A Heartwarming Film

Rating: 8/10 (28 June 2007)

Judd Apatow is unequivocally a genius. While traditionally R-rated comedies mean something demeaning, raunchy, and lacking any real redeeming value, such as American Pie, Eurotrip, and Harold and Kumar go to White Castle, Apatow has managed to elevate the genre to something approaching art. I haven't actually seen the TV show "Freaks and Geeks", but it is universally critically acclaimed and everyone bemoans that it was cancelled, another great show lost in the annals of screwed up TV bureaucracy (Firefly, anyone?). But I did see The 40-Year-Old Virgin, a movie from which I was not expecting much (I had never heard of Apatow before), but which I came out of marveling at how incredibly smart it was and what wonderful performances the cast gave. Here was an R-rated comedy that was plenty raunchy but still managed to have something smart and true to say. Knocked Up is no different - Apatow is two for two now with this wonderful story that celebrates and embraces the differences between men and women while giving us true-to-life view on adult relationships.
Seth Rogen plays Ben Stone, a practically broke pothead who is trying to make money through a website that catalogues films that contain nude scenes of actors and actress. Katherine Heigl is Alison Scott, an up and coming TV reporter who works at E! and gets promoted. On one side, a loser pothead. On the other, a successful drop-dead gorgeous young woman. On the day of her promotion Scott decides to go out and party with Debbie, played by the director's wife Leslie Mann, who is married to a Pete, played by Paul Rudd. The two women are having fun until of course they meet Stone and his pothead buddies. Stone and Scott hook up for a night of a wild sex, but unfortunately they don't use a condom. Eight weeks later, Scott finds out she is pregnant, and together the two decide to work things out.
In a scenario as unlikely as a gorgeous blonde hooking up with a rather unattractive and unemployed stoner, the story would suck if the characters were anything but lovable and believable, and fortunately ever single one of them is both. Ben's pothead roommates border on the simply conventional and unrealistic, but I think it's okay that they're just there for comic relief, and they serve to show the kind of lifestyle that Ben leads and how important his pals are to him. Ben himself is true to life and he is played perfectly by Seth Rogen. Katherine Heigl isn't as good, but she still shares some great chemistry with Rogen. Two characters that almost steal the show, though, are Pete and Debbie, who serve as an example to both Ben and Alison about what marriage is like in real life. True, the characters are caricatured a bit, but this is the case in any movie, and I thought both Rudd and Mann had perfect marriage chemistry together and the struggles within their marriage showed admirably well the difference between men and women, which brings me to the best thing about Knocked Up.
The mature view of adult relationships, the celebration of the difference between men and women, and the importance of taking responsibility and growing up are all themes that are well and competently explored in Knocked Up. Alison and Ben's relationship works because this is how it would look if it happened in real life. The two are deathly afraid of how Pete and Debbie's marriage looks like from the outside because of how much they fight, and the observations that they each have about the marriage are surprisingly accurate to what a given man or a given woman may observe in those situations. Many people complained about how unrealistic the two's love is, but this is a movie people, and it's not meant to portray real life. Besides, I easily understood what Alison sees in Ben - he's a sweet guy deep inside, and I could tell that he really cared for Alison. Like I said before, the chemistry between the two is wonderful, heartwarming, and endearing.
On the whole Knocked Up is a great film. The characters are excellent, the humor uses real life situations and real people for laughs, the raunchiness is not excessive, but perfectly fits the film. Every single one of the cameos is excellent, from Steve Carell all the way to Kristen Wiig, with whom I was particularly impressed. She's only in two scenes, but her comedic timing and delivery in both of those scenes was so perfectly executed that she effortlessly stole both of them. I did not enjoy Knocked Up as much as I did 40-Year-Old Virgin, partly because 40 had the amazing Steve Carell, partly because it bothered me that one of the final revelations of the film comes about because of mind-altering substances (not pot, but something else). I almost felt cheated, but I was quickly carried away from that feeling when I got sucked back into the story. If it weren't for the R rating, this would almost be a wonderful family film - it's that good. Sweet, excellent, heartwarming, and charming, Knocked Up has me looking forward to Judd Apatow's next project all the more.