Hands down the funniest American movie of the year. Hot Fuzz (from the Shaun of the Dead crew) is marginally funnier, but that film stuck to its guns (literally) as a comedy, whereas Apatow's first truly brilliant film manages to reach beyond its advertised low-brow laugh-fest nature to mine rich and timeless observations into common crises of the human heart.

It is a rare treat to enter a theater expecting a few hard laughs somewhere in the collegiate range and instead find almost constant delight at a film that serves laughs at a rapid clip, subtle tugs at the heartstrings and a range of characters that resonate for everyone in the audience. Knocked up will be the Wedding Crashers of this summer and happily it is a much more frank and honest exam of love and sex and the relationships that arise in and around it.

What I find completely amazing about Apatow is he had the sense to step back and let his actors improvise in 40 Year Old Virgin, and then turn around and let the script do most of the work here. Like Virgin he co-writes the film with his leading man and, most admirably, trusts his wife Leslie Mann with the films third most pivotal role. You might remember her as the drunk-driving bimbo who did her best to end Steve Carell's 40 year dry spell.

The cast is a delight across the board and it manages, at least in my opinion, to make the toughest of sells, which is passing Seth Rogen off as a romantic leading man. Rogen is emerging as a talent to be reckoned with both as a writer and actor. And, while it's true that he'll always be more comfortably cast as a side, window or foil, he has such a natural likability that the camera can also be fooled into loving him.

Katherine Heigl is pitch perfect as Alison the more polished professional woman whose minor indiscretion has left her in such a major pickle, and Rogen is equally convincing as the emergent knight in whining armor of the stoner set. Having to trade in the bong for a baby is by no means an uncommon dilemma, as Apatow deftly illustrates by juxtaposing Alison's sister (Leslie Mann) and her husband (the perfectly droll Paul Rudd) as the married couple who are 10 years down the road from the same shotgun nuptuals. Marriage does make for strange bedfellows, and keeping it together is really beyond miraculous, but as Apatow seems to intimate, over the long haul, home and family are really what all the fuss is about.

I guess the thing that surprised me most about Knocked Up is the way Apatow does not underestimate the intelligence of the audience. Again the advertising campaign for the film is almost exclusively aimed at the Cro-Mag set, yet amid the crude humor he manages to slip in something of a warm think-piece that hits everyone so close to home that it succeeds on any number of levels. Seriously how often does a film come along capable of keeping even the most high brow Woody Allen buff just as entertained as the guy who considers Harold And Kumar's exploits the height of comic sophistication?

Also impressive is crew of stoners/slackers/dreamers who comprise Rogen's peer group. Though there are a good many laughs at their expense, I was surprised at how little we see of them, which, I'm sure, came as a disappointment to younger audience members. They certainly make the most of their screen-time and I loved the way Apatow used Heigl and Rogen's ostensibly polar opposite worlds to demonstrate that once naked of pretense we're all pretty much cut from the same cloth. You'll love the way Knocked Up serves as a wake up call to just about everyone who sees it. From the perpetual party animal clinging fast to their youth, to those who cast such sloth aside for yuppie ambitions, to those who have moved years beyond those days but struggle with complacency in their relationships chasing phantom longings for the happiness that once came with every sunrise. I really don't want to give anymore away, just trust me Knocked Up is a Knock Out - the funniest, most satisfying and genuinely entertaining film to come along for some time.