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Zack and Miri Make a Porno
The Weinstein Company
MPAA RATING: R on appeal for strong crude sexual content including dialogue, graphic nudity and pervasive language
Starring
Seth Rogen,
Elizabeth Banks,
Craig Robinson,
Traci Lords,
Katie Morgan,
Ricky Mabe,
Jeff Anderson,
and
Jason Mewes
Lifelong friends and roommates Zack and Miri are facing hard times and a mountain of debt. When the electricity and plumbing get cut off, they seize upon the idea of making a homegrown porno movie for some quick cash, enlisting the help of their friends. The two vow that having sex will not ruin their friendship. But as filming begins, what started out as a business proposition between friends turns into something much more. (The Weinstein Company)
| GENRE(S): |
Comedy
|
Drama
|
Romance
|
| WRITTEN BY: |
Kevin Smith
|
| DIRECTED BY: |
Kevin Smith
|
| RELEASE DATE: |
DVD: February 3, 2009
Theatrical: October 31, 2008
|
| RUNNING TIME: |
102 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: |
USA |
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
78
Austin Chronicle
Marjorie Baumgarten
Smith gives the appearance of wanting to provoke, but along with his smuttiness, he wears his heart on his sleeve.
75
Chicago Tribune
Michael Phillips
Zack and Miri has a bright, chipper look to it, thanks to cinematographer Dave Klein, a frequent Smith colleague. Wintertime in Pittsburgh never looked so good.
75
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks make a lovable couple; she's pretty and goes one-for-one on the bleep language, and Rogen, how can I say this, is growing on me, the big lug.
75
Rolling Stone
Peter Travers
Naughty and nice is a killer-hard combo to pull off. Stick with Rogen and Banks. They rock it.
75
ReelViews
James Berardinelli
For two-thirds of its running length, Zack and Miri is vintage Smith - profane humor that knows no boundaries and obeys no rules. What's most amazing about Smith's barrage of hard-R jokes isn't the range of subjects he covers, but how few of them "miss."
75
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Noel Murray
The film is clumsily unfunny at times--particularly when Smith makes tone-deaf efforts at gay-and black-themed comedy--and it's occasionally gross just for the sake of being gross.
75
San Francisco Chronicle
Peter Hartlaub
Along with the awkward romantic exchanges that always seem to find their way into Smith's movies, there's also a sweetness that you don't often see in films that average multiple f-words per minute.
75
Portland Oregonian
Marc Mohan
As in many of Smith's earlier movies, the moments of ostensibly genuine emotion aren't nearly as convincing as the moments of juvenile obscenity and quasi-homophobia.
75
New York Post
Kyle Smith
The funniest movie of Smith's I've seen. It's "When Harry Did Sally."
75
Miami Herald
Rene Rodriguez
Smith's funniest, sharpest and most polished movie to date. It also is his most mature and emotionally engaging picture, even if it happens to contain one of the grossest sight gags I've ever encountered in a mainstream Hollywood film.
70
Chicago Reader
J.R. Jones
The mainstream acceptance of porn has also disarmed Smith's formerly outrageous humor, though there's a warm "Boogie Nights"-style vibe to the little family of oddballs Zack and Miri recruit to help them.
70
Variety
Todd McCarthy
It would be too much to say that what Smith has come up with here is inspired, but it is pretty funny and very energetic.
67
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Sean Axmaker
Zack and Miri is funny, and Rogen is a natural as Smith's alter-ego, spewing profane dialogue like he was born to it.
63
Boston Globe
Ty Burr
Rudely silly rather than transgressively shocking, Zack and Miri is the sort of bawdy but fundamentally decent farce you could take Grandma to, provided Grandma were familiar with the oeuvre of Traci Lords.
63
TV Guide
Perry Seibert
Zack & Miri stand out as Kevin Smith's most thoroughly representative film -- both for better and for worse.
60
Empire
Simon Crook
Crude, hilarious, if a little corny, Smith's latest hardcore comedy is right on the money shot.
60
The Hollywood Reporter
Kirk Honeycutt
Despite shortcomings and implausibility linked to their roles as written, Rogen and Banks come off with surprising charm and grace.
60
Time
Richard Corliss
Romantic comedies often make do on flimsy premises, but this one is thinner than Kate Moss and nuttier than an Almond Joy.
60
Film Threat
Pete Vonder Haar
The movie's front-loaded with puerile, junior high humor (and, admittedly, several laugh out loud moments), which is fine, but all this still followed by an increasingly awkward and clichéd third act.
60
Village Voice
Robert Wilonsky
The biggest titters at a recent preview screening came during a scene in which Mewes shows off his dick--as though, at last! Still, how Jason Segal of him. Does Apatow always get there first?
50
Slate
Dana Stevens
This movie could have been an effervescent neo-screwball romance, "Bringing Up Baby" with nut-sack jokes. So there's no blaming the subject matter for the fact that Zack and Miri feels so dispiritingly graceless.
50
Washington Post
Neely Tucker
This was originally rated NC-17, and somehow, I'm thinking that version will survive on DVD.
50
USA Today
Claudia Puig
Longs to be a smutty film with a heart of gold. Instead, it's a funny concept whose execution does not live up to its potential.
50
Philadelphia Inquirer
Carrie Rickey
By the halfway mark, Rogen's performance, like his voice, is less cuddly than grating, and the carbonated giggle that is Elizabeth Banks grows flat. This one's for the Smith cultists.
50
The New York Times
A.O. Scott
In spite of its sometimes tiresome, sometimes amusing lewdness, follows a gee-whiz romantic-comedy formula that would not be out of place on the Disney Channel.
50
New York Daily News
Elizabeth Weitzman
The moments when "Z&M;" works are, almost without exception, the ones that are more sweet than shocking. All the rest, frankly, feel like Apatow Lite.
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Liam Lacey
Like a lot of things about Zack and Miri, the porn title feels like it's trying too hard.
50
The New Yorker
David Denby
Kevin Smith turns out to be reverent after all: he wants to separate true love from mere copulating for money, but his story mixes romance and porn so inextricably that he seems confused, and the movie trips over its own conceits.
42
Entertainment Weekly
Lisa Schwarzbaum
A Smith production is always noisy, shambling, and liberally smutty on the outside while conservatively gooey on the inside.
40
New York Magazine
David Edelstein
It's written and directed by Kevin Smith--and hats off to him for being savvy enough to go for a piece of the Apatow action! Too bad he doesn't rise to the occasion.
40
Salon.com
Stephanie Zacharek
The jokes are forced, almost mechanical, in their crudeness.
30
Wall Street Journal
Joe Morgenstern
It's really dumb, even though it starts promisingly and continues, in a self-infatuated way, to consider itself quite bright.
25
Baltimore Sun
Michael Sragow
Smith appears to have poured his creative energy into the cheerful come-on of the title and left nothing in reserve for the movie. He fails to wring any memorable comedy from shoestring porno filmmakers because his own filmmaking is just as amateurish and slovenly.
 The average user rating for this movie is 7.0 (out of 10) based on 79 User Votes
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