Hey, everyone. ”Moriarty” here. Wow. If only I could see a poster or a trailer for this mysterious KNOCKED UP that I’ve heard absolutely nothing about at all whatsoever. Ahem.
'Sup Harry, you may remember me for a review of Cars I sent to you a few months back. At the very least allow me to tell everyone who called me a plant in the talkbacks for that particular review to go suck a fat dick and run off and preorder their tickets for the next Comic-Con. So anyway, I got to see a workprint last night of Knocked Up, the new Judd Apatow flick starring Seth Rogen, Katherine Heigl, Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann among others. I have to say that this film felt like a logical story for Apatow to follow up The 40-Year-Old-Virgin with. There's something about the way these characters come across that really appealed to me. They're so real that I'd be very surprised if people watching this wouldn't be able to identify with at least one of the people you see onscreen. At the beginning of the film, when the two main characters meet, you'll immediately recognize the situation and most likely recognize yourself as having been one or the other at some point in your life. Seth Rogen was really good and makes for a solid, believable lead. I was definitely able to relate to Seth Rogen's character in a way or two and even though for all intensive purposes the guy was an immature tool for most of the runtime, there are moments where he totally wins you over in trying to convince his girlfriend that he's the one for her. Katherine Heigl was okay as the soon-to-be baby momma and she's really hot in that Jessica Simpson kind of way. The only thing with her was that I felt like her character wasn't funny enough and just a bit too serious. I would've liked to see someone of Catherine Keener's caliber take on the role, you know, someone who could be sweet and charming and still kick comic ass but again, that's not to say Heigl wasn't any good. Just a little understated maybe. The two leads had good, if not great chemistry but whether or not it was believable that these two characters would stick together for as long as they do, I'll leave for you people to decide. I'm sure it happens in some rare cases but girls like her character wouldn't think twice about giving some loser with $117 in his account (and some change) a swift kick to the curb, not with her looks anyway. In fact, I think this film in it's current form suffers from the same problems that The 40-Year-Old-Virgin suffered from when it was released as an extended, unrated cut. At two hours and fifteen minutes, it was already a half hour too long. The first third of the movie was a riot but slowly becomes a kind of sweetie pie romance thing, putting the laughs in the backseat. The laughs taper off by the end of the movie to a level that doesn't match the powerhouse first third. By far, the funniest guy in this thing had to be Paul Rudd, who steals every scene he's in. Come to think of it, Leslie Mann was really funny as well. Just her facial expressions were enough to keep the audience in stitches. Every character gets a chance to shine and Seth's roommates are pretty damn funny just by standing around but they can't take the title of funniest friends/roommates in a movie from the boys of 40-Year-Old-Virgin. There were a bunch of other characters who would only have a couple of lines that were outright hysterical. There was a funny moment where Leslie Mann and Katherine Heigl go to a club and are denied entrance because, as the bouncer puts it, "We can't have two old, pregnant bitches running around in there." There was a gutbuster of a scene where Rogen and Paul Rudd go to Vegas on a guy trip and get wasted on mushrooms while watching Cirque de Soleil. The film was over two hours long but as we were watching a workprint, I'd be surprised if this didn't get at least a good twenty minutes cut out of it. Most of what makes it long are some extended bits of improv that was great in most cases and slightly amusing in others. There are some scenes that just went completely nowhere but it's kind of unfair to point those out because after all, it was a workprint and not a final cut. The film seems to have a lot of topics it wants to cover and while a lot of it is good stuff, a lot of it won't end up making the cut, I assure you. There was this big moment in the film where Leslie Mann tearfully tries to break up with her husband (Paul Rudd) because he's been lying to her about where he goes at night (he's not cheating like he suspects but going off to play fantasy baseball) but that whole climactic moment kind of doesn't go anywhere either. Lastly, I don't know how believable it is that Seth's character cleans up his act as fast as he does but I'm not going to start nitpicking. In the end, I think this movie is going to be a hit when it's released. I mean, it's damn funny and even though it doesn't sustain the level of hilarity that the beginning of the film sets up, I think word of mouth would probably carry this one to a healthy box-office take. A little snip-snip here and there should fix this one up to be even better. Fans of 40-Year-Old will love this film for sure. Besides, we all know Judd Apatow is the man when it comes to this kind of comedy. Somebody needs to let him do another TV series and get out of his way. The stuff he does, it kind of speaks to me on some deeper level than similar comedies do. This movie basically stands up and says, you are who you are and even though people should accept you for that, there comes a time when you gotta just grow the fuck up and accept your responsibilities. If you use this, you can call me Mr. Parker.
