Knocked Up Movie (2007)

Despite its provocative title, Knocked Up movie (2007) is an unconvincing love story with hardly any likeable characters. The cast can’t wring many laughs out of the dumb script which relies on shock value and gross-out comedy. Directed by Judd Apatow, who brought us the equally hyped-up Forgetting Sarah Marshall.

The story: Alison Scott works at “E! Television” and has just gotten a promotion. To celebrate she goes nightclubbing with her older married sister Debbie. While at the bar Alison meets slacker Ben Stone and they start chatting. After lots of drinks and dancing, she takes Ben home and the two end up between the sheets. They have sex without using protection and eight weeks later she discovers she’s pregnant.

Pros:

• Kristen Wiig displays a sharp comic touch as television executive Jill who seethes with jealousy when Alison gets a promotion
• Katherine Heigl does her best with the awful script

Cons:

• The ridiculous premise expects us to believe that career driven Alison would sleep with stoner Ben
• The fact that she would have a baby with him seems more implausible
• Alison’s pregnancy is unplanned but the option of abortion is never explored
• It would have been interesting to know her reasons for keeping the baby
• Nothing is mentioned about the financial struggles of being a single mother
• Ben’s witless friends are a crude and tasteless bunch, constantly high, viewers may also have to be high to find their lines funny
• The insensitive gag about Stephen Hawking has to be their lowest point
• Surely Alison earns a good salary at “E!” to be able to afford her own pad so why then does she live in her sister’s pool house?
• The idea that Alison is not appalled by Ben’s deadbeat friends is bizarre
• We aren’t told anything about Alison’s past boyfriends so it’s difficult to know if her mismatch with Ben is a plot device
• The movie is a guys’ eye view of pregnancy and a fantasy that successful, intelligent women will find unemployed, overweight goof-offs attractive

The biggest problem with Knocked Up is it’s premise. Who in their right mind would believe that Alison would sleep with Ben, yet alone have a baby with him? It’s so preposterous that it’s difficult to care if they’ll even end up together. Also, the fact that Alison doesn’t run a mile from his slacker friends beggars belief.

Heigl is ok, but she’s hampered by Apatow’s poorly written script while Rogen isn’t very memorable and is better in supporting roles. The script has lots of profanity, bodily function jokes and dialogue that’s offensive to women. You might find it funny if you’re drunk or if you happen to be a teenage boy.

The movie’s pacing is very slow thanks to a running time of over 2 hours, 30 minutes of which needs to be on the cutting room floor. There’s too many scenes of Ben’s friends. How many times do we need to see them sitting around uttering juvenile dialogue?

As in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Kristen Wiig comes out best. The movie lifts a little when she’s on screen which unfortunately isn’t often enough.

Most Knocked Up movie reviews were overwhelmingly positive which is a complete mystery to this reviewer. If you manage to get through it, the only question you’ll ask yourself is: why does Hollywood keep green-lighting Judd Apatow projects?

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