Two Brit sci-fi junkies make a pilgrimage to San Diego's Comic-Con, then take off in an RV to tour UFO hot spots from Roswell to Area 51. Enter Paul, an alien in shorts and flip-flops with the raucous growl of Seth Rogen. Paul has just fled the feds, who've held him captive since before Spielberg shot E.T. It's a flimsy premise, but Paul flies on the comic helium provided by gifted actor-writers Simon Pegg and Nick Frost. If you never saw these wonderboys in Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, get busy. Or just start with Paul, a cheeky spoof that puts a hilarious hurt to everything it loves, be it Golem or the Close Encounters mothership.

Peter Travers reviews Paul in his weekly video series, "At the Movies With Peter Travers"

Frost plays unsuccessful sci-fi writer Clive Gollings, and Pegg is Graeme Willy, the BFF who illustrated Clive's book with a three-boobed creature babe. Director Greg Mottola (Superbad, Adventureland), in for Edgar Wright, who helmed the first two Pegg-Frost epics, makes the most of a zany cast, including Jason Bateman and Bill Hader as men-in-black agents, and the pricelessly funny Kristen Wiig as Ruth Buggs, a fundamentalist Christian with a yen for Graeme's willy and a dirty mouth honed under Paul's tutelage. "Ain't that a bagful of tits," says Ruth. Paul is more like a bagful of giggles. Rogen is a nonstop hoot, but it's the byplay between Frost and Pegg that roots the laughs in characters we care about. That's right: characters. No anal probes.

Video: Simon Pegg and Nick Frost's Goofy Rolling Stone Photo Shoot

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“Ambling Alp”

The "Ambling Alp" was the nickname of the six-and-a-half-foot-tall Primo Carnera. Though the song is named after the Italian-born 1930s heavyweight champion, Yeasayer are actually paying tribute to boxing legend Joe Louis with this first-person psychedelic dance-rock tune. “I was always interested in writing a song that had boxing mythology in it,” Yeasayer’s Chris Keating said. “It’s pretty fascinating: There were so many amazing characters, and it was so closely entwined with 20th century history.” Yeaseyer also invokes German champ Max Schmeling and hints at the historical significance placed on the historic bouts between the Nazi-era boxer and the African-American Louis.