Liberal Talk Radio

Time was, Kevin Smith would seem pathetic by putting out “Clerks II”. Now it just strikes one as rather “Grup”-like:

Dude, if I’m wearing the Silent Bob coat when I’m 40,” Kevin Smith once told his old friend and producing partner, he should be shot. The producer, Scott Mosier, recalls this in the DVD extras for “Jersey Girl,” which Mr. Smith wrote and directed, his first attempt at a grown-up mainstream movie and a commercial fiasco. Never, never mention such deadlines, because two years later here is Kevin Smith wearing his ankle-length overcoat again to play the chain-smoking, pot-dealing sidekick Silent Bob in “Clerks II” (set to open July 21). Nearly 36 now, he seems to be violating the spirit, if not the number, of his own cutoff date.

. . .

He hasn’t let go of the juvenile wardrobe that so often reflects his humor; he even wore his trademark short pants to the opening of “Clerks II” at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. But the film itself, and the extended standing ovation it got after that midnight Cannes screening (preserved, naturally, in a video clip on the “Clerks II” site), suggest that his movies are not just for adolescent boys, and never were.

I’m going to put this out there — Kevin Smith sucks. Sure, “Clerks” was fun. But the rest of it was just terrible. Men converting lesbians (”Chasing Amy”)? Alanis Morissette as “God” (whom — as the article notes — he unironically thanks [the "real" God and not the Isn't-It-Ironic-God, hereinafter known as "IroniGod"] over and over in his films’ credits) in an “irreverent” “neurotic” take on Catholicism (”Dogma”)? “Jersey Girl”? Please. This isn’t independent filmmaking more than it’s just neo-conservative* trash with weird camera angles and a scary-looking guy in a trenchcoat. Did we learn nothing at all from Columbine?

The problem with auteurs is that so much of the auteur’s work relies on their personality — on their particular take, their particular point of view, their particular outlook on life. And Kevin Smith is, at core, probably just a lame New Jersey yobbo. Which makes his films total New Jersey yobbo-fests. Which is boring — and as types go, I can’t think of a lamer lens one perceives the world through than that of the Jersey yobbo, though the Flint yobbo, the Main Line yobbo and the conspiracy theory yobbo are not that far behind.

*Before certain people hijacked this label, I believe the best example of “neo-conservatism” was 1994’s Forest Gump. Let’s reclaim it!