![\"zach_and_miri_main\"](\"http:\/\/www.regrettablesincerity.com\/test2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/01\/zach_and_miri_main.jpg\" "\\"zach_and_miri_main\\"")
The downside of Judd Apatow\u2019s current popularity is when other filmmakers try to mix their own formula with his. A common theme running through Apatow\u2019s work is his character\u2019s dealing with their own gay panic as they mature from adult boys to adult men. This is exemplified by a scene between Seth Rogen and Paul Rudd in The 40 Year Old Virgin<\/em>, where they play video games and taunt each other with lines like \u201cYou know how I know that you\u2019re gay? Because you macram\u00e9d yourself a pair of jean shorts.\u201d There\u2019s even an extra on the DVD that shows that this improvised scene went on for more than 10 minutes as they came up with new reasons why the other person was gay. This continued between Rudd and Rogen in Knocked Up<\/em> where Rudd tells him \u201cyou look like Babe Ruth\u2019s gay brother. Gabe Ruth.\u201d<\/p>\nNow whether you think this is a homophobic way to deal with immaturity in a mainstream film is entirely up to you, but there\u2019s no doubt that in Zach and Miri Make a Porno<\/em>, just out on DVD, writer\/director Kevin Smith\u2019s attempt to mesh his dick and fart joke motifs with Apatow\u2019s maturity bent (even casting Seth Rogen as the lead), that Smith\u2019s cast is uncomfortable with the issue. This is proven with Justin Long\u2019s ridiculous overplaying as a gay porn star trying to comfort and ease his boyfriend out of the closet. \u201cI\u2019ll be your sherpa up the mountain of gayness,\u201d he says with a gravely lisp. Now that line reads a lot funnier than it plays, which is all too common a problem in Smith\u2019s work (Chasing Amy, Clerks, Dogma<\/em>), as actors struggle mightily to overcome the wordiness that is totally unnatural to their character\u2019s traits, and is simply a way for Smith to show off. But the surprise is the emotional dishonesty and discomfort with the material he\u2019s written, especially as Chasing Amy<\/em> is a smart exploration of gay relationships and<\/em> the complications of romance.<\/p>\n This may be because Smith is a moralist at heart, and making a movie about the joys and financial success of two working class best friends making a porn film to pay their bills doesn\u2019t jibe with his moral compass. And yet, all of this could be ignored if the movie were funny. For some reason, Smith constantly resorts to Mel Brooks style nudge-nudge jokes and even sabotages professional scene stealer Craig Robinson (the bouncer in Knocked Up<\/em> and the hitman dealing with his partner\u2019s weaknesses in Pineapple Express<\/em>) by introducing him with tired race baiting lines (\u201cyou gonna make a black man work Black Friday?\u201d) and letting his character drift off into being solely used as a deus ex machina.<\/p>\n Maybe Smith was bored? Sure, the plot trajectory is quite obvious as Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks (who is awfully toned for someone who\u2019s supposed to be lazy and unmotivated) are clearly headed for a happy romance, and we have to wait out 100 minutes for this to develop, as if it were in any way a surprise. But watching Smith\u2019s version of porn, in which everyone is chummy and comfortable with each other (despite none of them being actual porn actors before this experience), and the technical complications are missing, and clich\u00e9d 70\u2019s porn music is played on a boombox, while the camera is rolling and the actors are fornicating, is more than embarrassing, it is simply amazing. Smith\u2019s humor has completely devolved into his self-satisfaction regarding the shock value in his script, as the characters constantly curse unnaturally, as if to offend us, as if someone willing to watch a movie with this title would act like a little boy in church any time someone says fuck. Of course, Smith is<\/em> a little boy in church, maybe his hangers-on ought to let him know.<\/p>\n P.S<\/p>\n On one of his older DVD commentaries (I believe it was Dogma<\/em>), Smith mentions that the reason he can\u2019t always get larger budgets is because his movies tend to hit a brick wall at the box office once they gross $30 million, indeed Zach and Miri went to\u2026 $31 million.<\/p>\n P.P.S.<\/p>\n A mid-end-credits sequence hints at what direction the movie should have taken. It would have been much funnier if the starting point was this badly produced infomercial with Zach, Miri, and crew offering to make a needy couple \u201cthe porno of their dreams.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The downside of Judd Apatow\u2019s current popularity is when other filmmakers try to mix their own formula with his. A common theme running through Apatow\u2019s work is his character\u2019s dealing with their own gay panic as they mature from adult boys to adult men. This is exemplified by a scene between Seth Rogen and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[5188,635,634,629,640,633,628,277,639,30,638,632,624,627,636,630,4600,626,625,310,5189,28,637,631,4729],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=422"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=422"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=422"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regrettablesincerity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=422"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}