Pineapple Express certainly accomplished one thing – it launched M.I.A, and “Paper Planes” from obscurity to an annoying frequency of popularity. It’s on every channel on the dial, all day, everyday. Don’t get me wrong… It’s an OK track. The pulsing bass really sounds great in a quality pair of headphones. The trouble is… its just OK.
But this isn’t a music review, and you know Pineapple Express is in trouble when a ONE HARSH CRITIC review kicks off with a rant about a song that scores the trailer (I didn’t even hear it in the film). But that’s the problem with this movie – that song is about all I took away from it.
OK... That's kind of HARSH.
Pineapple Express is the story of two loser potheads (is that redundant?), who flee from a mobster, drug lord who wants to kill them. The film gets its name from marijuana harvested from a certain type of plantthat is mixed with Columbian soil and tropical crosswinds (or something like that). Its rare, and easy to trace. So when subpoena server Dale Denton (Seth Rogan) witnesses the mob lord, Ted Jones (Gary Cole), whack a man in his well-lit living room, he drops a joint rolled from the mob lord’s “pineapplee xpress”. Unlucky for Denton, this particular weed is only sold to one dealer – Saul Silver (James Franco).
The rest is history. Denton runs directly from the scene of the crime to his only friend and dealer, Saul Silver. Jones, tracking the weed from Denton’s joint, rushes to his buyer – Saul Silver. And mayhem ensues.
The film ends in a strange X-Files super agent shoot out, which is not only completely out of the blue, but is an action sequence that really doesn't belong. It's as if these filmmakers suddenly decided that the pot plot got boring (which it did), so a Segal style action segment would liven things up (which it does). But, it makes little sense.
Amazed that this simple plot can be a feature length film? Iwasn’t, but after watching it, I wish is was the length of an SNL skit. It’s OK, but just OK. The jokes don’t always hit, and the pacing allows plenty of time to reflect on bad lines. Laughs are more internal chucklings, and even that doesn’t come often enough. Certainly disappointing.
But here’s the good news…
Seth Rogan and James Franco really embody their charactersas a subpoena sever and pot dealer respectively. You go into this expecting Rogan to be Rogan (a good thing) and he is, but the surprise here is Franco’s 90’s throwback. If this wasn’t method acting, Franco is the greatest performer ever. He musters up every nuance of a chronic chronic smoker from red eyelids to profound thinking. Both of these gentlemen are funny off and on.
Basically, the best parts of Pineapple Express are in thetrailer. But be careful if you watch it as you’re sure to get a certain song embedded in your brain like a bad hangover.
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Josh Gloer, Movie Correspondent
You can find Josh's column One Harsh Critic, published everyother Sunday. Tuesday, Wednesday… Who can tell at thispoint? at http://oneharshcritic.gather.com.
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