This ad in The New York Times makes me unreasonably, but not unaccountably, happy. Who would have thought, only a year or so ago, that a major studio summer picture could be promoted with those (half-) faces and last names?
Rogen. Franco.
Like: Pacino. De Niro. Or: DiCaprio. Crowe.
What more do you really need to say? The title will be a mystery to most people until they see the movie, but it should already be clear to everyone by now that "Pineapple Express" is the greatest movie ever made.
Oh, come on. That's the whole (unspoken) idea of "Pineapple Express" -- which belongs in the company of such works as "Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle" and the entire oeuvre of Quentin Tarantino. How? Well...
(Don't read any further if you want to discover the movie's concept yourself. Just know that my three favorite comedies of the year are "In Bruges," "Pineapple Express" and HBO's "Generation Kill," which is a comedy in the sense that Joseph Heller's "Catch-22" and William Faulkner's "As I Lay Dying" and Stanley Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove" are comedies.)
Tarantino's movies are, above all else, about one thing: What if?
As in: If I, Quentin, were watching a movie, what would I really want to see? What would be the coolest things that I could recreate (call it an hommage), or improve upon, or put in a new context, or turn upside down and inside out? They're movies dreamed by video-store clerks who are destined to become acclaimed directors.
"Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle" chronicles the quest of the titular pair to satisfy their munchies at the Holy Grail of burger joints. (Because there's no In-'N-Out on the East coast, a sad indication of the area's cultural inferiority.) It is a stoner's nightmare, and a stoner's wet-dream (in the sense that most dreams -- whether nightmares or fantasy-fulfillments -- seem to involve an element of delay or frustration before the payoff).
"Pineapple Express" is the movie that Rogen and Franco's characters, process server Dale Denton and dope dealer Saul Silver, would have hazily brainstormed while sitting on Saul's couch, smoking a fattie. Pot-fueled from start to finish, it's appropriately goofy, ecstatic and paranoid. It's the movie that... I forgot what I was going to say. No, it's like that one Godard quote again, from the movie about guys and chicks: "Pineapple Express" is the movie they want to make and secretly want to live. And not even secretly.
So, it's an action movie, a cop movie, a gangster movie, a chase movie, a conspiracy movie, a drug-deal-gone-bad movie, a Ninja movie, a bromance, a hot high-school girlfriend movie (is that a kind of movie?), a Tarantino movie, a Jackie Chan movie, a Judd Apatow movie... All it's missing, really, is R-rated T&A, but they may have been too stoned and forgot before it got to that part. Then it culminates with a breakfast scene. Is there anything greater than a big, greasy breakfast after a big night out, when you can recount and embellish everything you did the night before, shaping and solidifying it into personal legend? You were the heroes, remember? But you were also total f-ups, but it was hilarious, and you somehow squeezed out of it. And you swear to be blood brothers for the rest of your lives. And then your grey-haired Bubby (is there any other kind?) shows up to give you a ride home. I'm starting to tear up now.
Best of all, the whole conceit is never explicitly acknowledged in the movie. There's no cut back to the guys who've fallen asleep stoned on the couch in front of the TV, waking up and realizing that they've spun the entire thing in a delirious Pineapple haze. It's just there, and you know it, because you can see it right in front of your face.
Maybe I said this before, but you know how certain bands or certain songs -- maybe the Stones doing "Monkey Man," the Pixies doing "Debaser," the Replacements doing "Can't Hardly Wait," Nirvana doing "Lithium," Outkast doing "Hey Ya," the B-52s doing "Rock Lobster," whatever hits you at a particular time and place -- can be the best band and the best song in the world right then and there? While I was watching "Pineapple Express," I wanted to believe that it was the greatest movie ever made, if only to justify to myself how hard I was laughing, and it didn't matter if I knew it wasn't because, for those moments of course, it was.
P.S. Franco gets an Oscar nomination or the whole thing is a farce.
Jim,
I too loved PINEAPPLE EXPRESS in absurd proportions. I'm glad to see it getting critical love.
And I hope you're serious about Franco's Oscar nom. I'm so glad he finally has a role that lets him shine like this, and doesn't want him acting all angst-y and faux-serious. ...God, how I lament the loss of Freaks and Geeks all those years ago.
P.S. - I think this is totally a movie that has to hit you at the right moment. If I hadn't been in the mood for it, I probably would have liked it a bit less. Until I saw it again, of course, in the right mood.
Is it still clever if it so happens that this "concept" is what actually happened? Ie., Rogan and company actually were sitting around smoking pot when they came up with the movie? Because according to interviews, that's pretty much exactly the case.
I saw Pineapple Express months ago at a preview screening, and although I mostly enjoyed it while it was happening, I ended up not liking it for a number of pretty glaring flaws.
One of which was that, although in theory a drug-slash-action movie is pretty cool, they did the "action" part very badly. The bad guy was bland and underwritten, the violence wasn't funny, and particularly in the big climactic shootout they kept forgetting that it was supposed to be a comedy. They didn't give us any reason to take the action stuff seriously, or to care about it; so whenever they interrupted the stuff we do care about (likable characters doing and saying funny things) to have extensive gun battles, I found myself incredibly bored and dissatisfied.
Other quibbles, in random order:
1. The script was written before Superbad, and released after--obviously they couldn't get it made until after they were successful with Superbad--and it shows. This script isn't as good, isn't as funny, isn't as polished, never gained any real momentum.
2. I'm all for improvisation and ad-libbing, but you have to actually come up with something. A lot of the jokes were Seth Rogan shouting the first thing that came into his head, which was generally the most obvious thing, usually his character's motivation. If he were running towards his friend because his friend were on fire, he'd shout, "Oh my God, you're on fire! I have to put it out!" Maybe that's a conscious decision, but it came across as lazy ("aw, heck, just yell it. Anything's funny if you yell it loud enough").
3. I don't remember the ending containing any sort of closure on any of the emotional issues or anything. But maybe it did and I just forgot.
4. Yes, the Apatow formula is refreshingly original compared to other formula comedies. But it's still a formula, and it's getting old. At this point I could make an Apatow movie. All you need is some talented, underappreciated comedy actors, a script combining two 70s film genres, a main character with a paunch, a receding hairline, and a low IQ, his inexplicably hot girlfriend, and his best buddy (just like him, minus the girlfriend). Add 2 cups of uneasily acknowledged homoeroticism (combined, somehow, with "jokey" homophobia), a pinch of nostalgia, and let cool. Best served to stoned audiences.
Jim? Nailed it.
This movie has what may be my favorite epilogue ever -- after Rogen heroically (and pantlessly) hauls Saul from the burning ruins of the most epic and deliberately cliche-filled action scene this year ("I'm out of bullets... oh, look, more guns!"), I actually couldn't wait to get out to the lobby and discuss all my favorite scenes. Then low and behold, the movie did it for me!
The whole damn thing was brilliant, really -- maybe the best action movie spoof I've ever seen, mainly because it doesn't know it's a spoof, except it does... if you know what I mean. I suspect there might be a bit of Joker-themed irony in your call for an Oscar nomination for Franco, but you know what? Screw it -- he does deserve one.
For me the clincher was one word: triangulate. For some reason when Rosie Perez used the exact same word that Franco used earlier, instead of "locate", "trace", or whatever; it was obvious that the whole thing was just a story and wasn't 'really' happening. If it makes any since that stuff in other movies is indeed really happening.
For me the ending was much more meta. They weren't talking about how awesome they were, but how awesome the movie itself was. The same way you'd bring up a movie, like say "Raising Arizona", with friends and start talking about all the best scenes, Randall "Texx" Cobb, etc.
Jim,
Can't wait to see this...I am probably going tonight or tomorrow. I stopped reading after your disclaimer, but I wanted to ask if you are going to be posting anything on Generation Kill wraps up? I find the show funny at time, but overall frustrating in how much wheel-spinning it does. Also, I finally rented In Bruges because well...it seems that all the smart critics are saying so many good things about it; despite the previews making it look like another Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead. Looking forward to watching it now.
Looking forward to Pineapple Express...I bow down to David Gordon Green, and I just love the fact that he and his crew made this movie.
Jim,
Were you a Freaks & Geeks fan? I love that show, and am thrilled to see its extremely talented stars making it big. It's almost as if Judd Apatow's career right now is the fantasy he would have dreamed up while Freaks & Geeks was going down in flames.
Anyway, I have a mea culpa too offer up - I didn't watch the series when it was on (I discovered it a few years later on DVD) and hence inadvertently contributed to its downfall. Sorry.
MovieMan: I'm in the same boat. Two summers ago a friend and I started having Sunday night BBQs and watching DVDs of "The Wire" (Season One) and "Freaks & Geeks" (one or two episodes of each) every week. I hadn't seen either. Wow. I wanted all those folks in F&G to be stars -- and now some are! (There's a stoned wish-fulfillment right there.) I've just been watching the third season of "The Wire" and noticing hilarious parallels to "Pineapple Express" because of it. And both those and "The Dark Knight" involve "cell phone triangulation"! Ah, the associations we make...
Me? I just like that images of two prominent actors baked out of their minds appeared in ads all across America, and on -- wait for it -- bags of popcorn in AMC theaters. Munchies!
I was quietly amused at how accepted this "illegal" activity is. And I'm not even a stoner myself.
(I wrote a long, long response that, through the magic of Windows Vista disappeared, so this is a less articulate version of my thoughts.)
Jim, I love the theory and The Dark Knight satire, and I totally had temporary "best movie ever" syndrome during the film. I think I've actually had "best movie ever" syndrome (informally known as BMES) three times with this film. First, when I saw those names together on IMDB a year or so ago with that one sentence plot description, second when I saw the red-band trailer, and the third time probably when Bill Hader began his solo-jazz improvisation at the begining of the movie.
One of the reasons I think it's so good, which isn't mentioned in your piece, is David Gordon Green. He fills the movie with wonderful, small stylistic touches that often transcend the rather banal activities (as in the begining of the film, during the credit montage, he makes Dale opening the trunk of his car into a languid, beautiful moment that punctuates the rythm of the editing in the sequence.) Green adds so many tiny non-sequitor moments, like the cut away to a little girl in a bathing suit staring a Saul while he eats a cheese burger and weeps (though this film has far less of that than any of his other films), and subtly moves the camera or zooms in odd but perfect ways (a good example is the almost imperceptible steady-cam in and outs during Dale and Saul's big row that has no motivation other than, perhaps, to break the convention of dramatic scenes being shot hand-held that's become so overused.)
Great film, great theory, I can't wait to see it again.
I was about to write about this in response to your Dark Knight column (about the greatest movie ever). Because, seriously, why can't a movie be one of your favorites until its effect wears off (days or months later)?
For instance, toward the end of last year, I wanted to rewatch and explore my favorite films from 2007 more than most other movies including old favorites, and were I to make a top 100 at the time, they'd certainly have ranked too highly. But at the time, they'd have been perfectly appropriate.
I guess most people are looking for a near-static list of the 100 best movies or even their 100 favorites, but I think a list like that ought to be fairly fluid. You may not update it (even in your head) daily, but it is something that changes with new inputs, even if most new favorites fall off the list within a month.
In sum, The Dark Knight was my all-time favorite movie about an hour and twenty minutes into my first viewing. It has since fallen.
Brandon, here's how I like to do it (not that it matters): a pretty sturdy list of "the best" (composed when you're in a more reflective mood), a more fluid list of favorites, and then perhaps a completely haphazard list of whatever is most interesting/exciting to you at the moment (for some people this could be the "favorites" list but I like a little stability on mine). Usually, if I'm list-making I like to do some kind of hybrid favorites/best, with the emphasis on favorites that I also think are great movies. But you make a good point...it's not as if one wants to watch Citizen Kane before any other movie at every given moment! Right now, I'm on a Twin Peaks binge but that doesn't mean I think Fire Walk With Me is the greatest film of all time (in fact, I had some major problems with it -- not that it wasn't criminally underrated, but that's another story)...
So let's hear it for the Holy Trinity of listmaking: the Father (a solid if stuffy "best" canon), the Son (personal favorites) and the Holy Spirit (whatever overwhelms you in the moment). Amen.
Like Nick Tinsley, I feel director David Gordon Green deserves a good portion of the credit for what I liked in this film. In particular, I can see a lot of the idiosyncratic style that animated Green's Undertow, which similarly blended together disparate tones: queasy and bloody explosions of violence, subtle comedy, meditative character moments. Green adapts himself to the mainstream comedy well, but he neverthless retains some of his signature aesthetic touches and, especially, responds with enthusiasm and sensitivity to the kinds of small character moments that are scattered throughout this film. A lot of the humor is in the details, like the girl on the playground that Nick mentions, or the way Saul, pretending to be tied up, quickly pulls his hand out and coughs into it.
Anyway, I really enjoyed the film in general, as well as your very cogent discussion of what made it work. My own review is here:
http://seul-le-cinema.blogspot.com/2008/08/89-pineapple-express.html
This reminds me of one of my absolute favorite quotes. Dennis Paoli, screenwriter for RE-ANIMATOR, in the special features for that film, says:
"We were trying to be faithful to the genre.. no, we weren't TRYING to be faithful to the genre -- we just loved it. We were doing what we loved."
I had read the above a few days before seeing the film for the first time (I missed a lot of dialogue due to laughing so hard - a true communal comedy - so a second viewing is in order) and watched with much of your thoughts in mind. I had a similar thought, pointed especially by Gary Cole's performance as Ted... it seems to me that everyone (well almost everyone) in this film is ACTING as if they've been written by two stoned scriptwriters. It's a fine distinction between acting high, and acting like the dialogue you're speaking was written while stoned. There's almost a strange sense of semi-consciousness to the performances, punctuated by the "Oh, hey" moments, where things occur because the scribes need them to occur in their stream-of-consciousness execution. (like the oft sudden/convenient appearance of guns, or whenever Dale explains how somethings going to play out, and then it plays out exactly that way).
I noticed a few things that could validate your claim of the unacknowledged story-as-dream-sequence... things like the disappearing cat cake at Red's place or the lack of damage on Dale's car when they park in the woods (after ping-ponging between two other cars in his escape from Ted's place). Are these things signifying the lack of reality in the film or are they nods to the lack of both fore and afterthought by the stream-of-consciousness screenwriters? Or are these things to drive the pot-addled mad while watching the movie (because certainly they would fixate on that bright-pink frosting with a case of the munchies following)... or just unintentional gaffes?
Franco was great but this movie was terrible, and offensive to boot with the "asian mafia are ninjas" thing.
You nailed it, Jim.
Pineapple Express just made me feel very good, I want to believe that it is one of the greatest films ever made, because it has been a long, long, long time since I've seen a film that was so sincerely enthusiastic, so positive, in a completely non-phony kind of way. There isn't a fraction of a trace of cynicism in the movie.
You want to see the bros bond, you want to see them kick ass, and the movie gives you that, where any old comedy that uses the Mafia as a stock plot device doesn't really care what you want.
This movie loves you. That shouldn't be such a rare thing in a movie. Why can't all movies love the audience?
first half of Pineapple Express was about half as good as Knocked Up; the second half was almost as bad as Freddy Got Fingered
I just adore this movie. I saw it 9 times in the theatres and though I haven't seen it in weeks, hardly a day goes by that I don't find myself thinking about it and smiling. People say it's about two lazy stoners, but it's really about one lazy stoner and one grown-up. Guess who that his. Saul has a home, a business, aspirations and responsibilities that he handles all on his own. His apartment is filled with books and collections. He's a businessman. As much as he likes Dale, he doesn't give him the PE, he sells it to him (and how). Feckless fuckups don't aspire to become civil engineers. And lastly, he is the sole supporter of his grandmother. Why? He's a young man. Where are his parents? It may be their absence in his life that contributes to this sense of bereftness that hovers about him.
There's a huge hole in Saul's soul that for whatever reason, only big fat Dale can fill.
Hell, this IS my favorite movie and I think it's going to endure for its three timeless messages.
1. You never know.One moment your peacefully passed out on your own couch in your own home and the next, you're in a hurricane. (Note how that line about hurricane season being over is repeated three times when we first meet Saul.)
2. There's no accounting for love. What exactly it is Saul sees in Dale remains somewhat of a mystery. Saul is twice the person Dale is.
3.Recongnize and value a treasure in your life before it's too late We know almost from the start of the film what it takes Dale almost until the end to see. Saul is a true friend, selfless, brave and caring. Even when they have their big fight and Dale says such awful things to him, he still gives him half his money. And through all their trials he ver once does what a lesser person would do and that is to call Dale out for panicking and dropping his roach at a crime scene.
Seth Rogen is very funny, but James Franco is simply enchanting. He just brings it in a performance that is as delightful to listen to as it is to watch.
And as I've said to anybody who will listen, if he isn'r rocking an armful of awards next year, there's no justice.
Jim, you got it. This movie actually is one of the best films ever made, not Casablanca, but certainly Double Indemnity levels of quality. It's that brilliant, the whole film sparkling with a certain ragtag genius that is only acquired when high.
It's demented, hilarious, well-made, and Saul is one of the most lovable people in Apatow history, and the glorious violence of the film is redeemed by his gentle goodness. Oh, and Danny McBride is genius. ("It's my cats birthday today")
P.S. Watching Pineapple Express baked is pretty interesting; I laughed even more at first, but then watched amazed at everything happening.