Kevin Smith Week: ‘Clerks’

1994 brought us many, many, many, great movies, Forest Gump, Quiz Show, True Lies, Bullets Over Broadway, Ed Wood, Star Gate, Wyatt Earp, Hoop Dreams, Killing Zoe, The Hudsucker Proxy, Là ©on, The Lion King, Natural Born Killers, Speed, Pulp Fiction, The Shawshank Redemption, and Street Fighter…wait?   I mean, look at that list, and when it comes to comedy, ’94 was the year of Jim Carrey.   Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, Dumb and Dumber, and The Mask all came out in the same calendar year, if you wanted comedy, you wanted Jim Carrey.   Well who would have thought the funniest film of the year and one of the most memorable out of all those classics to be released would be a self funded title made for $25,757 called Clerks.

Kevin Smith’s feature debut was filmed over the course of 21 days in the after hours of a Jersey Quick Stop that he worked in during the day.   The plot was simple, followed the exploits of two friends for one day at the shop when a whole lot of shit goes down when the lead Dante wasn’t even supposed to be there that day.   Dante’s partner in crime is Randall, a crude talking employee of the video shop next door that spends most of his time in the fore mentioned Quick Shop shooting the shit with his friend Dante.   Conversation ranges from relationships, blasting the local patrons, pornography, Star Wars and everything in-between.

Dante was supposed to have the day off, but gets strung in on the promise that he will only have to hold down the shop for half the day.   The women in Dante’s life guaranteed that his day will only get worse.   A dead ex-girlfriend, an engaged ex-girlfriend, and an orally fixated current girlfriend all make the fact that Dante is stuck at work on this day of all days even worse.   Add in Randall’s ‘wise‘ advice on all wakes of life, both real and factious, and Dante is bound to get into trouble much sooner rather than later.   If you have seen Clerks you are already smirking with memories, but if for some reason you haven’t seen this great piece of cinema I will spoil no more because you have no idea what you are missing.

Sure it is black and white, sure there is no action, sure there are no stars, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give this honest and unashamed look at society, pop culture, and relationships a chance.   The actors that are here are all pretty great actually.   Dante is played by Brian O’Halloran, who was a local actor who tried out for the part and was able to create very real and believable guy, who is smarter then his lot in life, but is content with keeping life in cruise control.   His banter with Randal is pitch perfect and astonishing that it works so well with so few takes taken by Smith of each scene.   Speaking of Randal, he is played by Jeff Anderson, and steals every scene he is in.   This happens to be so because Smith wrote the part for himself and gave himself all the best lines, but he eventually decided it would be too much work to both star, direct, and do everything else, so Anderson was given the part.   And to be quite honest, I can’t see anyone else in the part now anyways, as Anderson just nails it and owns the character now.   Anderson perfectly creates a character that is a great friend and someone you would love to hang out with, but also is one of those people that you know is just a real asshole to other people, but you let it slide because you like him so much.   His smug demeanor and I don’t give a shit attitude works so well, it’s a shame he hasn’t got to do much more acting since this film.   On the female side of things, the main star her Marilyn Ghigliotti as Veronica and she does a fine job, naturally bouncing off both O’Halloran and Anderson, while keeping us respecting here even with that magic number, 37.   Lisa Spoonhauer shows up in the later part of the film as Catlin, and does a nice job as well at immediately creating chemistry with Dante, which sells us how Dante acts once she is back around.   Rounding out the cast is Jason Mewes and Kevin Smith as Jay and Silent Bob, and while they have no lines really, they provide plenty of good laughs throughout, but Clerks best serves as a testament to how far Mewes has come as an actor.   Watching him in Dogma or Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, after seeing him work through that monologue towards the end, it is amazing to see how far he has come as an actor.

Now, I must digress a bit, but if you are a fan of Clerks, then there is one last piece of film you need to see about this film to fully appreciate what an amazing achievement it is.   The Snowball Effect is a documentary retrospective on the Clerks X DVD that is essential viewing for anyone that is a fan of this film, the filmmaking process, or is an aspiring filmmaker.   This documentary takes you back to Jersey, with Smith as your guide, and he takes you back through where he came from and what it took for him to get this picture made.   It really is an amazing achievement to see what he did and how he did it and The Snowball Effect is one of the best DVD features I have ever seen; please find a way to see it.

So what Smith created here was a true indie film that has had mass appeal to audiences over the year while showing that, if you really want to strive to do something with yourself you can.   Smith has gone from some 20 something that ran up some credit cards to make his first film, to a multi-millionaire with legions of fans following him and everything he does.   Smith has transcended becoming just a filmmaker and has become a sort of Geek diplomat, getting his hands into a lot of different baskets constantly “whoring himself out” as he would put it, when he is truly just taking full advantage to his access to the entertainment world due the substantial impact he can have on the influence of a large community of filmgoers.   And to think, it all started with a twenty-five thousand dollar, black and white filmed comedy that many considered just a bunch of dick and fart jokes.