A/K/A Tommy Chong

INFINITY
Street: Aug. 26
Prebook: now
> Candid film of an imprisoned cultural icon is as enlightening as it is infuriating.

This expansive, candid documentary details how Tommy Chong, of the famed Cheech and Chong comedy duo, spent nine months in prison for selling hand-blown glass bongs (water pipes) on the Internet to a Pennsylvania head shop operated by the DEA. Chong is a self-satisfied, happy martyr in this 2005 film (the arrest was in 2003), as he and devoted wife Shelby deal with the SWAT invasion and the $12 million case created by Attorney General John Ashcroft to put Chong away. Director Josh Gilbert examines the victimization of the laidback celebrity as well as the 30 years of shifting cultural influences that led to his bust. The story is one-sided, to be sure, but all the better to enrage the target audience. Jay Leno, rocker George Thorogood, Bill Maher, Peter Coyote, Cheech Marin and others make appearances as they come to Chong’s defense.

Shelf Talk: The 2003 imprisonment might be old news, but Chong’s book, The Unauthorized Autobiography of Cheech and Chong (Simon and Schuster), hits stands Aug. 12 and is ripe for pairing with the DVD. The film won a handful of festival awards, and Chong picked up a whole new generation of fans via his appearances on TV’s That ’70s Show.