Zack and Miri Make a Porno

Meh.

I don't even really feel like typing much out for this one. It isn't that its a bad movie - it isn't, really - but that it just feels so empty. I left the theater without knowing how I felt about the film. It bothered me that I couldn't decide how much I enjoyed watching it, or if I did at all. Then it occured to me: the movie succeeded in making me feel absolutely nothing! I really didn't give a crap about anything I had just seen. Now, there were funny parts... but they just felt strung together by a weak narrative that's become typical of Kevin Smith's latest films.
Zack and Miri have no money and mounting debt so they decide to make a porno for cash. Nothing of any further significance happens that you can't guess almost entirely from the title itself.

It might be hard to believe this, but Kevin Smith directed this movie. It won't be hard once you hear some of the inane dialogue, but you certainly wouldn't know it judging by the cast. Kevin Smith has obviously seen the golden goose that lays Judd Apatow's eggs and he needed to satisfy his tendencies of bestiality. Smith is essentially making a Judd Apatow comedy; he's got 3 of his actors in lead roles and the film is marketed like an Apatow film. However, unlike an Apatow film, where actors improv most of their lines, Kevin Smith's actors are bound to the words he himself has written. So the comedy feels forced - like Apatow allowed Smith to direct something he put together. I don't dislike Smith's films. Hell, I even warmed up to Clerks II (after 3 or 4 viewings), but some of his supposedly "real" dialogue is just trite. Maybe it's because I can tend to be one of those people who references obscure film shit all the time, so I don't want to hear someone like me or my friends on-screen, but I'm sick of constant pop-culture bombs being dropped every 5 minutes. It gets old. Family Guy is a great example of that.

Everyone here is pretty funny. Personally, I thought Justin Long (the Mac/PC guy) was one of the highlights as a gay porn star who inspires Zack to produce porn. Rogen is his usual self, but I think the character Smith wrote for him wasn't taken as far as he could have been. The same thing goes for Elizabeth Banks. I guess you don't really need to know a lot about who they are as people, but I felt they were pretty one-dimensional. Craig Robinsons steals another movie as the barista-turned-porno-producer who is in charge if finding new "talent". Jason Mewes does a good job playing someone other than Jay in a Smith movie. The frosted shit scene is pure gold.
So, should you check it out? If you like the people involved then I'd say it worth seeing, but you might just want to wait for DVD or something. I don't think its a rush-to-the-theater kind of flick, you know?