Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle 2004

Terry Lawson, Detroit Free Press: At road's end, Harold and Kumar smells very similar to the shrine of its title, which is great before you bite in and way less appetizing after you've sobered up. Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: In their formidable quest for junk food, Harold and Kumar end up redefining what the all-American protagonists of Hollywood movies should look like -- and prove this comedy is not quite as brain-dead as it originally appeared. Read more

Chuck Wilson, L.A. Weekly: Smart, goofy and endearing, Cho and Penn make a terrific team, and the fact that they're starring in their own movie suggests that, in the Hollywood comedy frat house, there's finally room for everyone. Read more

Allison Benedikt, Chicago Tribune: Just as Mike Judge's Office Space has become an anthem for all us Gen X cubicle slaves, Harold and Kumar will resonate deeply with anyone who attended high school in the 1990s and at least saw a joint. Read more

Ted Fry, Seattle Times: It's a delightful surprise that Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle is so hilarious for pretty much all the reasons it should be so predictably brainless. Read more

Carla Meyer, San Francisco Chronicle: Has enough laughs and misadventures to satisfy its built-in audience, but it won't win any converts. Read more

Richard Roeper, Ebert & Roeper: ... an instant stoner classic. Read more

Bob Townsend, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: A funny stoner buddy movie, with nods to those original multicultural high times guys, Cheech and Chong, and flashes of the kind of party-on comedy that Saturday Night Live slackers Wayne and Garth made most excellent. Read more

Kathy Cano Murillo, Arizona Republic: It does have one thing on its side: It's freakin' hilarious, man. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: Silliness is the movie's only ambition, but there's something mind-blowing about seeing a fratty comedy through two pairs of Asian-American eyes, particularly when those eyes belong to actors who were token minorities in other dumb comedies. Read more

Kevin Crust, Los Angeles Times: That Cho and Penn are such likable actors and are so funny in their roles earns the movie more slack than it probably deserves and prevents it from being just another gross-out comedy. Read more

Bruce Westbrook, Houston Chronicle: This gonzo ganja comedy is propelled more by sly charm, sharp wit and stinging social satire than by mere smoke jokes. Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: Perfectly paired, John Cho and Kal Penn take the stereotypes of the brilliant Asian and the genius Indian for a joyride. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: [Harold and Kumar] share a quality the overgrown adolescents in films like this are never allowed to possess: They're witty, focused, and highly aware. Read more

Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News: In those rare instances when it's not being a dumb comedy, Harold and Kumar is a rather crafty satire of racial stereotypes (which, it must be said, traffics in a few stereotypes of its own). Read more

Lisa Rose, Newark Star-Ledger: While Harold & Kumar isn't quite a low-brow revelation on the scale of Clerks, it is one of film history's more inspired examples of off-color Jerseyana. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: The laugh ratio in this run-on of skits is pretty low, at least to the unaltered mind of one who's seen enough of these films and eaten enough White Castle burgers to last a lifetime. Read more

Stephen Holden, New York Times: Attacks of hunger and indigestion, comic hallucinations and episodes of flat-out insensibility are scrambled together on this goofy roller coaster ride of dope. Read more

Jay Boyar, Orlando Sentinel: Crude, tasteless, sophomoric and crass. It is also, sometimes, funny. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: One secret of fiction is the creation of unique characters who are precisely defined. The secret of comedy is the same, with the difference being that the characters must be obsessed with unwholesome but understandable human desires. Read more

Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com: Stretches the boundaries of offensiveness in ways that both make us laugh and make us think. Read more

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Read more

Jennie Punter, Globe and Mail: Plays it a little too safe and hackneyed with the comedy, but the characters and the talented actors who play them are a refreshing change of pace that make the movie feel like a minor buddy-comedy revolution. Read more

Geoff Pevere, Toronto Star: If it's possible for a movie to be sly and full-on raunchy at the same time, Danny Leiner's p.o.v.-shifting stoner-buddy comedy is it. Read more

Derek Adams, Time Out: Behind all the Farrelly-esque gross-out humour and Cheech & Chong-isms lies a sensitive little picture with a deftly handled anti-racism slant. Read more

Mike Clark, USA Today: This is one more 'youth movie' that'll put years on anyone over 25. Read more

Robert Koehler, Variety: What could have just pushed the usual youth comedy buttons is instead a crafty spoof on issues from racial politics to American highway monoculture that belies its cover (and marketing) as only a dumb gross-out laffer. Read more

Dennis Lim, Village Voice: Winds up a sweetly nonchalant and excellently unwhiny allegory of seeking and gaining entry to the Caucasian fortress that is present-day America, or at least nocturnal New Jersey. Read more

Desson Thomson, Washington Post: A peppy, satisfying comedy that could soon become a minor classic. Read more

Stephen Hunter, Washington Post: Will seem a classic if you're stoned, and only slightly less funny if you're straight. Read more