Pineapple Express (2008/Unrated/Sony DVD Single Edition)
Picture: B- Sound: B- Extras: C+ Film: C+
Director
David Gordon Green first found wide acclaim for his underrated George Washington (2000) and has been
trying to find more commercial and critical traction ever since. After more independent work (Undertow, Snow Angels) he comes up with his most commercial film yet in Pineapple Express (2008), a film that
is a “stoner comedy” on the surface, but tries to cover all kinds of territory
and almost pulls off the coup of being a great comedy.
Instead,
the Seth Rogen/Judd Apatow/Evan Goldberg screenplay tries to cover much
territory to be the Destroy All Monsters
of such films, staring with the monochrome opening set in the 1950s as military
drug tests humorously make its use in the country illegal, then we fast forward
to the usual modern Apatow/Rogen world where now is sort of also then (i.e.,
the 1970s and 1980s) as Rogen plays a guy who delivers court notices (‘you’ve
been served’) and loves to smoke you know what.
He does
this in disguises as if he is going to deliver a singing telegram and one day,
he is about to complete another job when he witnesses a murder and the killers
see him… sort of. This makes him miss
his date with a high school girl and her family (he is too old for her) and goes to his dealer (James Franco in a really
good performance) for help. Of course,
this is a tight-knit community and one of the killer’s is a kingpin-level
dealer (Gary Cole having fun with his bad guy persona) and the other a lady cop
(Rosie Perez giving a great performance) and it just gets crazier and crazier.
The film
can be split into thirds. The first is
the typical stoner comedy, the middle second is the big surprise building into
a suspenseful situation with some real laughs and proof that Rogen is a great
comic actor, but the last third collapses, never delivering on its potential
and the script becomes too silly. That
means a few great missed opportunities, the film not being the home run it almost
was and it is also more violent than it needed to be. For what is here, it is worth a look and it
is worth a look.
The
anamorphically enhanced 2.35 X 1 image is nicely transferred, with only some
softness, which should make for an interesting comparison to the Blu-ray
whenever we see it. You get some motion
blur, but this looks decent and was shot in Super 35mm by Tim Orr in some of
his best work to date. The Dolby Digital
5.1 mix is joke-based, but the surrounds have good ambience often while the
music and sound effects are worked in well.
Extras include a funny gag reel, extended/alternative scenes, making of
featurette and cast/crew commentary. A
double DVD set adds more and the Blu-ray has its own exclusives.
- Nicholas Sheffo
