This week, everybody’s favorite multiethnic pothead duo – Harold (John Cho) and Kumar (Kal Penn) – returns to the big screen for another reefer-laced comedic adventure courtesy of creators Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg.

I’m very happy to see H&K get the sequel treatment, not only because I’m a huge fan of the original film, but also because – back when I was a full-time Play guy – I had a chance to chat with Hurwitz and Schlossberg, who even then were dreaming of following up their inventive, borderline absurdist stoner comedy with an even more ambitious Harold and Kumar movie. The writing partners not only got that sequel made, but they also got the chance to direct it – and being exceptionally nice, smart and funny guys (if I kiss enough ass, can I get a crack at scripting part three?) the opportunity seems extremely well-deserved. Here’s the thing, though: most early reviews of Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay, while surprisingly positive, have praised the film for its incisive political humor, rather than its stoner tendencies. Personally, I think it’s terrific that Hurwitz and Schlossberg have seemingly moved past the pot-and-potty jokes of the original H&K for some slightly more culturally relevant gags, but I hope that those who enjoyed the first film for its wacked-out drug humor don’t get, uh, burnt out on part two.

If you do happen to be seeking out a stoner comedy more of the shut-your-brain-off type, however, I can recommend one that’s very entertaining even if, like me, you see it stone-cold sober. Smiley Face, which played Sundance last year and is now available on dvd, is a very funny, very lightweight item from cult filmmaker Gregg Araki that just might be the ultimate pothead comedy. Why? Because moreso than any of the Cheech and Chong flicks, Dude, Where’s My Car, or even H&K, this one is almost completely plot-less, more of a stoned meander through Southern California than an actual narrative – in fact, I’m tempted to call it the "Ulysses" of pot movies, at the risk of offending lit scholars, stoners, and stoned lit scholars. At any rate, the film is a heck of a lot of fun.

Anna Faris, an actress I love to see in anything that doesn’t have the words “Scary” or “Movie” in its title, stars as Jane, a sweet but rather un-ambitious aspiring actress who’s more interested in her bed and her bong than in, you know, working. The film catches up with her one fine morning when, after a few breakfast bong hits, she scarfs a bunch of cupcakes baked by her creepy sci-fi nerd roommate Steve (That 70s Show’s Danny Masterson) and discovers not long after that the delicious treats were full of weed. Now stoned out of her mind, and with an electric bill to pay, an audition to make it to, and a plateful of pot-laced cupcakes to replace before Steve gets home, poor Jane must venture out into the world and accomplish these few otherwise simple tasks made near-impossible by the ganj-induced haze she’s stumbled her way into.

Smiley Face is Faris’s movie from frame one, and she gets to show off a wide range of comedic skills despite the fact that her character is baked beyond human comprehension – in a lesser actress’s hands, the “I’m so stoned” act would get tiresome over 80 minutes, but Faris is both endearing and very convincing as the kind of girl that occasionally gets caught up staring at the ceiling for hours at a time. The supporting cast is full of familiar faces, each one popping in and out of Jane’s misadventures for a scene or two – there’s John Krasinski, a straight-laced friend of Steve’s who drags Jane along to his dentist’s appointment; Adam Brody as a dreadlocked dealer who discusses Reaganomics and threatens to repossess Jane’s beloved pillow-top mattress if she doesn’t pay up all her unpaid pot debts; Danny Trejo and John Cho (Harold himself!) as a couple of sausage-factory employees who discover Jane passed out in the back of their truck, and so on.

The film is never anything less than silly and inconsequential, and that’s a big part of its charm – any big ideas or major twists of plot would have just gotten in the way of its lazy, breezy vibe. The ending is a bit of a misfire (and actually sort of a downer) but otherwise Smiley Face definitely earns its place near the top of the stoner-movie canon, and could really catch on as a cult favorite if the right people on the right substances happen to catch it at the right time.