Zack and Miri Make a Porno.

"Kevin Smith's movies may not have a lot of artistry - to update an old review of Chasing Amy, he's now directed eight feature films without ever losing his amateur status - but they do have tremendous faith in art," writes Paul Matwychuk. "The most appealing aspect of Smith's career has always been the way this overweight minimum-wage slave from New Jersey, without any Hollywood connections, managed to film his way out of poverty and obscurity on the strength of nothing but gumption, self-confidence, and a tremendous flair for dick jokes. It's tempting, then, to look at Smith's latest comedy, Zack and Miri Make a Porno, as a kind of disguised autobiography."

Smith's "predicament is just one part of a larger problem facing many filmmakers in the field of R-rated comedy," writes Dave Itzkoff in the New York Times: "It is nearly impossible for them to make their pot-smoking, breast-baring (but heartfelt!) movies without in some way encroaching on the raunchy (yet tender!) turf that [Judd] Apatow already owns."

Updated through 11/2.

"[H]ats off to him for being savvy enough to go for a piece of the Apatow action!" David Edelstein in New York: "Too bad he doesn't rise to the occasion."

"Zack and Miri Make a Porno doesn't offend as much it disappoints, revealing yet again in Smith a distinctive voice with little to say and, even worse, one willing to sacrifice rarer talents (a feeling for emotive wavelengths) in favor of the ones (pothead in-jokery, hipster hostility) that pad the walls of fanboy cultism." Fernando F Croce in Slant: "The characters may be able to get off on camera, but viewers hoping for an expansive collision between the sensibilities of director and star will end up with blue balls."

"Reached by phone on the set of the Judd Apatow-directed dramedy Funny People..., Seth Rogen sounded pretty much exactly like the potty-mouthed, pop culture-spouting slacker he plays on film: dropping f-bombs, talking pornography and Star Wars in equal measure and admitting his willingness to do full-frontal nudity in Kevin Smith's latest movie, Zack and Miri Make a Porno," reports Chris Lee for the Los Angeles Times. That scene didn't happen, by the way. As for The Green Hornet, to be directed by Stephen Chow, "We're rewriting it right now with a lot of Stephen's notes and ideas. We wanted a director to come on and bring his own sensibilities to it."

Interviews with Smith: Jason Guerrasio (Filmmaker) and Peter Sobczynski (Hollywood Bitchslap).

Earlier: Reviews from Toronto and Austin.

Update: The Playlist finds that the "soundtrack has some decent tunes on it. Sort of."

Update, 10/28: Alonso Duralde retraces the careers of Smith and Apatow at MSNBC.

Updates, 10/29: "Amiable and engaging in person and a filmmaker for whom comic and movie nerds so desperately want to root, Smith makes two kinds of movies," writes Robert Wilonsky in the Voice: "romantic comedies and bromantic comedies, with Chasing Amy - his one legitimately great movie - the crossover hybrid hit. They're all decidedly conventional affairs, save for the detours into gross-out juvenilia that, the older Smith gets, seem less sincere and feel more like pandering to the audience that goes to his movies solely to walk out with a couple of lines they can quote to each other on the ride home."

"Smith's reliance on the same old reference-heavy raunch is a classic case of overcompensating; he's a Jersey loser-jock embarrassed by his sentimental streak," writes Henry Stewart in the L Magazine.

"[I]t's a lovely, naughty little movie that allows writer-director Kevin Smith to indulge his twin penchants for scatological sex talk and heartfelt slacker romance" and "a laugh-packed and tenderhearted tale that explores the accidental crossing of the line between having sex and making love," writes Alonso Duralde at MSNBC.

"[I]t's hard to imagine this film succeeding on any level without Mr Rogen and Ms Banks as the leads," writes Sara Vilkomerson in the New York Observer. "The two of them share a natural chemistry, and while the film has some clunky moments and a couple of beats-off jokes leading up to the, um, climax of the film, when Zack and Miri inevitably get together (in quite an unusual fashion), the movie takes a surprising turn from the somewhat crass to heartwarming."

More interviews with Smith: Erik Davis (Cinematical) and Sean O'Neal (AV Club).

Updates, 10/31: "'I don't know bleep about directing,' Smith once confided to me. 'But I'm a bleeping good writer.'" Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times: "He is."

"The movie wants to insist that pornography is a jolly, innocuous pursuit, but also to take refuge in a sincere, romantic traditionalism that is antithetical to the cynical, often playful sexual ethos of pornography," writes AO Scott in the New York Times. "The 'porno' remains unfinished, and so does Zack and Miri, having - like most pornography, interestingly enough - thrown away an imaginative premise to get down to predictable, mechanical business. It's as if Mr Smith were a plumber who knocked at your door and then, against all reasonable expectations, insisted on fixing the sink."

"Think of it as When Harry Fucked Sally," suggests Hank Sartin in Time Out New York.

"The fact that Smith is just about my age, has a sense of humor that's oddly in touch with mine, and has a background that's eerily similar to my own means I'm always rooting for the guy to succeed," concedes Scott Weinberg at Cinematical. "And I think his latest comedy is about to help him succeed big-time."

"I'm afraid there's no one to blame but writer-director Kevin Smith if viewers walk out of Zack and Miri never wanting to have sex again," writes Slate's Dana Stevens. "A cult figure among the Adult Swim crowd, Smith has always been better at the foulmouthed and frankly sophomoric (Clerks, Mallrats) than the wistful and sincere (Chasing Amy, Jersey Girl). This movie ups the ante in both categories; it wants its audience to guffaw at dick jokes and swoon over the perfect kiss. That combination of raunch and heart isn't impossible to achieve - at his best, Apatow can pull it off - but it requires a nimbler pen and a sweeter soul than Kevin Smith brings to this movie."

For Noel Murray, writing at the AV Club, "it's nice to be able to break from the ritual of Smith-bashing for a change and say that his latest movie, Zack And Miri Make A Porno, is honestly enjoyable."

"At 38, the grand old man of raunch talk has figured out how to make a movie that's sweet, funny and (a little) sexy," writes Richard Corliss in Time.

"Zack and Miri isn't a movie about making a porno; it's a movie about making movies," writes Neil Morris in the Independent Weekly. "Smith sees an extension of himself in Zack, whose slovenly existence springs to life only once he discovers his passion for filmmaking." Oh, and: "One person saves Zack and Miri Make a Porno: Elizabeth Banks."

"For all the potty-mouthed dialogue, gross-out gags, general licentiousness and rampant supporting role nudity gleefully strewn throughout Zack and Miri Make a Porno, this finally feels like a blithely puritanical tale, limpid, shackled to tired convention and extolling an emotionally juvenile foundation for love," argues the Vue Weekly.

"It's too bad the movie doesn't have the balls to back up its risqué concept with any new insight into love or relationships," sighs Paul Constant in the Stranger.

"I found potty-mouth fatigue setting in pretty quickly," writes Salon's Stephanie Zacharek. "The actors, game in every way, at least try to give the appearance of being casual and spontaneous: Banks, in particular, is always fun to watch - her eyes have that great, demented gleam. And Rogen is simply Rogen: At some point he's going to have to play something other than the schleppy, average guy who lands the gorgeous babe, but his comic timing is certainly adequate for this kind of material."

"Both High School Musical 3 and Zack and Miri Make a Porno set out to corrupt our youth," warns Armond White in the New York Press. "The Disney film, second sequel to the 2006 cable TV and CD blockbuster, aims capitalist tripe at unsuspecting teenagers, while Kevin Smith's extended sex skit trashes whatever is left of adult romantic innocence."

More interviews with Smith: Chris Lee (Los Angeles Times) and Marc Savlov (Austin Chronicle).

Update, 11/2: "How does a man who has no idea how to frame or light a shot, or structure a screenplay, or write a convincing conversation, or direct actors continue to be a mainstay of indie cinema?" asks Elbert Ventura in Reverse Shot. "Perhaps the charge is unfair, as I haven't been his most diligent follower. After 1999's Dogma, an ugly, lame, and utterly stupid movie inexplicably hailed by some, I gave up on Smith, the goodwill left over from 1994's Clerks - a revelation for this teenage New Jerseyan new to film geekdom - all exhausted. But if Zack and Miri Make a Porno is anything to go by, I've missed nothing."

Posted by dwhudson at October 27, 2008 1:48 AM