So I saw this movie in Blockbuster, and realized right away the concept is similar to Super Size Me, the documentary about a guy who eats nothing but McDonalds for 30 days.  In this documentary, a comedian decides to go without weed for 30 days, taking various tests of his mental and physical capacities, followed by 30 days of smoking nearly constantly from the time he gets up to the time he goes to sleep.  The idea is to show what, if any, detriments there are to being stones all the time (for someone who doesn’t have a day job and can get away with being stoned during the time he does work).  For the most part the results are as expected, slightly diminished lung capacity and slight weight gain with basically no other differences.  Mental alertness tested through simple memory excercises and SAT scores can be chalked up to being more prepared during the second set of tests (while high).

It is interesting as a documentary specifically on Marijuana usage, and legalized sale in California, showing the number of legal stores increasing 300% in a year and how apparently easy it is to get a card to legally purchase and smoke pot in California.

What I would have liked to see is the statistics of drug dealers and/or gang violence since the legal stores have been added.  I personally think while you will always have drug dealers and gang violence related to controlled substances, that it would go down at least a little as the main cash crop moves out of back alleys and into legitimate shops.

After seeing the amount of resources spent on finding and raiding illegal grow ops, I think taxes would be lower if it was legalized.  If it were taxed like tabacco, it would also be a huge boon to government.  One of the interesting stats in the movie is that weed sales were estimated at $12 Billion last year, and if taxed that would have meant roughly $1 Billion for the government, just in California.

I side benefit would be, with government regulations all marijuana would be pure.  Also farmers without a decent cash crop would be able to grow something that by all accounts is very easy to grow.

Rating: I’d suggest renting or downloading if you can.

• Movie Review