Sticks of Fire: a Tampa blog

“Knocked Up” (R; 132 minutes)

The heartiest laughs are the ones we don’t see coming. “Knocked Up” isn’t a sequel or a remake, and that’s one reason its off-kilter characters keep us merrily surprised. The other reason: It’s doggone funny — as long as you don’t mind jokes told in the most shameless, shocking contemporary idiom. Yes, Mom, that means really bad language.

But from behind the profanity emerges a sweet-tempered tale about, um, adjusting one’s priorities.

This comic collision of raunch and romance is essentially simple: A tipsy one-night stand results in a pregnancy and a relationship steeped in wariness, warmth and wackiness.

Writer-director Judd Apatow gives protege Seth Rogen his best shot yet at stardom. After employing Rogen in two TV series (”Freaks and Geeks,” “Undeclared”) and a hit comedy (”The 40 Year-Old Virgin”), Apatow cast the teddy-bearish Rogen, 25, as slacker dude Ben Stone, a blissful underachiever who doesn’t mind sharing a house with four fellow slobs (Jay Baruchel, Jonah Hill, Jason Segel and Martin Starr, all Apatow veterans).

But one night at a bar, he crosses paths with Alison Scott (Katherine Heigl, from TV’s “ER” “Grey’s Anatomy”), an ambitious TV entertainment reporter. She’s giddy from a promotion and celebratory drinks, and the next morning they go their separate ways — until Alison brings Ben the big baby’s-coming news.

While the reluctant couple’s destination isn’t hard to deduce, the route is a joy to follow. Rogen and Heigl match each other line for line, look for look, in an updated edition of the old screwball school. Of course, they didn’t use such language in the golden era.

Supporting players get their licks in as well. Leslie Mann and Paul Rudd, as Alison’s sister and brother-in-law, are especially funny. Celebrity cameos add extra chuckles for what should be the summer’s top hit that’s neither a sequel nor a remake.

We give it a B+.

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Edited 2007 Jun 11 10am: Corrected: Katherine Heigl was in Grey’s Anatomy, not ER (thanks, chaaalie).