Cheech and Chong’s Up In Smoke 30th Anniversary Edition DVD Review
Posted by Leonard Hayhurst on 10.04.2007
Still Smoking After All These Years
CAST
Cheech Marin: Pedro De Pacas
Tommy Chong: Anthony “Man” Stoner
Strother Martin: Mr. Stoner
Edie Adams: Mrs. Stoner
Tom Skerritt: Strawberry
Stacy Keach: Sgt. Stedenko
Christopher Joy: Curtis
June Fairchild: Ajax Lady
Mills Watson: Harry
Karl Johnson: Clyde
Rick Beckner: Murphy
Zane Buzby: Jade East
Wally Ann Wharton: Debbie
Director: Lou Adler
Written by Cheech and Chong
Ellen Barkin has her film debut in an unaccredited part playing a guitar
TECH SPECS
The film is in widescreen with audio tracks in 2.0 and 5.1 surround sound. The songs really thump without drowning out the rest of the audio, but other than that it’s not a film where you need a top of the line transfer. Subtitles and audio are also available in French. The movie runs 85 minutes and was released in 1978. The rating is R and if I have to tell you why, then you have no idea what this movie is about.
THE MOVIE
Pedro picks up Man hitchhiking and they instantly become fast friends. This is due to Man playing drums and Pedro having a band in need of a drummer. Additionally, they are both big time stoners. They have trouble scoring weed and almost get involved in a police bust at Pedro’s cousin’s house. They then get deported to attend the wedding of another cousin. To get back to the states from Mexico they pick up a van to drive back for Cheech’s uncle. They land the wrong van and wind up in a van made entirely of a new type of marijuana. Narco agents are hot on their tail, led by Sgt. Stedenko. Pedro and Man pick up Jade and Debbie who tell them about a battle of the bands. While competing inside, the cops find the van and torch it. You can probably guess what happens to people when you burn an entire van made of pot within an enclosed area.
A major treat is all the great actors who pop up in bit parts in the film. Strother Martin has one of the all time great cameos as Chong’s angry father. Cheech reveals on the commentary that Martin’s few seconds of screen time was so memorable that bands were created named “The Finkelstein Shit Kid” and “United Fruit.” Stacy Keach is just genius as the tough ass sergeant who is just as big a bonehead as his underlings. When he finds the Ajax he thinks it’s the highest grade coke he’s ever seen. Keach’s character is the classic know-it-all that doesn’t know anything. Skerritt could have been given more to do, but he makes his strung out Vietnam vet character work.
The bottom line is that this movie is flat out hilarious in all ways. It’s filled with classic lines and scenes that have long out lived the seventies drug culture the movie is spoofing. People who are actual stoners revere this as one of the greatest movies of all time. Even those who aren’t into the drug culture will still find plenty to laugh at. Cheech and Chong incorporate bits they had honed over ten years before the movie was made. Their timing and delivery is impeccable. Their material has that ‘smart-stupid’ vibe that is so popular today along with treading on the mundane and realistic of the average layman. They’re in on the joke, but hide it so well. The concept of having an entire van made of weed is just so far out genius. Throw in that the two schmucks don’t realize what they are driving and are trying to score weed is so rich with irony. Then you have the girl who snorts Ajax and thinks it’s the greatest high of her life, which is just subtle commentary on how the culture and the mindset is more important than the drugs themselves. There is really a lot in between the lines with commentary being made against both the world of ‘squares’ and the hippies, yet it’s overall so funny that all the underneath stuff just slides through.
This whole movie is not about getting high, it’s about the world of getting high. While the storyline and plot is needlessly convoluted and aimless, the world they have created is not straightforward and linear. The plot just serves as a loose framework for Cheech and Chong to deliver laughs and explore this warped world they’ve created. While comedies today are all fast cuts and close-ups, this movie has a languid pace and wider scope. Scenes are allowed to play out almost in the vain of a classic Hollywood film. The commentary revealed that they didn’t know what they were doing as amateur filmmakers and that was probably a good thing. At heart, Cheech, Chong and director Adler have a keen sense of what simply does and doesn’t work in making their target audience laugh. Cheech and Chong would do several other films, but never reach the level of creativity, freshness and the raw feel of the different achieved here.
EXTRAS
Commentary with Cheech Marin and director Lou Adler: There are a lot more dead spots here than there should be. Chong being involved probably would have enlivened proceedings and filled up those blanks. Adler and Marin crack up way too much at their own movie. What is there is interesting as Adler and Marin fill in a lot of interesting background on individual scenes and elements. For instance, Jack Nicholson owned the Volkswagen that Chong drives in the beginning with the Rolls Royce grille. Joan Baez’s favorite character in the movie is Judge Gladys Dykes. Quentin Tarantino took a lot of elements from this movie for his movies in the rhythm and concept of dialogue delivery.
Deleted Scenes
All deleted scenes include commentary with Marin and Adler. They say that everything worked, but they cut things to get the film down to a certain running time and keep a certain flow.
*Pedro and Man: Extra bits of Pedro and Man in the car at the beginning. This includes Man commenting that Pedro’s car looks like a pussy inside and Pedro giving Man a joint that contains Hamburger Helper.
*Red Birds: Harry Dean Stanton plays a bailiff who sells Pedro and Man Red Birds before going into see the judge. This explains why Chong was so messed up in the courtroom scene.
*Leslie Horwinkle: Chong plays a bum put in the same cell as Pedro and Man.
*Munchies: Sgt. Sedenko makes his unit read their homework to him. They discuss the concept of the munchies. Sedenko has slides of a cop who smoked reefer to show the effect of the munchies, but there are no slides. On commentary they said they were going to add pictures later, but never wound up using the footage.
*Momma’s Bedroom: More of Pedro and Man goofing off in the police station and Sedenko and his men trying to radio in. The title of the scene comes from Man saying that the van was last seen in the vicinity of “your momma’s bedroom.”
*Pop Stoner: Man’s parents show up at the station to bail him out. His dad is drunk. On commentary they say they’re spoofing Rebel Without a Cause and that the fur coat being worn by the mother belonged to Adler.
*Hippies and Valium: A quick line of Harry saying that the dead police dog could sniff out “half a valium up a hippie’s ass.”
*Ajax Lady: More with the girl who snorted the Ajax tweaking.
Lighting It Up-A Look Back at Up in Smoke: Cheech and Chong talk about how they first met and started working together. They started in Canada and eventually moved to Los Angeles. They had a hard time finding a manager and getting pointed in the right direction until they met Lou Adler. Adler chimes in. Adler got them into albums. “Dave’s Not Here” was their first big hit. They then jump to talking about the making of the movie. It was low budget and shot in less than a month. They talk about all the actors they got to do bit parts. They learned that they couldn’t be high while filming the movie or they would never get anything done. They discuss the punk song at the end and how they incorporated the growing tend of punk rock with their traditional hippie and stoner bits. None of them thought the film would endure the way it has. Just a talking heads segment that’s a little dry.
”Earache My Eye” animated music video featuring Alice Bowie: The “Earache My Eye” bit set to low rent computer animation. Chong does the voice of the kid with Cheech doing the dad. The animated visage of the dad is Stacy Keach. Just kind of a weird presentation. They must have been high when they came up with it.
Cheech and Chong’s the Man Song: A conglomeration of clips from the movie of Cheech and Chong saying the word man. The word is uttered in the film 295 times. Man, that’s a long of mans.
Vintage Radio Spots: Two radio promos for the film. One features Horrendo Revolver and the other has Saydis Saydat. Revolver is a lisping reporter who interviews Cheech and Chong as two youths who just saw the movie. In the second spot Chong plays a reporter interviewing an Arab prince voice by Cheech who wants to see Up in Smoke. Some more bad animation plays with the tracks.
Theatrical Trailer: An announcer compares Cheech and Chong to the comedy duos of Laurel and Hardy in the thirties, Abbott and Costello in the forties and Martin and Lewis in the fifties. They skip the sixties, which I would give to Rowan and Martin. Clips from the movie with standard trailer narration are pretty funny. I almost think it was done purposely. Also included is a preview for Blades of Glory.
The 411: Despite the film being dated and appealing to a certain culture, it is still flat out hilarious. This is thanks in large part to the great comedic chops, chemistry and energy of Cheech and Chong. Having a really solid cast for a movie like this in other roles also helps to pull proceedings along. The commentary and interview segments could have been better, but the release offers a nice mix of extras. The movie alone is worth having and it’s highly recommended to anyone who enjoys ‘dumb-smart’ comedies.
