Hey, everyone. ”Moriarty” here.

I met Applescruff on Saturday night in a parking lot in Reseda, where all of us were gathered for the Alamo Drafthouse/Rolling Roadshow presentation of BOOGIE NIGHTS. Tim League is, without question, my favorite showman. He puts on a great party every single place he goes, and if you’re ever, ever, ever in a position to see something that Tim’s presenting, go. If you’re any sort of film fan, you’ll appreciate the experience.

Applescruff came out dressed in full-on BOOGIE NIGHTS ‘70s gear, but before the movie, all he wanted to talk about was PINEAPPLE EXPRESS. He was one of the readers who made it into that Burbank screening a week ago, and he was practically evangelical about what he saw. I’m hearing this same reaction from a lot of the people who saw it. I’m glad he wrote in to share that enthusiasm with you... check it out:

Hey Harry,

AppleScruff at your service. What a great night that Boogie Nights thing was. Nothing beats having Eli Roth pour you a Dewar’s and Coke and telling jokes with Ron Jeremy. Everyone involved in putting last night’s event together deserves a hundred nights like that. And congrats once again on the nuptials! Really happy for you guys.

Just wanted to drop in and give my take on “Pineapple Express”, a movie that defies conventional genres and manages to be both dark and light, dead serious and friggin hilarious. It’s “Harold And Kumar” meets “Reservoir Dogs”. I seriously think that the filmmaker’s goal is to make you piss and crap your pants at the same time. I don’t want to speak on the plot very much as I was told that we were the first group of people ever to see it (I thought it had just wrapped like last month! It’s crazy how quick the turnaround can be.) But I will say that it involves two stoners who are living meaningless lives; one a pot dealer, the other a process server. One of them witnesses a very bad thing and the two are suddenly forced to wake up and focus or die. It actually sounds incredibly serious when you say it like that, and I would stress that in many ways it is, but at the core of this movie is a love letter to weed, growing it, smoking it, selling it and basically anything else you can do with it (I’m pretty sure there is no way to have sex with a plant, but I think if there was someone in this movie would have done it.) As I mentioned earlier, this was the very first draft of the film, so I’m sure a few things will be trimmed. It stands at just about 2 hrs right now, but honestly I wouldn’t cut much, save maybe the very first thing we saw. There’s a prologue which I felt had absolutely NOTHING to do with the rest of the movie and served only to allow a shot of the old school Columbia logo in black and white. Almost everything else I saw was gold though. Seth Rogen is as funny as usual, and they give him yet another gorgeous love interest, only this time it’s a high school chick ala “Manhattan”. But the real star of this show is James Franco as the pot dealer Saul. He is funnier than he has any right to be, and I couldn’t breathe a few times he was on screen.

Obviously if you did not like movies like “Half Baked” or are completely against marijuana you probably won’t think some of the bits in this movie are very funny, but this is a movie from the same people that made the great series “Freaks & Geeks” along with “Knocked Up”, “Superbad” and “40 Year Old Virgin”. So rest assured that this is no mindless pot fest. This movie has it’s brain and heart firmly in tact. I’d like to mention however that I found this to be this team’s loosest picture. It’s like the “Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy” of their catalog. I’m thinking these guys are very comfortable now and they’re able to effortlessly coast through each film. And the quick turnaround from filming to test screening supports this theory. All in all I’d have to say this is one of my favorite comedies, period. It’s a movie I think I could watch over and over again. And I would advise you all to get ready to quote this movie ad infinitum, as the one-liners are piled on generously (two words: Daewoo Lanos). Unfortunately I was told this movie won’t be out till August ’08. Can’t wait to hear about another screening so I can see it again!

AppleScruff