Judd Apatow, he of the immaculate comic conception, has stated that The Pineapple Express is inspired from Brad Pitt’s stoner character in the 1993 Tony Scott directed/Quentin Tarantino scripted crime drama, True Romance. Imbued with a quirky, 1970s, Wes Andersonesque sensibility, The Pineapple Express is a straightforward film in which non sequitur subplots, vibrant supporting characters, sight gags, slapstick jesting, arcane masculine rituals, ridiculously absurd situations and hilarious monologues fuse into an unbridled, feral caper comedy.

Twenty-something Dale Denton’s (Seth Rogen) job as a process server is really just a sort of vocational cover for his true calling — smoking pot. Saul Silver (James Franco) is his supplier, a lethargic layabout who doesn’t appear to have showered or groomed himself in weeks, uses far too much of his product and imagines himself in a friendship with Dale who would rather just maintain a strictly “business relationship.”

All of that changes, however, when Dale witnesses a murder by a crooked cop (Rosie Perez) and the dangerous drug kingpin, Ted (Gary Cole). In his panic, Dale carelessly tosses his roach of a new, high-grade, rare strain of pot dubbed Pineapple Express. Before Dale can wrap his drug-addled mind around the situation, Ted traces the roach back to him and Saul, and dispatches a pair of hit men (Kevin Corrigan and The Offices’ Craig Robinson) to do what hit men do best.

As Dale and Saul run for their lives, unable to discern which threats are real and which ones are simply the product of their marijuana-fueled paranoia, they fall in with a number of scene-stealers, most notably Danny McBride (The Foot-Fist Way) as Saul’s cowardly, back-stabbing, indestructible friend Red. Although their intent is to get as far away from Ted and his gang as possible, Dale and Saul find themselves in the belly of the beast, leading to an apocalyptic showdown reminiscent of Reservoir Dogs and any number of James Bond films.

The Pineapple Express is Superbad with violence. It even duplicates a penultimate moment between the leads. Reimagining the stoner genre, the creative triumvirate of director David Gordon Green (known for his morose, character-driven indies that fare well at festivals but not at the box-office), producer Apatow and writer Rogan have constructed a film that turns increasingly violent and bloody as the film goes on. While one would hardly label The Pineapple Express a taut action thriller, there are enough fist-a-cuffs, gunplay and explosions to make one suspicious of the film’s dubious parentage.

Like so many of Apatow’s male-centric, female-deficient films, The Pineapple Express is not about what it claims to be about at first glance (in this case, smoking pot), but is a love letter to friendship, camaraderie and the potholed odyssey that is male bonding. This is a buddy movie with Seth Rogen and James Franco filling in for Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. The pudgy, nondescript Rogan is quickly disproving every notion of what a star should look and act like (thankfully), and Franco, known for strait-laced roles like Harry Osborn in the Spider-Man trilogy is nothing short of a comic revelation.

Apatow’s films have never been ashamed of their R-rating and The Pineapple Express is no exception. But like all Apatow’s best work, the raunchiness is always balanced by positive, redemptive forces of love, friendship, sacrifice and forgiveness. While the film seems to glory in drug use, a more careful examination reveals a cautionary warning against the harmful and debilitating effects of pot. Some may see the slight message as self serving; doubtless others won’t see it at all.

© Copyright 2008 Brandon Fibbs. All rights reserved.