PAUL

“PAUL” (Simon Pegg, Nick Frost & (voice of) Seth Rogen)

Just as Simon Pegg was getting to the point of being given the first name, ‘Heywhateverhappenedto?’ he bounces back with what is clearly his funniest film.
‘Paul’ is exactly what I was hoping it would be – a return to the Simon Pegg that made the humorous parodies “Shaun Of The Dead” and “Hot Fuzz” (the former being the better of the two) as ‘Paul’ sends up science fiction/alien flicks in the same silly low-brow way that ‘Shaun Of The Dead’ skewered zombie films. The difference being, I laughed almost continuously at ‘Paul’.
It doesn’t start off well though. When I saw Pegg & Frost (co-writers of the script as well as co-stars) playing ‘elderly’ English nerds vacationing in America by visiting Comic-Con and every infamous UFO site in their ‘Traveling Beagle’ RV, I was worried. I thought this film wasn’t aiming at me as its target audience. But then I started laughing and I rarely stopped. Yes, this is the funniest movie since ‘The Hangover’. The question now is - will I laugh when I view it again?
Pegg & Frost are Graham & Clive; middle-aged geeks but with a goal – Clive has written a science fiction comic book (Sorry, I refuse to use the term graphic novel) with Graham’s illustrations. The cover features a female alien creature with three breasts – a bit that gets over-milked (If you’ll pardon the expression) but I have to admit I chuckled at the final “3 titties... awesome!” quip.
They show the comic to every geek they encounter, including a famous sci-fi writer played by Jeffrey Tambor.
Graham & Clive encounter every form of American misfit you can imagine but the one that changes their lives is when Paul, a stereotypical short green creature with large eyes and an ‘E.T.-like’ torso crashes in front of them.
As a CIA agent (Jason Bateman) pursues them, aided by two local agents - Paul, Graham & Clive become buddies.
Apparently Paul’s usefulness has run its course (Steven Speilberg has made a film about every one of his stories) so now they’ve decided to dissect the alien to find out how he ticks.
There are childish fart jokes and crude R-rated lines like “Get your damn hands off my (bleeping) nuts!” but they work simply because the script is so full of funny lines. It also helps that Seth Rogen is heard but not seen – as the voice of Paul it is clearly his best ‘acting’ to date.
SNL’s Kristine Wiig plays the daughter of an RV park manager who joins the trio... well, I say ‘joins’ because kidnapped is such an ugly word, and she is another bright spot, given plenty of R-rated language to spew as a deeply religious woman who is shone the light of truth via Paul’s ability to transfer his knowledge to others.
It took me a while to place John Carrol Lynch as her father since he has hair! To those who watched the Drew Carey Show, Lynch played Drew’s large, bald and gay older brother.
Like ‘Hall Pass’, the laughs are cheap and stupid - but it did make me laugh, scoring a 57 on my ‘Laugh-o-Meter’.
I told my wife as we sat in our seats, “I’m hoping this is Simon Pegg returning to what he does best.” And it was.