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The films of Kevin Smith

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    The films of Kevin Smith

    How do people on here rate Kevin Smith?

    I recently started watching "Chasing Amy" again (originally saw it at the cinema when it came out). It is very amusing to see Ben Affleck with a late 90s grunge beard, and there is some sparky dialogue, though the Alyssa character has a very strange voice and I haven't got to the end yet.

    I also recently saw "Tusk", which is bizarre but absorbing. It concerns a man who abducts a podcaster and sets about turning him into a walrus. It's weird and quite compelling. I saw the first half hour of "Red State" and that seemed well directed and plotted.

    What do you reckon to him? Which films of his have you seen and liked or disliked?

    The reason I started watching him recently is that I read some of his autobiography, which interested me when it dealt with his filmmaking and writing.

    So - is he a talented director and writer, or a dated 90s has been who finds pooh and weed more funny than they really are?

    #2
    He's useful in rendering me virtually ungoogleable.

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      #3
      Ever decreasing returns, I think. Not seen anything after Dogma, mind.

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        #4
        Originally posted by Kevin S View Post
        He's useful in rendering me virtually ungoogleable.
        Iirc you're they second board member connected to him.

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          #5
          Liked Chasing Amy, Clerks, and Mallrats. I'm also a fan of Comic Book Men in lo-res kind of way. AdeC jr however, is a massive admirer. So much so that a couple a years back he finagled a job as PA on an episode of The Flash that KS was directing. It was shooting at BC Place, which is huge, but that day the set was inside a small room with no room for anyone but actors and camera-crew. He was so bummed out. Just as he was leaving though Smith walked by with another couple of people, my boy — showing more moxie than I would — said. "Hey man I asked for this gig so I could see you work, but never got the chance. I'm so pissed. Could I at least get a photo?" Smith said "C'mere Man," gave him a big hug, bought him a coffee and chatted for about ten minutes. Ace dude. No doubt.

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            #6
            Was really into his Jersey trilogy at uni, and enjoyed Dogma. Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back is fuck awful and really, really dumb and I lost interest in him. From what I gather he made a couple of real stinkers, then Clerks II (which I did watch but thought little of). Red State iirc is actually worth watching and quite interesting, will have to dig it out again. Nooch.

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              #7
              Mallrats and Clerks are as good as it gets. Honourable mentions for Dogma and Chasing Amy, however.

              A quote from Clerks got me my first ever snarky dickhead reply on OTF. Halcyon days indeed.

              Originally posted by RobW View Post
              Nooch.
              Snoogins.

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                #8
                I quite like Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, though not for any reason that I can adequately quantify. Just bits of it make me laugh like a drain. He'll never top Clerks though. He also is responsible for Jason Lees career, which is pretty damned unforgivable.

                However, he did host a Q&A on one of my favourite films of all time - The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across The Eighth Dimension - with stars John Lithgow and Peter Weller and for a fully paid up Blue Blazer Irregular like myself, it is an hour of wonderfulness.



                If you haven't seen Buckaroo Banzai then, um, it is about the cultest of cult sci-fi. I love it to bits, but it pretty much defines a marmite film, either you get it and love it or you just go "what the hell?"

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                  #9
                  Disagree. Dogma wasn't good, but Jay & Silent Bob Strikes Back was funny and quoteable. Just because it was so absurdly juvenile and silly. He should stick to that. I couldn't get very far with Clerks 2. It just seemed to be played out.
                  He never really topped Clerks. It was so completely new and different for its time. Saw it at the DoG Street theater in Williamsburg in college.

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                    #10
                    That's like an LCD Soundsystem lyric almost.

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                      #11
                      Rick Derris to thread, surely?

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                        #12
                        Originally posted by Antepli Ejderha View Post
                        Iirc you're they second board member connected to him.
                        Allo.

                        I'll come back to this thread tomorrow, but not as an apologist.

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                          #13
                          Originally posted by Lang Spoon View Post
                          That's like an LCD Soundsystem lyric almost.
                          Interesting, that James Murphy was from West Windsor-Plainsboro South (as was Ethan Hawke and Brian Singer,) and Smith was from the Jersey Shore.

                          It's like I tell everyone, there is no New Jersey. Brian Singer and Ethan Hawke ARE West Windsor. That kid who directed La La Land IS Princeton. Zach Braff IS South Orange/Maplewood.

                          Smith ain't them. He's pure Jersey Shore.

                          That heroin/opioid epidemic in the midwest? It's all over the Jersey Shore.

                          For me, Smith is a friend who made some movies that made you laugh your ass off. He has a great eye for talent, and the end of Chasing Amy pretty much captured how beautiful it can be to lose the only girl you will ever love.

                          If you see movies from Ireland, his best ones have more in common with The Commitments or others from there than in the US, or even the rest of New Jersey.

                          He was never the best, but no one would ever be better than making jokes like Silent Jay's actions the millisecond he heard the world was going to end.

                          Not great by any stretch of the imagination, but a kind of friend in high school that you'd smile about when you really concentrated and thought about him. That's what I'd say.

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                            #14
                            I meant the last sentence of HP's post. But that was a very interesting post anyways.

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                              #15
                              Originally posted by Lang Spoon View Post
                              I meant the last sentence of HP's post. But that was a very interesting post anyways.
                              I just found it serendipitous to think of James Murphy with Kevin Smith. In a way, it's what New Jersey is. Getting enough cool from New York and Philly and the Atlantic Ocean and being taught good writing and English skills in high school.

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                                #16
                                I'm a big fan of his movie podcasts; specifically SMovieMakers. Great interviews and insights on the process, and he's a library of insider stuff. I was hooked on Edumacation with him and Andy McElfresh, but after a while you just get so fed up with his stoner nonsense chatter. His movies are, indeed, getting worse by the year. He retired and then unretired to make his Canuck Trilogy, and neither of the first two (Tusk and Yoga Hosers) did very well critically or commercially. He just doesn't really care any more.

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                                  #17
                                  For all I enjoy his work, Smith's main problems are his short attention span and his need of someone to reign him in.

                                  He carved out a niche and loyal following with the early films (Clerks, Mallrats, Chasing Amy, Dogma, Strike Back) but understandably didn't want to limit himself to the indie ghetto and went looking for the mainstream breakout with Jersey Girl which was something of a disaster in mainstream terms (but with lower key leads and lower expectations might have fared better). Chastened by that he dipped back into his 'universe' for Clerks II which looked and felt like a desperate lunge.

                                  He then saw how Judd Apatow was making movies with similar ingredients (smart dialogue, dick jokes, stoner humour) to his own, with big results, and tried to get on board with Zack and Miri, which was relatively big budget and big launch, and comparatively flopped at the box office. After that disaster he lost faith in his writing and tried the director for hire route with Cop Out, didn't like it and abandoned that avenue.

                                  Then we had the back to basics indie self-release of Red State (very underrated) and then the flights of whimsy with Tusk and Yoga Hosers (neither of which I've seen yet), each of which came out of stoned podcast conversations which were funny at the time but which (it sounds like) were not worthy of committing to film.

                                  Along the way he has tried to get Clerks III and Hit Somebody (an ice hockey movie) off the ground without success.

                                  In all of his main failings its usually been a case of him being giving free reign (and money) and wasting it, though when he's had to keep things tight (Clerks obviously, Chasing Amy and Red State) it tends to pay off.

                                  I listen to a lot of his podcast output, but by no means all - there has been a huge amount of it. I'm sticking with Edumucation for the time being but as WOM suggests it often descends into complete stoner nonsense, the difference here usually that Andy McElfresh won't reign him in in the same way that Scott Mosier and Matt Mira will do on the others. Across the various podcasts though his enthusiasm and knowledge of TV and film comes through clearly, and when he's candid about the making and marketing of his films it's very interesting.

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                                    #18
                                    Originally posted by Jon View Post
                                    Rick Derris to thread, surely?
                                    I've let him know

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                                      #19
                                      The man himself had a massive heart attack last night, but is recovered enough to talk at length about it on Twitter and Instagram. I have an obvious soft spot for him and his work (hence my user name), and he's only a year or so older than me, so I'm fairly vested in this one.

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