"Zack and Miri" - do they or do they not "Make a Porno" ?

Cafe Society
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“Zack and Miri” - do they or do they not “Make a Porno” ?

To answer your actual question would be a spoiler, because a big part of the movie is that they want to, but keep running into problems.

I liked this movie a lot. I’m sure I went into it biased because I’m a Kevin Smith fan, but so be it. I liked this just as much as any of his others, but time will have to pass to see where it might fall on the list. To get a perspective, here’s my rough list, which isn’t set in stone. It can change depending on which one I’ve seen most recently.

Clerks
Dogma
Chasing Amy
Jersey Girl
Clerks II
Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back

Mallrats (I do like this, but the others, I love)

Zack and Miri is more raunchy than Clerks II, but as sweet as Jersey Girl (shaddup, I love Jersey Girl because it is very sweet). It’s a mixture that might not sit well with some of his fans (those who hated Jersey Girl) but maybe the raunch part of it, and oh my god, it’s VERY raunchy, will overcome their aversion to tenderness. It’s also, being a Kevin Smith film, very funny. IMO, of course. I certainly laughed, often.

Khadaji, come on, if you’re an Elizabeth Banks fan, you really do need to see this. She’s adorable! Yeah, ok, it does have a certain level of stupid, duh, but it’s a fun stupid, just because these people are so inept at doing something so seemingly simple. How hard is it to make a porno? Hard, for these guys. Partially because emotions keep getting in the way.

The acting is all good, and everybody looked like they were having a great time. Besides Rogan and Banks, it’s always fun to see Smith regulars Jason Mewes and Jeff Anderson. Justin Long (the doctor in Idiocracy) and Brandon Routh (Superman Returns) play off of each other wonderfully. It’s nice to see the very funny Craig Robinson in a bigger role. He was the fantastic “Doorman” in Knocked Up. There were lots of other smaller roles that stood out too.

My only problem with casting was that I had to try to keep down the bile when I realized that Tracy Lords was in the movie. She’s got a good role, but I hate her with the passion of a thousand suns. Not because she was a porno actress, but because she sold out a lot of people and got them into terrible trouble just to further her own career. I’m so happy the bitch has never become a big star, that I tolerate her presence in small roles, and this role was a pretty good one.

Basically, if you like movies such as Superbad, Knocked Up, 40 Year Old Virgin and the ilk, you’ll probably like this too.

Anyway, if anybody does go see it, stay through the credits!

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putting Chasing Amy above Mallrats is just ridiculous.

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So what? Put it in a spoiler box.

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Chasing Amy is in an entirely different universe than Mallrats. Mallrats is good, but Chasing Amy is perfect.

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I just wanted to say that I expected this movie to make me smile, but instead it made me laugh my fucking ass off. Absolutely hysterical.

And very sweet, almost innocent… in a sexually explicit sort of way.

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Like the stand-ins scene in Love Actually?

27

I finally saw it tonight. First I love it and it had one of the funniest laugh really hard out loud and the entire audience did too I have ever seen scenes. I really enjoyed it, I enjoyed the romantic part and *Jersey Girl *is the only Kevin Smith movie I did not love.

It was great, Elizabeth Banks was radiant and funny. Seth Rogen was at his best. Justin Long (Mac from the PC & Mac commercials) was over-the-top funny. I thought Mewes, Lords and Katie Morgan did well and pulled off some funny lines. Jeff Anderson was at his snarky best and whoever Craig Robinson is was very good as Delaney.

Does anyone know who the really drunk Pittsburgh Steeler fan was that wandered in? I thought it might have been Jack Black but I could not tell for sure.

Great movie!

Kevin did it; he made a really good movie without Jay and Silent Bob.

I’m going to an “Evening with Kevin Smith” next Friday with my wife. My kids will be at my sisters and I plan to drink a lot of coffee and try to stay to the end this time. If you like Smith, you have to at least rent the “Evening with Kevin Smith” DVDs that are out there and better yet try to go see him.

Jim

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Well, the first sentence of the review on CNN.com answers the question of whether or not they make a porno. If you’re a fan of the movie, however, you might not want to read the review.

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From what I’ve gathered, some people believe that children seeing the portion of the alphabet from N to R in a certain arrangement will cause them to spontaneously start blowing old men. This is all about protecting the children from seeing that accursed 5-letter word.

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Damn, that’s a cynical, mean-spirited review. They had a major mistake right off the bat, saying “The platonic duo, friends since high school…” when they’d been best friends since 1st grade. To me that’s a big difference. I would have viewed these two quite differently if I’d thought they’d only known each other for, really, a few years. Childhood friends have a different dynamic than high school/college buddies. But, whatever. There are a lot of spoilers in that review, and since the writer didn’t like the movie, it’s like he tosses off the spoilers and the whole review with his fingers holding his nose.

Ah well, it worked for me. It’s not brilliant or anything, and it’s not on the level of funny that Tropic Thunder is, but I enjoyed myself very much.

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pornq?

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Yes. No.

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Q-Porn - you know - gay porn featuring John de Lancie and Patrick Stewart…

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When you see a response like this, you know the poster does not have children…

“Daddy, what’s a porno?”

“Can I make one, too?”

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But how would little Billy or Susie even know that movie exists as long as their parents don’t nudge them and go “Wanna see Zack and Miri Make a Porno?”

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That was Tyler Labine, best known for his roles on the TV shows Reaper and Invasion.

What can I say? I thought it was terrible–all the laughs are telegraphed a mile away, all the sentiment is predictable and ham-fisted, and there’s nothing approaching 1/10th of the wit or insight or emotion of Chasing Amy. Banks is luminous (and deserves more lead roles), but Rogen’s been a lot better in just about anything else from the last 3 years and most of the rest of the cast is wasted. Smith obviously indulges in the superficial naughtiness of the premise, but the film is stultifyingly boring in how non-edgy it truly is. Not Superbad, just super bad.

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Thanks for the Tyler Labine part, that is why he was familar to me and reminded me of Black. I know him as Sock from *Reaper * where he plays a Jack Black style character.

I am surprised by your review especially as *Superbad *was the most overrated boring movie I have seen in years. So I guess we could not be more opposite in our views of these two movies.

Now I have not seen *Pineapple Express *but that was because the preview looked so bad. What movie beside *Superbad * did you like him in?

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I saw it on Friday and I liked it. I thought it was funny and I loved Zach and Miri’s “porno scene” it was HOT. For some reason, I really enjoy Elizabeth Banks. I remember IMBDing her after 40 Year Old Virgin, her bit character really stood out for me in the film. She is nearly luminous in Zack & Miri - her “afterglow” happiness after their first time is really sweet.

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They were running commercials during the World Series. Kids watch baseball. Of course, as I alluded to above, you still get questions like “What’s erectile disfunction?” during baseball games.

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Not an enormous amount, is my gues, since:

1.) There were plenty of porno theaters in similar-sized cities in the US at the time

2.) There were military bases nearby that would provide a constant, VHS-less stream of customers

3.) The SLC government was pretty dogged about proseuting not only the porno theaters, but also the “girlie bars” (They couldn’t take off anything beyond a bikini, but they were essentially stripper bars) on any sort of lead – including possible asbestos tiling.