Starring Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks. Rated 18A.

It would be foolish to expect New Jersey writer-director Kevin Smith to make a movie based on visual storytelling or, apparently, to make his dialogue relevant, concise, or at least passingly mature.

Here he attempts to make his characters more grown-up by moving them into the "adult" film industry. Platonic Pittsburgh flatmates Zack (Seth Rogen) and Miri (spunky Elizabeth Banks) need to think about making some money shots just to get the lights turned on again in their rundown apartment. They get the idea when they find that Miri's old crush (Brandon Routh) has morphed into a gay-porn star under the tutelage of a partner, played amusingly by Justin Long.

I'm not sure how dweebs with no distribution dough get to profit from smut films in an age of free everything on the Net. But our less-than-horny heroes prove inspiring enough to gather a crew of supporters, including actual porn vets Traci Lords and Katie Morgan, Smith bud Jason Mewes as a studly dumbbell, and The Office warehouse dude Craig Robinson as a deadpan producer.

The real problem—and this is where the sentimental, Judd Apatow awww factor seeps in—is that Zack and Miri are lifelong friends whose relationship changes the moment there's skin-to-skin contact. There's mild humour in the duo's attempts to find the right porn plot, especially when forced back to the Starbucks-like setting where Zack works. But forget shock value in an environment that finds words like nutsack and shithole peppering every paragraph.

Beyond this, a complete disinterest in the erotic—not to mention a general preference for the scatological—makes this Porno more not than hot.