'Knocked Up” is the triumphant (cautionary?) tale of the beauty who wore beer goggles one night at the club and the geek lucky enough to be the target of her misguided (right minded?) affections.

Which leads to the title of this comedic film — “Knocked Up” — an absolute laugh riot and one of the best films of 2007.

The gruff man-child Seth Rogan (Steve Carell’s buddy in “The 40-Year-Old Virgin”) plays the aforementioned geek, a good natured, but often dazed, confused and irresponsible young man by the very apt name of Ben Stone, who lives with his equally dazed and carefree best friends in Los Angeles as they prepare to launch a celebrity skin Web site called “Fleshofthestars.com.”

The gorgeous Katherine Heigl (Ellen Pompeo’s buddy on “Grey’s Anatomy”) plays Alison Scott, a charming young celebrity interviewer for the E! Cable channel, who meets Ben at a trendy nightspot in celebration of her recent promotion.

Thanks to the miracle of alcohol, Alison makes the highly improbable, but endearing, decision to take Ben home, and there’s a funny scene at the club in which Ben lauds the actor Eric Bana for his work in “Munich” that relates to his triumph later that night.

Thus the main plot point: Alison’s having Ben’s baby, though Ben’s an aimless shlub without a real job or means of supporting her.

But since he’s a nice guy who won’t run away, and she loves him, Ben and Alison decide to team up for the new arrival. And of course we have the prerequisite pitfalls and tribulations that create the necessary drama and tension of our fun baby movie.

Advertisement

Ultimately the movie is about a man who has to face responsibility after a lifetime of marching to the beat of his own drummer, and this central theme is explored with a lot of heart from Rogan.

Heigl also turns in an outstanding performance, essentially as a straight man to Rogan’s comic foil. She’s a tremendously talented actress who never fails to present something real on screen.

“Knocked Up” writer-director Judd Apatow is a filmmaker I’ve admired since his writing work on “Larry Sanders,” “The Ben Stiller Show,” “The Cable Guy” and the truly excellent, though short-lived TV show “Freaks and Geeks.” Apatow also wrote and directed a recent cinematic favorite of mine, “The 40-Year-Old Virgin.”

Here is a filmmaker with a real knack for memorably hilarious dialogue filled with realism, current and past pop zeitgeist authenticity, tremendous wit, and a deep reverence for 1980s cinema and pop culture. (Oh, how I miss my childhood.) When you cast Harold Ramis (Egon from “Ghostbusters” and the director of “Groundhog Day”) and Joanna Kerns (Maggie Seaver from “Growing Pains”) as parents in this movie, you have to love the ’80s.

I loved Apatow’s dead-on characterization of club culture, geek culture, male bonding and female camaraderie. He captures the way people actually talk and observe modern society.

There are memorable scenes in “Knocked Up” that are insanely hysterical — the kind of comedic scenes that remind me of the great comedies of the ’70s and ’80s, when deeply idiosyncratic characters and smart hilarious dialogue were king. Think Hal Ashby’s “Harold and Maude” meets “Revenge of the Nerds” meets John Hughes’ “She’s Having a Baby.”

Apatow’s E! material here, also deftly carries on that great tradition of Hollywood roasting itself (see also “The Player,” “The Larry Sanders Show” and “Curb Your Enthusiasm”).

I dug the no-holds-barred truthfulness and solid friendship between Ben and his buddies, where they simply share honest, raw observational conversations and insults that are truly sidesplitting. There are guys who spend countless hours and conversations obsessing about movies and beautiful women in the cinema, and this movie definitely celebrates that segment of the population.

“Knocked Up” also does a nice job of paying homage to other good movies. Witness the hilarious psychedelic tomfoolery between Ben and new friend Paul Rudd (playing Alison’s brother-in-law) at Cirque Du Soleil (the one place where you really shouldn’t be taking a Magical Mystery Tour). The scene is a beautiful twist/homage to the Terry Gilliam-directed cinematic adaptation of the Hunter Thompson book, “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,” the poster of which hangs on Ben’s wall). Then there’s the recurring motif of the infamous Neve Campbell/Denise Richards pool scene in “Wild Things,” male bonding over “Back to the Future,” a truly sidesplitting bouncer confrontation at the club, and the most shocking money shot in recent memory, which I won’t reveal here, but think “Discovery Channel.” Did I say this was a fun movie?

“Knocked Up” thankfully places its characters over its plot, emotional depth and authenticity over convention and formula, and heart and intelligence over its decidedly lowbrow elements. This movie succeeds in every way and I’m anxious to see what’s in store with “Superbad,” the Apatow produced teen comedy about two co-dependent high school geek buddies, starring Jonah Hill (one of Ben’s buds in “Knocked Up”) and Rogan, due out in August.

Neil Nisperos can be reached at 737-1059 or nnisperos@lompocrecord.com.