With both filmmakers having cut their teeth on this brash brand of in-your-face filmmaking, it was only a matter of time before Kevin Smith met up with Seth Rogen. The 40-Year-Old Virgin served as the impetus for Smith to write the lead character of Zack and Miri Make a Porno specifically for Rogen. In this new comedy, Rogen and his not-afraid-to-self-deprecate act bring life to Smith's mile-a-minute, foul-mouthed, everyday-man's dialogue. Both men realized the importance of bending from their traditional methods here -- Rogen pulling back a bit on the ad-lib reins and Smith allowing some leeway with his written words. Together the two have created a romantic comedy that's both as sweet and as obscene as anything you'll see this year.

Zack (Seth Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth Banks), best friends since grade school, are now living together as platonic roommates. Both appear  just floating through life with no real ambitions and not enough motivational drive to fill a thimble. Their coffee shop jobs barely pay enough to feed their Amazon.com Wish List habit, much less leave anything to pay the bills. So, when faced with mounting debt and loss of power in their filthy apartment, Miri desperately proclaims "these are the exact circumstances people find themselves in right before they start having sex for money." Queue light bulb over Zack's head. He convinces Miri that they could make a homemade porno film to raise some quick cash. Miri's not completely sold on the idea. She wonders why, if it were so easy to do, everyone isn't doing it. Having an answer for everything, Zack tells her that others don't choose this route because "they have options – and dignity.”

Making money from a homemade porno film is really an awful idea and mostly unbelievable in today's world where the Internet practically guarantees porn is never more than two clicks away. But it surely provides a rich playground for Smith's brand of humor. Throw in a couple of real-life porn stars and an R-rating that had to go through the MPAA appeals process three times (without changing a single scene) to avoid the dreaded NC-17, and you've got a film as tastelessly funny as anything the Apatow juggernaut might put out. Now if we could just get Smith and Apatow to partner on a film. What might that look like?

Despite the fact that Zack and Miri includes enough lewd and lascivious activity to make a prostitute blush, it’s a quite charming story with a big heart and a sweet message at its center. Though Rogen and Banks might seem like polar opposites on the attraction scale, the two are very convincing as a couple and even manage to make genuine sparks in their love scene. The film unfolds its message when the time comes for Zack and Miri to film their "big" scene together. As they make love, Smith's camera focuses on their faces rather than on body parts. It's about human feelings rather than carnal pleasures. Zack and Miri finally come to the realization that they love each other.

Besides Rogen and Banks, Smith has packed the film with his usual cast of misfits and quirky characters, including the dunderheaded D-list porn actor Lester (played by his longtime Jay and Silent Bob collaborator, Jason Mewes), coffee shop co-worker Delaney (Craig Robinson nearly steals show) as the porn film's producer -- picked as producer simply because he had enough money to buy a video camera --  and a various assortment of former porn stars-turned-mainstream-actors who play porn stars (confusing, I know).  However, the genius in Smith's filmmaking skills comes in his ability to make the characters loveable and sympathetic despite their long list of despicable traits and repugnant behavior. Smith's dialogue is written as real people speak, and that goes a long way toward endearing an audience to the characters.

Zack and Miri Make a Porno will never be called tasteful or subdued, but like many of the other films in this raunch-com genre, largely popularized by Judd Apatow (though Smith really started it with Clerks), it's also a sweet romance sure to burrow itself into the heart of even the most blue-nosed  prude.

(Released by The Weinstein Company and rated “R” on appeal for strong crude sexual content including dialogue, graphic nudity and pervasive language.)

Review also posted on www.franksreelreviews.com .