The New Pornographers

Zack and Miri Make a Porno
Written/Directed by Kevin Smith. Starring Seth Rogen, Elizabeth Banks, and Jason Mewes.
3.5/5 Stars

Kevin Smith was raised as a Catholic and he still attends mass occasionally. The corruption and evilness of sin has been deeply embedded in him since childhood. In some backwards-twisted, nonsensical, upside-down, Wacky World kind of way, it almost makes his films more charming and meaningful. Tits-and-ass jokes become endearing in Kevin Smith’s world.

A.O. Scott once commented that Smith’s films have a dirty mind but a pure heart. Zack and Miri Make a Porno isn’t so much an offensive, profanity-ridden sex romp but is instead a sweet, romantic-comedy under the guise of an offensive, profanity-ridden sex romp.

Kevin Smith is 38 with a wife and kid and he still thinks sex is dirty in a kind of giggly-schoolgirl way, and that it’s amusing to startle people with enough expletive language to fill a dictionary and then some. But the one consistent, underlying variable in almost all of Kevin Smith’s movies is that, at the end, there is always some tender message about love, friendships, or even religion.

Is Zack and Miri really that offensive though? Well, there are so many vulgarities in the dialogue that if the film were ever to be broadcasted on primetime, it would be cut down to about twelve minutes in length and still have enough bleeps in it that it would make the sound of a fire alarm welcoming. And the rumoured Jason Mewes sex tape that Kevin Smith has suggested need not be surfaced: the film has its fair share of soft-core sex and even the long-awaited debut of Mewes' penis. But, alas, the eventual romance that blooms between Zack and Miri is ever more endearing for it all.

I suppose there is a plot summary in due order here but it is not particularly necessary. The setup: Zack (Seth Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth Banks) are lifelong, platonic friends and housemates who are flat broke. The action: they gather a group of friends and would-be porn stars to make a porno so they can pay their bills and avoid eviction. The conclusion: well, that’s all too obvious, isn’t it?

But everyone already knows the ending before even walking into the theatre. It’s how Zack and Miri fall in love which is the exciting part. The dialogue is so refreshing that you just want to transcribe it, lick it endlessly and sleep with it between your legs.

Every conversation between Zack and Miri—from how they wouldn’t let the sex affect their friendship, to how it had affected their friendship when it eventually happened, and finally to the “after we had sex I realized that after all these years that I love you” talk—is so rich, original, and, well, funny, that you can almost excuse Smith for placing the dialogue within the almost overdone context of friends who don’t want to ruin what they got with sex but end up falling in love regardless. As a result, there aren't many narrative surprises in this movie.

But Smith has grown visually, something he has been doing gradually with each film. He maintains that he’s always been a great writer but only a so-so director. Not true. Although he may not be as good as Scorsese or Spielberg, he doesn’t have to be, either. Smith doesn’t write those types of films, and his directorial style perfectly matches his writing style.

Just like in Clerks II, Smith is able to pull off one of the most important scenes in the movie without an iota of talking: Zack and Miri’s much-anticipated first sexual encounter is the only love scene in a movie full of sex scenes.

Elizabeth Banks is adorable and you can do nothing but admire an actress’s range when she can go from playing the First Lady to playing a porn star in back-to-back weeks. It’s also nice to see Seth Rogen in a movie in which he’s not smoking weed. Not that I particularly disliked The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up, Superbad, or The Pineapple Express; I was just getting tired of him playing the same stoner character in every movie. He is funny here and it’s a welcoming change.

So what more can I really say? It’s true: Kevin Smith has a hit on his hands. It’s not as good as Chasing Amy or Clerks; but I laughed...a lot.