Dir. Danny Leiner, 2004, USA, 88 mins
Cast: John Cho, Kal Penn
With a change of name from its original US title (Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle being its product-placement heavy moniker across the pond), Harold and Kumar Get The Munchies follows the exploits of t wo twenty -something stoner roommates. Harold (Cho) a Korean American investment banker and Kumar (Penn) an Indian American medical school candidate go through a life changing journey when, on the search for the ultimate munchies, they spend a night roaming the state of New Jersey in search of White Castle hamburgers.
Given this synopsis, things initially don't look so good. Despite the cult status of the Cheech and Chong series, the stoner comedy is a sub-genre that tends to attract a smaller than niche crowd at best. Like a joke that you have to be spaced out to enjoy, there is a chance that much of the humour could fall flat for a sober audience. Couple this with the fact that Danny Leiner's previous directorial effort was Dude, Where's My Car? then there is seemingly no hope for this film. So why does it work so well?
Bereft of wit and containing crude and often sick humour, Harold and Kumar Get The Munchies is the modern day equivalent of the Animal House and Porky's brand of bawdy comedy, a simple road movie in which the heroes are intelligent slackers, anybody who lives in the city is self-obsessed and everybody outside the city is an ugly hillbilly racist, redneck. The women are thinly sketched caricatures, mainly present to be lusted after, which sadly is to be expected in a film of this particular genre.
What the film offers are jokes that you feel mildly guilty for laughing at, silly moments of daft inanity and gasp out loud horror. An attack by a rabid racoon is humorous but then the creature vomits blood on our heroes. It's funnier than it sounds but as gross out moments go, it is well within the top ten.
The leads are notable for being ethnic actors with the film's promotional material pre-empting our lack of familiarity with them by using the tag lines: John Cho "That Asian Guy From American Pie" and Kal Penn "That Indian guy from Van Wilder".
This casting works brilliantly as Kumar, who should be the stereotypical hard working Indian son, and Harold, who should be the put upon banker, overturn traditional stereotypical roles.
Initial fears that a tedious comedy with sporadic cries of "Far out man!" might be the order of the day, are quickly quashed because, despite the central theme of dope smoking, the vast majority of the film is a buddy yarn with various scenes only tenuously connected. The sketch style of the film helps move the action along quite agreeably, with the occasional poor scene more often than not quickly making way for a better one.
An in-joke about the actor Neil Patrick Harris (Doogie Howser) is a comic highlight despite his questionable level of audience recognition in the UK, Harris is game enough to send up his image and provides some of the film's biggest laughs.
Harold And Kumar Get The Munchies will be by no means regarded as a classic in years to come. It can barely be regarded as anything other than a guilty pleasure now; but see the film with a large audience (preferably on a Saturday night) and it elevates to a huge success despite being as disposable as a White City Burger carton.
Jonathan Wilkins
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