‘…It’s Okay, I’m Taking It Back’

Utopia, along with a couple of other bloggers on IM, asked about ‘Clerks II.’ Their trepidation is wholly understandable — it would have been really easy to screw this up. For all of its faults (just ask any critic who wants to ride a high horse around Cannes), ‘Clerks‘ was a classic, because it caught the ennui that the grunge slacker-ass emitted from every pore. It was a black-and-white Waiting For Godot, with dick and fart jokes.

I have to say this in the interest of full disclosure: I also saw ‘Jersey Girl.’ It wasn’t that bad of a movie. What Kevin Smith tried to do was to have an honest modern love story, and he was still trying to feel his way through the storymaking process.

He took the lessons learned from ‘Jersey Girl’ and applied them to writing ‘Clerks II.’ The film is touching at points. Brazen in others. “Jesus, I can’t believe Smith put that in there!” at points. It equals Smith’s best film, by a long shot — and I LOVED Dogma.

So, don’t be scared. You can go see it with a light heart and eased brow. Just don’t have too many hang-ups about bestiality, like Joel Siegel.