(2008) Oh my, what a mess! Pot-smoking process server Dale Denton (Seth Rogen) uses various clever disguises to proudly pronounce: "You've been served!" At 25 (immature for his age) this dude's dating an 18-year-old (mature for her age) high-school senior, Angie Anderson (Amber Heard), who insists on his coming over for dinner to meet her parents.

Even though grass makes everything - food, sex, bad movies - so much better, and everyone who tries it likes its effects, he cogitates, nevertheless, the fact that it's illegal makes otherwise law-abiding citizens have to deal with criminals. Director David Gordon Green's way over-the-top bromance from Rogen and Evan Goldberg's screenplay is a trifecta of bad trips, bummers, and incredible violence.

Dale drops over with cash for stash from his dealer Saul (James Franco), who's got "the dopest dope I ever smoked." Pineapple Express, his exclusive product: "It's like God's vagina." Turning down an offer to get stoned because he's got another summons to serve, Dale becomes witness to the murder of an Asian man, killed by a female cop and the intended target of his summons, Ted Jones (Gary Cole), drug kingpin and Saul's primary source for maryjane.

Panicking, Dale tosses his roach and bashes his way out of a tight spot between the police car and another vehicle. Returning to Saul's apartment, Dale explains what he's just seen: probably an incident of capping the competition, explains Saul, who suggests they go see his middle man Red (Danny McBride), fleeing the scene with weed, $78 in cash, and snacks, just in time to avoid introductions with Ted's two thugs.

After a night in the woods, ridding themselves of their cellphones out of paranoia, they hitchhike (the battery dies in Dale's car) to Red's place. Following a violent confrontation with Red, they force him while duct-taped into his grandfather's wheelchair to admit he'd sold them out. Neither Dale nor Saul wants to kill Red, though doing so would be in their best interest: "Maybe we could just convince him to kill himself."

Finding disguises in the abandoned car, Ted concludes that Dale's an expert hit man hired by the Asians. Concerned about his girlfriend and her family, Dale shows up in time for dinner, urging them to "prematurely evacuate," while Saul goes to his bubbe's (grandmother's) place, where he gets kidnapped by the bad guys.

The movie becomes an uncontrolled substance, going way beyond believability: funny but preposterous (Saul steals a police car, driving it with his foot stuck through a red-Slushee-obscured windshield on a furious car chase); impossible but redemptive (with two bullets in the belly, Red not only survives without medical attention but manages to come to the aid of his buddies); savagely brutal but demonstrating empathy (throughout the carnage Dale, Saul, and Red repeatedly express apologies to one another for previous unpleasantness).

In a secret underground military facility in 1937, according to the film's opening, a lab experiment involving Pvt Miller, tested the effects of Item 9 (when smoked causes one to ignore authority), resulting in its being dismissed (and the subject disposed of) but declared an illegal substance. This cartoonish caper is Reefer Madness in reverse.

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Copyright © 2009 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

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