Trailer remakes seem to be all the rage now — the Dark Knightwith kids clip I posted last month is getting a lot of mileage lately — and this week Indy Mogul premiered its parody of the full Pineapple Expresstrailer, for a fake movie titled “Banana Express.” Here’s the quick synopsis: a gorilla (Seth Rogen) and his banana dealer (James Franco) go on the run after the former witnesses a zookeeper murdering a fellow gorilla.
It may not be the funniest thing you see this week, but you have to give them credit for attempting to “ape” the Pineapple Express trailer shot for shot (Indy Mogul links to the original trailer and welcomes you to compare the two videos) and for including their own parody of M.I.A.’s “Paper Planes” titled “Banana Peels & Bombs”, which can be downloaded from Indymogul.com. Think you could do better? In 36 hours? I’m anxious to see other trailer remakes and parodies, so bring ‘em on.
Rogen and Franco are hilarious in Pineapple Express, but the pothead to really watch out for is Danny McBride. Often relegated to brilliant and all-too-brief supporting roles, McBride stars in The Foot Fist Way, which is finally getting a gradual release thanks to Will Ferrell and Adam McKay. McBride’s magic lies in his ability to be a complete asshole 100% of the time on screen, while still charming the viewer. How does he do that?
ALSO, a call to Karina brings us back to the mid-twentieth century with some great television. What is it that makes AMC’s Mad Men so addictive? Need an excuse to not leave the house for the rest of the summer? Try TCM’s Summer Under the Stars.
Pineapple Express‘ Wednesday night opening broke two records: with its gross of $12.5 million, it had the best August Wednesday opening day ever. It has also now grossed more than every other film directed by David Gordon Green combined. His previous high grosser was All the Real Girls, which made about half a million dollars back in 2003. That’s right: in a single day, he beat his personal high score by a factor of 25. Of course, Pineapple also opened in 125 times as many theaters as Real Girls played in its widest release.
There’s really no way to calculate how much of that $12.5 million is due to the efforts of Green, and how much can be credited to the Judd Apatow brand name, to the combination of leads Seth Rogen and James Franco, or to the immortal Huey Lewis. So…cheers all around!
Typically we see red-band trailers arrive online after the green-band trailers show up in theaters. But so far we’ve seen two R-rated promos for Pineapple Expressyet still no sign of any cleaner, theatrically distributed version. And after watching this second trailer (actually the first promo was more just a clip than an actual trailer), I’m doubting whether the film could even have a broader, theatrically appropriate ad. Is the MPAA alright with marketing stoner movies to general audiences?
I decided to seek out the original trailer for the comparable Up in Smoke, and it turns out the thing was only approved for “restricted audiences.” Of course that was long ago, when theaters could run such ads (and America was less uptight).However, more recently, both Harold and Kumar Go to White Castleand its upcoming sequel Escape from Guantanamo feature references to marijuana in their “approved for all audiences” trailers, so it shouldn’t be too difficult for Pineapple Express to do the same. Sure, Pineapple Express seems to be even more about getting high, in nearly every scene of the movie in fact, but surely the people at Sony can manage to focus primarily on that lame, derivative, accidental-witness-of-a-murder plot, while also concentrating on the fact that this is a Judd Apatow production, starring newly minted comedy star Seth Rogen and Spider-Man vet James Franco and directed by critically acclaimed filmmaker David Gordon Green.
I guess they do have a long time to figure that out. The movie doesn’t come out until August 8.
Pineapple Express‘ Wednesday night opening broke two records: with its gross of $12.5 million, it had the 
