Saturday, November 16, 2024

Clerks II

Clerks II (2006)

Runtime: 97 minutes

Directed by: Kevin Smith

Starring: Many of the people you’d expect to be in Clerks II, + Rosario Dawson

From: The Weinstein Company

Instead of watching a freakshow fight in a sport I don’t like involving two reprobates in what was probably a crappy fight on a platform not smart enough to rent enough servers for an event they’ve been hyping up for months… instead of giving that a second thought, other things were done then I visited Prime.

My discovery that this was free for me on Prime was the main reason for me to revisit the movie. It was seen theatrically back in ’06 and I must have rented it once on DVD but the last viewing was more than 15 years ago. As mentioned before, my sympathy for Kevin Smith’s public admission of mental health struggles aside, as a filmmaker I think less of them than I did at the time. In 2024, whoo boy did some of this age rather poorly.

No surprise that this would be different from the first; among other considerations, where Kevin Smith was in life when the films were made. This time, Dante & Randal are forced to work at a fast-food joint. Dante is about to bail and get married to a girl in Florida but in this one crazy day (& night), things go awry. Now, despite comments in the past that may paint the picture for long-time readers that I’m automatically against vulgar humor, this isn’t the case. A particular gross setpiece in the third act inspired by a famous 80’s film did make me laugh, for example.

The Elias character did also inspire laughs, although he was still a cypher for what Smith doesn’t like, chiefly religion, Transformers and The Lord of the Rings. Back in ’06, “Pillow Pants” was preposterous and impossible to believe even in this universe. Homophobia is present; this was long before “humor” of this type was seen by many as negative. However, there’s a long scene involving racial slurs… and yeah, in any movie where Smith broaches the subject of race, I’m never going to like it (& I never have) as it’s just tone-deaf, not to mention embarrassing.

A shame, as there are laughs plus actual heartfelt, poignant moments as our 30-something leads start becoming moody over their lot in life, whether they should aspire for me, or find something that makes THEM happy. The presence of Rosario Dawson also was an asset. The overall effort can be sloppy and the filmmaking craft can be criticized; be that as it may, it’s a sequel so of course the original is better yet this was fine for me who still really likes the original. Scuttlebutt tells me it’d be best, re: my liking the first two films to never experience Clerks III.

Likewise, much of Kevin Smith’s filmography is best left ignored or forgotten by me. However, this and Clerks I can happily watch again.

 

No comments:

Post a Comment