By Rob. Walton

Entertainment reporter Alison Scott (Grey's Anatomy's Katherine Heigl) and a broke, THC-mellowed illegal alien -- strangers -- are about to become parents in this pregnancy comedy from the writer-director of The 40 Year Old Virgin. A few weeks after a drunken one-night stand with committed stoner Ben (Freaks and Geeks' Seth Rogen), E!'s newest celebrity interviewer Alison realizes she's knocked up. She decides not to "take care of" the unwanted pregnancy and instead tracks down the unwitting father and apprises him of their impending bundle of joy. But soon, she's not so sure the sweet but clueless guy who fashions super-bongs out of gas masks and plays fetch in the backyard with her pre-school niece will make the best father.

Like The 40 Year Old Virgin, Judd Apatow's newest Xtreme comedy -- which includes a memorable 'shrooming expedition to Vegas and a hilariously graphic childbirth -- has a good heart. While decidedly less outlandish than its forerunner starring Steve Carell, Knocked Up is another successful relationship story that's so funny because it seems so honest. Whether absurd (Alison's sister Debbie, played by Leslie Mann, laments that the new towels are never quite so soft again after her husband jerks off into them); slapstick (there's a montage of quirky "gynechiatrists"); or comparatively mundane (a precocious elementary schooler informs the adults that she Googled "murder"), the domestic scenarios just ring true.

Apatow lets his growing stable of comedic regulars play to their strengths, allowing, for instance, Debbie's husband (Paul Rudd) to perform his uncanny De Niro impression at the dinner table. And the movie wouldn't be complete without Apatow's patented (improvised?) trash-talking, as when Ben's buddy (Jason Segel) tells the hirsute contender in their ongoing "Dirty Man" competition, "Your face looks like Robin Williams' knuckles."

Equal parts date movie, sex comedy and stoner farce, Knocked Up delivers.