Friday
31Oct2008
Movie Review - 'Zack and Miri Make a Porno'
Friday, October 31, 2008 at 12:03AM | Zack and Miri Make a Porno
Starring Seth Rogen, Elizabeth Banks, and Craig Robinson  |
Zack (Seth
Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth
Banks) have been friends forever. They've been roommates for years.
But that's the extent of their relationship. They've never dated or had sex and
the subject has never really come up. It's like they never heard Billy Crystal's
theory in When Harry Met Sally.Zack and Miri are not exactly upwardly mobile people, and they've been floating on their collective debts for some time. That's bad news for roommates. The water in their apartment is turned off. Next is the electricity, which the pair tries to circumvent by setting newspapers on fire in an oil drum they've put in their living room; it's kind of an indoor Hooverville. They fear that they'll be evicted between Christmas and New Year's if they can't make the rent, which they can't, and since they live in Pittsburgh and not Palm Springs, being out in the cold on Christmas means really being out in the cold.
The solution, it seems to Zack, is to make a porn movie. Having just attended their ten-year high school reunion, he figures that everyone there would want to see them have sex just because. His logic is a little flawed, because Zack believes everyone wants to see anyone have sex, even Rosie O'Donnell. And that's not true. Not everyone would pay to see that, and personally, I'd pay not to see it.
After a little arm twisting, Miri agrees to make the adult film, and Zack goes out and recruits a cast and crew. The process, functioning here as a long montage, is more or less what you'd expect - auditions, gaffes, sex scenes, etc. - and the "make a porno" part of Zack and Miri Make a Porno is just not very interesting, especially if you've ever had some of the sex yourself or have ever "accidentally" watched pornography. At the very least, it's not as interesting as the relationship between Zack and Miri should be. That's should be.
Smith also wants his movie to have a sweet, gooey center. And it does. The problem becomes using one to get to the other. There's a missing link here between the the first part of the title - Zack and Miri - and the second - Make a Porno. It isn't a forgotten link, because Smith tries to show us how much Zack and Miri mean to each other, even if they don't know it, but the switch that is flipped between hardcore sex comedy and romantic comedy feels fake. It occurs because Smith needs it to, not because the characters would suddenly see each other in a different way because of their situation.
There are good moments here, and comedies rely in large part on stringing those moments together more than they do a consistent flow of dialogue and exposition. Smith gets there a little over half the time. Only one character is consistently funny (Craig Robinson from The Office as Delaney, who is producing the porno), and several of them aren't at all (Jason Mewes as a variation on his Jay to Smith's Silent Bob, Gerry Bednob as a foul-mouthed coffee shop owner, Justin Long and Brandon Routh as gay porn stars). And they're subtraction by addition, because we want to like Zack and Miri, and Smith could have easily spent more time with them proving their case.
Rogen doesn't show us anything new here, but he's fine. Banks, on the other hand, continues to display a willingness to do anything for anyone at anytime...for a laugh, that is. She's got to be a director's dream, because it doesn't seem that anything scares her. And she has an overwhelmingly boisterous laugh that punctuates a lot of scenes in Zack and Miri, even when the scenes aren't that funny. She's outworking everyone in this film.
I really dug the soundtrack to Zack and Miri, and a few isolated scenes, but I can't say the movie itself really convinced me. Smith has made better films - Clerks and Chasing Amy - but he's made a lot worse, particularly lately. If you find his films endearing or hilarious, you probably will again. If, on the other hand, you think Smith has been in a state of arrested development for 15 years, Zack and Miri won't make you think otherwise.
Reader Comments (3)
Back for opening weekend. Just saw the flick, thought it was good, not Clerks or Amy, but still a very funny/warm serviceable flick. As compared to most of the shit, thats been pumped out this year.
Opening weekend should about tell us, if it will hit 75 million or not.-
There's no way it hits $75 million. I'm still holding to that.
Well, I'm back to eat shit,...only opening at 400,000 dollars more then Clerks 2 which starred two people nobody's ever heard of or hardly remembers, honestly I'm shocked. It did a little less than 8 million yesterday which was up almost 400% to a very shitty friday, because well nobody goes to the movies on Halloween. I however don't feel quite as stupid, because everyones reporting that Harvey and Bob had this going somewhere between 80-100 million, so thank god im not alone, however when I'm wrong, one dude gets to say I fucking told you so, while they look retarded to the whole industry. I also think they'll do better there second week. If this doesn't out gross dogma, it will all but prove that Kevin Smith is cursed at the box office.
But honestly getting away from all that shit, I'm obviously not a fan of his work, due to the money it makes. I thought Zack and Miri was his first real movie since Dogma(not that I didn't enjoy Jay&Bob/Jersey Girl or Clerks 2 but if anyone will understand where im coming from it should be you)It was funny, had heart and was also his first movie, that I thought was shot insanely well, throughout all the laughs, the biggest scene that sticks out to me is when Banks is on the couch and seth and katie go to the bedroom, and the camera just pans back with the pixies "hey" playing underneath it, is one of the most powerful shots I've ever seen in a movie period, let alone a kevin smith comedy.
If nothing comes from this movie other than me leaving the theater thinking, that was worth the 10.50 and I'll be back to see it again, in my mind it's nothing but a success.-