Harold and Kumar

I had low expectations going into my viewing of this film. In fact, I reveled in the idea that I would watch this movie and then be able to tell other people who like it how mediocre or flat-out bad it was (Note: I took great pleasure in doing this for Anchorman and especially Napoleon Dynamite).

But something funny happened on my way to disliking Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle. I started legitimately laughing. It began with Kumar's interview with Fred Willard and the first elevator scene with Maria (awkward, but plausible situations are amusing to me, partially because I experience them a lot). Overall the movie had a good sensibility and did not go overboard with obvious jokes that just aren't funny (there were some of these, but again, not too many). This film was in a vein similar to Half Baked, another stoner cult classic.

The standout scene for me was Kumar's dream sequence with the bag of weed. It was creative and hilarious. The best part was when the bag of weed wife gets Kumar coffee while he's going over his accounting, and Kumar throws it in the weed bag's face (but then he "comforts his wife"). I also enjoyed the "extreme" sports guys. When one guy called the other guy Extreme Sports Punk #1, that was a clever little joke that probably went unnoticed by many. And of course Neil Patrick Harris was excellent.

For once I was wrong about a comedy like this. In this case, I happily admit defeat to a movie that was funny.