violent scenes with a nasty aftertaste. These are characters who are easy to love, and then the last half of the movie forces us to watch them get beaten up and shot repeatedly. It's like going to Grandma's house for Christmas dinner, and then watching everyone in attendance get decapitated. It's jarring, unexpected, and inappropriate. We should want to party with these characters, not go to war with them. And that, intrinsically, is the failure of The Pineapple Express. It forgets that people who get stoned just want to kick back and have a good time. Instead, the film tries too hard to be the direct opposite. Despite a few brilliant performances and some quirky charm, The Pineapple Express is a bad hit.

rating: 2.5