The plot centres around Saul and his client Dale Denton (Rogen). Denton is a process server – he tricks people into admitting their identities in order to serve them with subpoenas. When going to serve Ted Jones (Gary Cole), who turns out to be Saul’s supplier’s supplier, he witnesses Ted murder a man. He throws his joint filled with Pineapple Express weed out the window and speeds over to Saul’s house. Both think they’re okay until they realize that Pineapple Express is so rare that Ted only sold it to one middleman (Red, played by Danny McBride), who in turn only sold it to one dealer (Saul), who only sold it to one client… you guessed it, Dale. The trail is easy enough to track, so the go on the run, but not before Dale exclaims “We need to pack! Get the weed, food, snacks, fruit roll-ups!”

Their attempt at escape is horribly bungled as one might expect. Hitmen are after them, Red is quickly “coerced” into giving them up, their car won’t start, and they have no money and nowhere safe to go. They spend much of their escape time high as hell. Dale manages to alienate his high school girlfriend (Angie, played by Amber Heard) and her family, banishing them to a motel. During an attempt to apologize for his errors after a “near death experience”, Dale sobs tearfully to Angie on a payphone, at which point she tells him she wants to get married. Dale replies, “oh…. I made a mistake.” This is one of my absolute favourite lines of the movie.

The movie is about friendship, weed, the drug trade and hitmen. It really shows the bond between two men, Saul and Dale, forming and becoming stronger, albeit in an extremely weird situation. It mocks the stringent anti-marijuana laws in most of the world. It is a grown-up (though far from mature) version of Superbad, complete with violence and drugs. It does it all with style, great acting and laugh out loud moments.I haven’t seen a movie this funny in ages.

As previously expressed, James Franco does a fantastic job in the role of Saul Silver. He fills out the role really well. His voice, mannerisms, and facial expressions could not have been more perfect. This is not a powerful role, but a truly believable one, situation aside. Saul is definitely removed from traditional reality and demonstrates this through his quirky turns of phrase. Seth Rogen continues on his star streak with Dale Denton. He plays the part well. Dale experiences a range of emotions and does not handle them well at all, which certainly fits the situation.

All in all, this movie was completely worth seeing. It was stupendously funny, a true entertainment movie. The special effects scenes, explosions, and stunts throughout appealed to me, and no doubt would appeal to most. If you’re ready for a laugh, love to light up, or are a fan of Apatow or Rogen, I would more than recommend this movie.

And the plausibility is what renders it terrifying. I have honestly in my life, however short it may be thus far, seen acting talent like Heath Ledger as the Joker. This character leaves the realm of comic relief entirely and becomes utterly frightening, for he is first and foremost insane. He’s not a silly smiley man, he’s not a prankster wreaking havoc, he is entirely unpredictable and promotes chaos in all its forms. Please go see the movie. There are no words beyond my feeble attempt to describe how absolutely spectacular the whole production is.

I recently read this article analyzing the Joker’s love of chaos. The approach is very different from one I would have taken but I really see the author’s point. The article views the Joker as an “upholder of feminism”. Again, not my initial reaction, but very interesting. The Joker and Batman are polar opposites. Batman is the patriarchy – order, system and safety. He works to eliminate chaos in all its forms, from crime to corrupt authority. He upholds “the plan”, whatever the plan may be. The Joker very clearly stands for chaos; he states this on more than one occasion. He wants to have fun. That is his goal, to promote chaos to entertain himself. If Batman is the patriarchy, the oppressive restrictive order, and Joker is his opposite, than what is Joker? A feminist?

Don’t worry, I am not arguing here that Batman is anything but a hero. He certainly is, but you cannot argue that he promotes any order but the accepted status quo. The Joker yearns to drag this down and resurrect – what? So far it seems his sole aim is to change the status quo, to usher in a new era where there is no plan. Having seen the movie and viewed the Joker in all his epic glory, I would say he is well on his way. This is readily apparent in his destruction of Gotham’s “legitimate” hero, District Attorney Harvey Dent, played by Aaron Eckhart. He effectively drives Dent to the point where he can no longer be a part of the plan. His scars from an incident in the movie – if you don’t know what it is, I won’t give it away – disfigure his face and render him Two-Face, another well-known villian played in the original by Tommy Lee Jones. Two-Face is a split personality who kills on random chance. He flips a two-headed coin, one side with the face scarred, to decide whether the people he encounters will live or die. The Joker single-handedly caused Dent’s downfall from Symbol of Justice to Chance-Driven Villian. What a turn.

I eagerly await the next installment of the Batman series. If the Joker is to return, I cannot imagine that anyone could fill the big shoes left by Heath Ledger. In fact, I can’t wait to see The Dark Knight again for that performance and the formidable opposition of Christian Bale as Batman. Go see the movie, your perception of cinema will be forever changed.

First and foremost, I need to point out a massive problem with American health care. I think this sums it up nicely. In the United States, Viagra is covered by health insurance companies, but no form of birth control is. What a nice little hypocrisy. It’s cool for old dudes to be getting laid, just as long as they’re impregnating someone. If you want to watch a fun little (short I promise) clip of McCain failing epically at discussing the issue, click here. He avoids the issue like it was an interracial gay couple. America is more sexist than racist, I think we’ve seen that displayed many a time by now… You can only get what you need if you have a penis and behave accordingly. The thing is, they like to be really hush-hush about it. Want to see more blatant hypocrisy? What about the fact that McCain allegedly supports equal pay for equal work, but voted against a law that would allow workers to take legal action for wage discrimination? And what about the mommy wage gap? Statistics have shown that the more children a woman has, the less she gets paid. Talk about an oxymoron. Women don’t have any access to birth control, pregnancy tests (yes in some pharmacies they will even deny women pregnancy tests), Plan B, abortions or family planning… and yet, when they have children, they’re treated like lepers. What’s a girl supposed to do?

Stay the hell at home is what. People are only judged by society by the financial contributions they make. What about all the people that don’t make money? The mothers that raise the big-time bankers, lawyers and politicians (oh how we love those) are literally valued for nothing. In the current American economical system, they are just zeros. They don’t make money so they aren’t worth it. Recent studies, which I can’t cite because I can’t remember the name of but I’m sure you can find if you really want to, have shown that if stay-at-home moms were paid for the work they do they would make well over $100 000 per year. Excellent.

The paradoxes run on and on. They are hard to deal with and shocking on a daily basis. The one that gets to me most is victim blaming – the legal system saying that women are responsible for their own rapes. Think that people have a better attitude lately? Think again. How are women told to protect themselves? Dress a certain way, walk in certain places, carry a whistle. I ask you this: why is the burden of safety on women? Why is no one saying to the men that they have no right to treat women this way? Why has no one stepped up and said a person should be treated as a person, not a rape toy?

This is just the beginning of a humanist issue. Gender inequality still runs as rampant as racism. Please don’t fool yourselves. That said, do something about it. Speak up if something makes you uncomfortable. Tell people it’s not ok to talk down to you. Just be strong, be aware, and read the news… better yet, read as many versions of the news as you can, to try to find the truth, because everyone has a bias. Make sure you’re as informed as possible so you can form your own opinion. I have a bias too. I think that there are serious issues that need to be addressed now, on both a macro (governmental) and micro (person to person) basis.

“You must be the change you wish to see in the world.” – Mahatma Gandhi

Just a little update on McCain:

Here’s a lovely little quote from the New York Times:

I think that we’ve proven that both parents are important in the success of a family so, no I don’t believe in gay adoption.

I’m new. My name is Lindsay. I’m fun. I have a fish that was named Freddy when I brought him home but has since been called Piggy, Piggles, Squigglepig and Pigpig with as much love as possible. Freddy likes to swim upside-down in his tank, make piles with his gravel and bury the food he doesn’t like (and he is very sure of and consistent with his tastes) in those piles of gravel after rolling them into little tubes. He is quite the inexplicable fish. I am completely in love with him and he’s a great companion. I haven’t eaten meat in over 4 years. I like purple, toast, enthralling books, conspiracies, photography, stories, expression, language, and dreaming and thought.

My purse is leopard print and covered in rhinestones. It contains gum, a rubber duck, an old-school hand-held fan, a notebook, a pen, a sparkly green wallet, a swiss army knife, a book called Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk, a nail-polish-painted cell phone, a blue digital camera, some info about my local Y, a mint, some Spongebob Squarepants tissue, and a rainbow umbrella.