Knocked Up (Judd Apatow, 2007) ***1/2

Dir. Judd Apatow
Starring Seth Rogen, Katherine Heigl, Paul Rudd, Leslie Mann

Judd Apatow strikes again with another R-rated comedy that manages to be funny and sweet at the same time. It's refreshing for someone like Apatow to be churning out comedies. In an era where Hollywood tries to trim movies so they can get a PG-13 rating (the latest egregious example being the upcoming Die Hard sequel), Apatow has now struck gold with two movies that don't compromise to this mindset. Apatow’s The 40 Year Old Virgin was a vulgar comedy with a sweet romantic core that came out to surprising success a couple years ago and turned Steve Carell into a star. Now we have Knocked Up, an even more raunchy outing that still remains the core honesty and compassion of Apatow’s previous film.

The basic plot is pretty simple, following two people that are direct opposites and their unlikely romance. Ben Stone (Seth Rogen) is an unemployed slacker who sits around all day smoking pot and working on an adult website with his similarly immature friends. Alison (Katherine Heigl) works as a production assistant for E! Entertainment Television. After landing a huge promotion that gets her the chance to be on the air, she hits a nightclub to celebrate and ends up having a one night stand with Ben. Eight weeks later, she finds out this one night stand resulted in pregnancy.

Knocked Up is filled with vulgar humor from beginning to end. In that sense it’s not much different than American Pie, Road Trip, or the various comedies of that ilk that have popped up over the last decade. Apatow’s screenplay is filled with jokes about pot, sex, What makes this movie work so well is the underlying sweetness that evades any kind of cynicism. This is a movie that is actually serious about the central romance and doesn’t just use it as a vehicle for gross out jokes. In between the vulgar raunchiness, there’s an adorable romance at the center that builds believably throughout the movie. In most romantic comedies there is a forced breakup scene that usually ends up being hopelessly contrived, but in this movie the relationship between Alison and Ben is developed organically and not one moment of it feels forced.

Apatow is also a pro at coming up with a gifted ensemble to fill the background of the central premise. In Knocked Up, one of the main attractions is the somewhat rocky marriage between Allison’s sister Debbie (played by Apatow’s wife Leslie Mann) and Pete (played by the invaluable Paul Rudd). The seemingly happy couple is a nice counterpoint to the central romance. The pressures and fears faced by Pete and Debbie feel genuine, thanks to the well defined performances from Rudd and Mann. Also on board are Ben’s gang of immature friends, filled with Apatow vets Jay Baruchel, Jason Segel, Jonah Hill, and Martin Starr. They all lend solid support, generating a wonderful comic chemistry and are responsible for the biggest laughs in the film.

Knocked Up clearly relies heavily on improvisation, which has been a constant feature of Apatow’s previous projects. This one seems even more heavily improv based than 40 Year Old Virgin, as the structure feels a bit looser and some scenes run on past their obvious ending point. Perhaps the success of his previous film allowed him the courage to take more chances and for the most part it pays off. Rogen and Rudd especially have some terrific moments during their one on one scenes, and a dinner scene featuring references to Back to the Future is a highlight. The drawback are a few scenes that run out of steam long before Apatow yelled cut, including one where drugged up Ben and Pete freak out about chairs, which starts off as funny but ends up dragging the movie at a crucial point.

Seth Rogen is an interesting choice for a leading man as he’s far from the matinee idol type. Most directors or studios would not have the creativity to cast him, even in an underdog role like this one. Rogen got his start on Judd Apatow’s critically acclaimed television shows Freaks & Geeks and Undeclared, and then went on to steal several scenes in Apatow’s The 40 Year Old Virgin. In each of those projects he has pretty much played the same character; immature slackers that enjoy drugs, alcohol, and pornography. The amazing thing about Rogen’s natural screen presence is that he invests each of these characters with so much empathy that you can’t help but root for them. In Knocked Up, He proves that someone with this quality can make a memorable lead character in a romantic comedy.

The great news is the wonderful box office success of Knocked Up. Apatow struggled in the TV realm (in ratings, not quality), but is so far two for two with feature films. Hopefully this leads to more daring output from studio executives, who can no longer have excuses for their cowardly decision to cut films for a lower MPAA rating. Judd Apatow is leading the way himself as the producer or screenwriter in several upcoming R-rated comedies. Hopefully his influence will lead to more choices for solid adult comedy in the future.

Spider-man 3 (Sam Raimi, 2007) **

Dir. Sam Raimi
Starring Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, Thomas Haden Church, Topher Grace

If the makers of comic book movies don’t study history, then they’re doomed to repeat it. Such is the case with Spider-Man 3, which finds itself trapped in the same murkiness as the subpar Batman sequels. After the success of the original Batman, the series made a mistake by trying to shove as many villains as possible into each film. This culminated in the franchise nadir Batman and Robin, which contained three separate villains. Sam Raimi’s Spider-man 3 runs into the very same problem, and while not as awful as that entry into the Batman franchise, it is certainly beneath the level of quality in the first two Spider-Man films.

The 3rd film in the series picks up by exploring two major developments from the previous installment. Mary Jane now has knowledge of Peter’s dual identity and their newfound romance suffers as Peter struggles handling Spider-man’s fame. Peter’s friend Harry is also aware of the dual identity and is now out to get revenge for his father. Both of these stories would be enough to cover an entire film, and probably demanded such treatment to fully work. Unfortunately, Raimi decides to fill the film with two more villains for Spider-man to deal with, Venom and Sandman. Even at an extended running time of two hours and twenty minutes, there isn’t nearly enough screen time to cover all of these story threads.

The budding romance between Peter and Mary Jane was a strong asset to the first two outing. At the end of the 2nd film they finally ended up together, promising interesting potential story developments for Spider-?Man 3. Unfortunately, Raimi’s idea of developing this romance is making Peter into a complete jerk (with the help of Venom of course), causing conflict for the young couple. The problem with this is we barely get a handful of scenes that show the two of them actually enjoying each other’s company. After spending two films watching them get to this point, Raimi spends the third outing having them fight and bicker for nearly the entire running time. It’s hard to care about a failing romance when there isn’t much romance to begin with.

The direct fault of this is the decision to pack the film with so many villains. Without so much wasted screen time, the Peter-Mary Jane story would have had a complete arc, providing us a happy couple to care about when things went sour. This also impacts the character development for the individual villains. Just like in the Batman series, packing extra villains into one film makes the backstories for each villain feel rushed. Sandman is a particularly great character and is well played by Thomas Haden Church. Unfortunately, his lack of screen time prevents us from really getting to understand his inner turmoil and family background.

At least we finally get a resolution to the Harry Osborne storyline. It was handled fairly well in the first two films, but by this outing it started to drag. Part of the problem is James Franco’s performance His mumbling, sometimes incomprehensible line delivery has been a nuisance from the very beginning, and despite slight improvements here, it robs this important character of the proper emotional impact. However, it’s not just Franco’s fault this time around. The plot developments for this subplot are absolutely ridiculous. A crucial scene where Harry learns a very important piece of information from his butler (no explanation is given for why the butler chose to wait so long to deliver this news) is so contrived that I had to check the end credits just to make sure that this was the same director who had made the intricately plotted thriller A Simple Plan.

Spider-Man 3 is not a complete disaster. The FX work is still outstanding, perhaps even surpassing the excellence of part 2. There is an abundance of CGI used, particularly for Sandman, but none of it looks like fake digital images plastered on to film like you get with lesser CGI work. Raimi shows flashes of his old self with a nifty musical detour where Peter attempts to make Mary Jane jealous. It would also be unfair to ignore the stunning moment at the end between Peter and Mary Jane, which is so well acted by Maguire and Dunst that it almost makes up for incessant bickering that plagued the rest of the film. At least that gives them something to build on for the fourth outing.