Pineapple Express Review

Published by Jeff Leins on: August 17th, 2008

Pineapple Express resurrects the stoner comedy subgenre laced with frantic action and the familiar “bromance” storyline we’ve seen before from Apatow-branded movies.

It takes the paranoid “what would happen if something went down right now” conversation and expands it into a movie that works about half the time. When the characters are passing the jokes around, it’s funny. But when it goes off on action tangents, it seems lazy and half-baked.

Two guys get into trouble, tangle with the cops, and stumble their way through to the other side before realizing they’ve become closer friends. The plot sounds a lot like Superbad because both were written by Seth Rogen and his real-life “bro” Evan Goldberg.

However, this time it isn’t two high school kids. It’s about a slacker process server (Rogen) and his marijuana dealer Saul (James Franco). After a montage setting up what Dale Denton does when he’s not getting high, he stops by Saul’s house to buy more. The perpetually-high pot peddler shows him a new blend of grass named Pineapple Express. He says it’s almost a shame to smoke it, “like killing a unicorn.” Of course, they smoke it any way.

Dale leaves to serve papers to Ted Jones who turns out to be a homicidal drug lord (Gary Cole) working with a corrupt female cop (Rosie Perez). When Dale accidentally witnesses the execution of the marijuana competition, he discards the Pineapple Express roach and subsequently gets the two stoners wrapped up in a turf war.

Rogen spouts off a few funny lines, but he usually plays the straight man to Franco’s goofy, spaced demeanor. But when Red, Saul’s supplier, is introduced they both take a backseat to the hilarious Danny McBride. If only some of his lines weren’t ruined in the trailers. The movie works when it sticks to what the troupe is known for: random improvisational riffs.

When it dives into an actioner though, it started to lose me. Explosions, car chases, and heavy gunfire take over and it ceases to be much fun or funny.

Having seen and enjoyed the other Apatow/Rogen collaborations, I was expecting hilarity from the Express. But instead it was sort of a forgettable mess of uneven action and pot talk. As far as stoner comedies go it is probably one of the better ones, but like weed brands they’re all pretty much the same. Or so I’m told…

Marijuana is illegal in the United States of America, people. I would recommend that you don’t smoke pot before seeing Pineapple Express.

2.5 out of 5.