There are a number of ways to deal with the realities that beset everyday existence, the trials, tribulations. the day-to-day crap and the unexpected. Some are funny, some are not.
Knocked Up definitely falls in the former category.

In the movie, we meet Ben Stone (Seth Rogan - The 40-Year-Old Virgin) and Allison Scott (Katherine Heigl - TV's Roswell, Grey's Anatomy) who meet, get drunk and have a one-night hook-up. Two months later, after a mix-up due to the cultural and language differences, Allison discovers she is pregnant.

This situation is even more complicated than you might think - Allison is a young go-getter who just received a promotion at E! while Ben lives with his stoner buddies, whose idea of work is making a website which will detail the appearance of the body parts of the rich and famous on film, in terms of not just what, but when.

Ben, on learning of the outcome, decides that he wants to be there every step of the way and they both decide to at least try to fall in love - despite the fact that they have Allison's sister Debbie (Leslie Mann) and her husband Pete (Paul Rudd) as rather bad examples to 'look up' to.

The rest should be predictable - but is anything but. The differences between men and women, the difficulties experienced by both trying to start and maintain meaningful relationships and just what constitutes growing up - in fact, the battle of the sexes - are just some of the life matters that writer and director Judd Apatow examines, skewers and brings to life, sometimes painfully so, on the big screen.

With the excellent Mann (who is also Apatow's real-life wife) as Debbie, a suspicious, nit-picking wife to the usually uptight, slacker-beneath-the-surface Pete, life after marriage is given a good look at. Rudd plays the downtrodden husband expertly, even when he and Ben steal away to Vegas to get high on mushrooms.

Ben gets the same treatment in some points, being embarrassed and left by the sidewalk after one memorable argument and then being forced to walk three miles to have another vicious one, not with Allison, but Allison's hormones - delivering a speech which hits the nail on the head for the most part and should be given a standing ovation by every red-bloodied male who sees it.

One - or two - of the welcome added elements to Knocked Up are Ben's stoner buddies and Debbie and Pete's kids Charlotte and Sadie (wonderfully played by the director's own kids Iris and Maude).

Rogan is perfect as Ben, the slacker forced to change his life and lifestyle due to fate and circumstances. Heigl does a good job, aided by a script and a director which both play to her strengths. The movie pushes the boundaries - there is a baby delivery scene which almost certainly goes beyond anything shot for the 'mainstream' - and the humour is often crude. That said, it gets its point across effortlessly and the only way you would not be laughing would be if you are dead and there are no movies in heaven or hell.

Executive Class

Gardens with Gravel

Death to the Mullet!