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I have edited the title of this thread to reflect what it has become.
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Dec 30, 2013 19:06
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One example of his clunky filmmaking is the scene in Chasing Amy where Hooper is on the phone with Holden, and the guy next to him is snickering through the conversation. The implication is that he's laughing at the fact that Hooper is setting Holden up with a lesbian without his knowledge, suggesting that it's an intentional prank, but according to Kevin Smith, the guy is simply laughing at the comic book he's reading. He also writes clunky dialogue like "I'm battling this jackass on his blog's message boards."
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Dec 30, 2013 19:06
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I was a big Kevin Smith fan back in my early college days. I have two stories that relate to him. The first happened when I was in my first year of college. I could go into a long, detailed story, but I'll keep it short. I walked into Smith's comic book shop in Red Bank when he was walking in the back. It was pretty cool at the time. I stood there for about 10 minutes and bs with him, which was pretty cool. But then, later that year, I kind of lost interest with him when he told at his movie marathon to and I quote him "shut the gently caress up" all because I asked him a question about Clerks 2. After that, I kind of lost interest in him director wise, but gained interest in his other ventures. If it wasn't for him, I would never know about his SIR radio network and would have never found out who Jensen Karp is for that matter and why I need to get up on the stuff that he says is awesome.
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Dec 30, 2013 19:39
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Does Scott Mosier still have anything to do with Smodcast or Kevin Smith? When I use to listen it seemed like he was slowly trying to distance himself from Smith but that was several years ago.
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Dec 30, 2013 19:48
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screenwritersblues posted:I was a big Kevin Smith fan back in my early college days. I have two stories that relate to him. What did you ask him about Clerks 2?
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Dec 30, 2013 21:49
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bartok posted:Does Scott Mosier still have anything to do with Smodcast or Kevin Smith? When I use to listen it seemed like he was slowly trying to distance himself from Smith but that was several years ago. People say this, but it's freakin BS. Mosier has been just as heavily involved with the podcast as ever, the only thing is that Scott hasn't produced Smith's last movies, he's made it clear he's wanted to do his own stuff (which is apparently that stupid turkey movie that came out last month). I'm a much bigger fan of Smith than most people here, but mostly for his Q&A and podcasts, the only movies of his that I've really liked are Clerks and Mallrats, but a lot of the misinformation and bashing is sort of pathetic. He does take things way too personally sometimes (his rant about getting thrown off the plane was embarrassing to listen to), but he's pretty entertaining, and he truly cares for his fans.
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Dec 30, 2013 23:43
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zandert33 posted:I'm a much bigger fan of Smith than most people here, but mostly for his Q&A and podcasts, the only movies of his that I've really liked are Clerks and Mallrats, but a lot of the misinformation and bashing is sort of pathetic. What misinformation?
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Dec 31, 2013 03:02
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Toady posted:What misinformation? Surely you've heard some of the propaganda? Big Critics are broadcasting it on the hour over the radio.
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Dec 31, 2013 03:29
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Esroc posted:I can forgive him for being a little upset that the "art" he poured his heart and soul into is being torn apart by people who have no idea what went into making it, and even worse have no idea what was going through his mind when he made it. Then he should probably stop making movies because people saying "It stinks" about your movie is always a distinct possibility. Like, I know this sounds really smug and condescending but part of the reason he's never improved is he has no idea how to actually take criticism and that's kinda lovely!
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Dec 31, 2013 04:00
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Toady posted:What misinformation? Let's see "Does Scott Mosier still have anything to do with Smodcast or Kevin Smith? When I use to listen it seemed like he was slowly trying to distance himself from Smith but that was several years ago." I've listed to most of their podcasts, and this has never even been implied, and just by the nature that they are still doing it to this day shows this is misinformation.
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Dec 31, 2013 04:23
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Esroc posted:I can forgive him for being a little upset that the "art" he poured his heart and soul into is being torn apart by people who have no idea what went into making it, and even worse have no idea what was going through his mind when he made it. I guess the first time I understood Kevin Smith was when one of my illustrations at an art gallery got picked apart by someone who wasn't even an artist who had entirely misinterpreted the pieces message and purpose. I admit I didn't say anything to them (because I lack a spine), but inside I was pretty upset that they dared to call my work poo poo when they had so completely missed the point. It sucks that your feelings got hurt but that's the risk you take when you put your work out there. I'm sure your critics don't hate you personally, although if you'd had a tantrum about them not getting your art then they might start to. I'm guessing that if Kevin Smith made a masterpiece he'd be more than happy to soak up praise from these despicable non-artists. Human Tornada fucked around with this message at 04:52 on Dec 31, 2013 |
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Dec 31, 2013 04:49
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Wasn't Mosier working on a cartoon pilot for Disney? What ever happened to that?
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Dec 31, 2013 05:30
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zandert33 posted:Let's see I didn't realize this was a sensitive issue I honestly was just curious. I stopped listening to Smodcast right around the time Smith started doing Smodcast live. I hate listening to podcast recorded in front of crowds. It just seemed like Mosier was frequently absent from the show. Sorry for assuming he was busy with other projects or Kevin Smith phased out the original Smodcast in favor of the dozens of other podcast he does.
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Dec 31, 2013 05:48
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Human Tornada posted:I'm guessing that if Kevin Smith made a masterpiece he'd be more than happy to soak up praise from these despicable non-artists. Well yeah. He went from printing out and framing positive reviews in his early career to completely ignoring* what his critics say when they started giving poor reviews to his movies. *He's not actually ignoring what critics say
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Dec 31, 2013 06:02
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zandert33 posted:Let's see Someone described an impression from listening to the podcast. You made it sound like there was lots of misinformation going around about Kevin Smith. Yaws posted:Well yeah. He went from printing out and framing positive reviews in his early career to completely ignoring* what his critics say when they started giving poor reviews to his movies. He saved the negative ones, too. All of 'em, even well into the 2000s when everything was online, he'd print them out for lamination. Toady fucked around with this message at 07:00 on Dec 31, 2013 |
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Dec 31, 2013 06:52
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So what is the deal with his new movie? The plot actually has me really interested. I used to like Kevin Smith in high school (I think most of us did) and I still think Clerks deserves the praise it got. I keep holding out hope that he's improved. Didn't see Red State though.
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Dec 31, 2013 07:19
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I tried listening to a few episodes of Kevin Smith's podcast, but it was so loving tedious. Listening to him get high and giggle at himself while broadcasting is just the opposite of entertaining. His movies were interesting when I was in high school, but nothing about his personality nowadays makes me excited for any of his new projects. When he's not high and laughing at his own jokes, he's actually got some good storytelling skills but I don't know if he's capable of making a good film nowadays. I think the movie world has kind of passed him by and he's probably better off sticking to commentary. After all, only people who make movies are qualified to criticize them ( ), so maybe he can just do that full time.
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Dec 31, 2013 09:35
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I pretty much half-enjoyed most of his early movies. Clerks was fun, I kinda enjoyed Dogma because of Linda Fiorentino (especially because she didn't appear to care about it at all) and loved Chasing Amy. The rest, meh, but that's okay. I also listened to some of the earlier Smodcasts and the two things that turned me off were the episode about Helen Keller where they spent literally an hour discussing this woman without either of them knowing anything about her, so it was just an hour's worth of guessing. Not looking up actual facts or anything, just an hour of nonsense. *Boring* nonsense. Then, the second trigger was the "Zack & Miri" backlash episode. He spent an entire episode talking about how he was so appalled that the movie didn't do well, for reasons beyond his control (the moviegoing public, poor marketing, etc). Look, it's lovely that the movie didn't succeed and didn't do Apatow business, but it clearly wasn't very funny. When watching it, I kinda felt bad for Smith, because it was clear he was going for this style of ensemble comedy (down to choice of actors) but he just couldn't pull it off. The "Evenings with" movies are pretty fun though. I enjoyed his Bruce Willis talks.
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Dec 31, 2013 10:04
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Are people seriously criticizing a filmmaker for keeping his good reviews? Do you also think it's dorky for athletes to save their trophies? Good god, man. I want to get a picture of Troy Duffy, Kevin Smith, and Joss Whedon together so I can post it online and listen to the sound of a thousand nerds' heads exploding in impotent rage. "BUT HOW CAN PEOPLE LIKE THEIR MOVIES WHEN THEY SUCK?! HOW?!" *'Splode.
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Dec 31, 2013 10:33
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Anal Surgery posted:I think the movie world has kind of passed him by and he's probably better off sticking to commentary. After all, only people who make movies are qualified to criticize them ( His films were never that great to begin with. He's constantly getting praise for his dialogue but it all sounds written and unnatural. Every one of his characters sounds like Kevin Smith and a lot of them enjoy whatever Smith liked at the time (Degrassi Jr. High, Star Wars, Comics etc.). It's just lazy. I dunno, he seems like M. Night Shyamalan. One passable movie in his early career and he's pretty much coasted on that since.
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Dec 31, 2013 10:43
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That does bug me, and noticing it is the moment I kind of grew out of Smith's films, but after accepting that they weren't some kind of voice-of-a-generation series, I just accepted them for what they were and moved on. I do find it inconspicuous how these discussions never seem to include Red State, though. Not that it was high art, or anything, but it very much doesn't sound or feel like his other stuff, and it was the last film he made.
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Dec 31, 2013 10:47
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LividLiquid posted:That does bug me, and noticing it is the moment I kind of grew out of Smith's films, but after accepting that they weren't some kind of voice-of-a-generation series, I just accepted them for what they were and moved on. Now that you mention it Zach and Miri didn't seem to have the dialogue annoyances I mentioned. I've never seen Red State
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Dec 31, 2013 10:50
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LividLiquid posted:Are people seriously criticizing a filmmaker for keeping his good reviews? Do you also think it's dorky for athletes to save their trophies? That wasn't the point being made at all. LividLiquid posted:I do find it inconspicuous how these discussions never seem to include Red State, though. Most of his movies have a different feel from each other, they just all have the same staid direction. Also, Red State was garbage.
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Dec 31, 2013 10:54
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LividLiquid posted:Good god, man. I want to get a picture of Troy Duffy, Kevin Smith, and Joss Whedon together so I can post it online and listen to the sound of a thousand nerds' heads exploding in impotent rage. That picture cannot exist, because neither of those fine upstanding men would associate with Troy Duffy. I quite like Kevin Smith as a person, he 'throws shitfits' a lot but in ways that don't really offend me and can often be entertaining. His really long rants about Superman/Batman feel like a whole lot of nothing to me, but that's probably because I enjoy discussing films and go into them expecting that when they're really just More Kevin Smith: Batman Jokes And Mondo Weed. His movies aren't perfect and I think his opinions about critics are bad, creating a sort of onanistic vicious cycle, but whatever Clerks was good and actually is pretty revolutionary as a Gen X movie, or a Kevin Smith movie: SPOILER: Did you know Dante's NOT the smart one????? It's been a few years since I saw any of his actual films, and it was Cop Out, which I stopped watching because, despite there being funny things in it, I felt a sudden impulse to stop. Hbomberguy fucked around with this message at 11:31 on Dec 31, 2013 |
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Dec 31, 2013 11:25
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I know way too much about Kevin Smith's anal fissure
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Dec 31, 2013 11:31
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What's worse, that he told you or you listened? To all of it? If Bad Man Kevin Smith gave you direct orders to kill someone and you did it, would it be his fault? These are hard-hitting questions.
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Dec 31, 2013 11:32
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Kevin Smith is something special, in that I don't just find myself disliking his movies, but I now also dislike his fans. He seems to have found a way to make the perfect type of mediocre dreck that attracts fanatical nerds like obese moths to a poorly written light bulb.
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Dec 31, 2013 14:49
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TrixRabbi posted:So what is the deal with his new movie? The plot actually has me really interested. I used to like Kevin Smith in high school (I think most of us did) and I still think Clerks deserves the praise it got. I keep holding out hope that he's improved. Didn't see Red State though. Which one, he's got that crazy walrus one coming out, Clerks 3 and now the just announced one about how people have to ask Hell for help when a giant rampaging Jesus comes down for the Rapture. Apart from Jesus being a literal giant (I think) that's actually a pretty fun idea and I'm surprised it's not been done before. For some reason though I see it more as a graphic novel than a movie.
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Dec 31, 2013 16:24
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I'm kind of looking forward to the walrus one. The idea came from a podcast where he and Mosier were discussing a strange, most likely fake, classified ad about a man offering free rent to anyone willing to dress up and act like a walrus for 2 hours a day or something. They started playing "what if?" and throwing ideas back and forth and came up with an outline for a horror movie as a joke. Over the course of the episode he starts to get more and more excited about the plot. If you're a fan of listening to the guy talk, it's a fun episode to listen to. Then he let Twitter decide if it was a good idea or not. I'm sure the movie won't be perfect, but it's a fun idea and I'll probably see it because its not every day you get to hear a writer/director come up with a movie idea on the spot and then see it actually get made.
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Dec 31, 2013 17:20
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LividLiquid posted:Not that it was high art, or anything, but it very much doesn't sound or feel like his other stuff, and it was the last film he made.
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Dec 31, 2013 17:40
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I think I stopped listening to Kevin Smith when on his podcast he discussed going back in time and discussing the idea of having to suck his own dick. He's the epitome of a manchild, including the jorts, fatness, weed smoking and stupid sense of humour. He should just go away as he has nothing left to contribute.
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Dec 31, 2013 17:58
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You can't talk about Kevin Smith on the internet because the second you do everyone that dislikes him comes out to tell you why they dislike him and why you should dislike him.
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Dec 31, 2013 18:06
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kdrudy posted:You can't talk about Kevin Smith on the internet because the second you do everyone that dislikes him comes out to tell you why they dislike him and why you should dislike him. And? Negative opinions are banned from your celestial world?
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Dec 31, 2013 18:09
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Hbomberguy posted:It's been a few years since I saw any of his actual films, and it was Cop Out, which I stopped watching because, despite there being funny things in it, I felt a sudden impulse to stop. You do know that he didn't write Cop Out right? He went to the studio and wanted to see what it was like to film someone else work. Still I agree it was not that great and was really a fluff piece. And to be honest of lot of his work has not been great but I believe that he might have gotten some excitement back for this next movie. TrixRabbi posted:So what is the deal with his new movie? The plot actually has me really interested. I used to like Kevin Smith in high school (I think most of us did) and I still think Clerks deserves the praise it got. I keep holding out hope that he's improved. Didn't see Red State though. Well, he had the idea for the movie on June 25th 2013 and had a script and funding for it by late September early October and had it in the can by late October. Since then he has been editing and post production work for an unannounced possible release at Cannes with a distribution release for the fall 2014. http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplayl...andbag-20131231
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Dec 31, 2013 18:14
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Human Tornada posted:I'm guessing that if Kevin Smith made a masterpiece he'd be more than happy to soak up praise from these despicable non-artists. I think this is what most people react to with Kevin Smith, his hypocrisy. He didn't seem to mind critics at all when they were celebrating him as the next big thing, you never heard rants about how misunderstood his movies were back then. But now that he and critics don't get along, he can't even be honest about why he's stopped giving a poo poo. I'd respect him a hell of a lot more if he said something like "for whatever reason critics used to really like my stuff, but now they always hate on it so I prefer to just not even pay attention to the negativity." Instead its these condescending and self-righteous rants about how people who don't create art are lazy and know nothing about artists and how dare they even comment on my work. Boo loving Hoo.
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Dec 31, 2013 18:16
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I like a lot of Kevin Smith's stuff, primarily the View Askew/Jay and Silent Bob stuff, but I only just got out of high school, so who knows how long that will last. I haven't seen Cop Out, Zack and Miri, or Jersey Girl, and I thought that Red State was pretty bad. I also don't really like listening to him. Like, he's occasionally an interesting guy, I enjoyed the Evenings stuff, but his podcasts don't do it for me. But, I think he can make good films. He's at least decently funny, I like a lot of the things he likes, so the stilted, referential dialogue works for me, I guess. And his movies can be surprisingly deep and poignant, if he's lucky. There's a lot of praise for Clerks, Dogma, and Chasing Amy, and for good reason, I feel. Mallrats and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back had much more fluff, and didn't really have anything backing the puerile jokes, and I like them less, but they're still enjoyable from time to time. I even like Clerks II, I don't know how much of an unpopular opinion that is. I don't really know what my point was, but I'll probably go see his new movies, or at least order them on Netflix.
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Dec 31, 2013 18:53
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Holligan posted:You do know that he didn't write Cop Out right? He went to the studio and wanted to see what it was like to film someone else work. Forgive me for criticising the director for the poorly-directed movie he directed. I can understand where you're coming from here. Smith has never really had an eye for 'visuals' or 'cinematic language' or...well, movies. All he is is his writing. So if the script wasn't his...then he wasn't really responsible for anything wrong with the movie, was he? Except he made the movie. Films aren't their scripts (I've read the script for Superman Lives. It is loving garbage, but could have made a good movie if it was directed by someone decent, AKA not Kevin 'random cuts to shots of the character's feet' Smith). Smith's rant about Bruce Willis brings up a heck of a lot of other stuff that could do with unpacking, or rather could have done before he turned loving 43. Viewing big-time celebrities as personal heroes instead of human beings and putting them on pedestals, getting super high all the time and not even noticing the way this might affect actors' reactions to him (other directors have come out to say Willis worked fine with them, though the guy does seem a bit like an rear end in a top hat quite often nowadays), not knowing how lenses work or what they do when even I know that poo poo and I'm literally less than half his age, and finding a problem with the fact people want to talk about his loving films, even though A: That's all his fans do and B: That's all HE does and C: Art isn't a void you occasionally poo poo movies into. I don't even hate the guy or his movies. I feel kind of bad that he doesn't seem to recognise cause and effect. He's self-aware enough to know he's doing something wrong, but doesn't want to or care to stop doing it and feels criticism and hate are inevitable, even though a huge portion of complaints about him are directly about that attitude. I wonder why people keep calling me fat. I'm 'too fat to fly' lol what a funny take on a thing that happened sort of, wait why are people calling me too fat to fly that's not very nice either way I have a good sense of humour about it I'M NEVER GETTING ON A PLANE AGAIN Let's talk about Clerks. Who likes Clerks but not Clerks 2, and why?
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Dec 31, 2013 19:05
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I've been tempted to go through his filmography and do a write up on each one, especially since I haven't seen most of his films since high school. But that would also mean rewatching Cop Out. So that's kind of holding me back.
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Dec 31, 2013 19:21
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Hbomberguy posted:Let's talk about Clerks. Who likes Clerks but not Clerks 2, and why?
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Dec 31, 2013 19:58
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| # ? Apr 26, 2024 13:58 |
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I used to like Kevin Smith, back when I was a teenager. Swear words and comic references were all it took for me to give it a thumbs up. But there were two things that caused me to write him off as a whole, now that I'm an adult: 1. I was listening to his SMODcast back before it blew up into having like, fifty shows or whatever. I listened to him essentially have his nervous breakdown after Zack & Miri underperformed. What was originally useful for decent background noise while doing work, became utterly unbearable once his talking points essentially boiled down to "everybody smoke weed all the time!" and "Wayne Gretsky is a GOLDEN GOD." I think it was the episode where he broke down into sobs while talking about Gretzky's dad or something, and it was just so weird, that I had to give up the show. Haven't gone back since. Maybe he's chilled out, but it was a case where seeing more of the man behind the curtain really did him no favors. He just sort of came off as a developmentally arrested manchild who lives in Ben Affleck's old mansion and smokes weed all day. 2. Red State. This was his opportunity to do something different; it sounded provocative, dangerous, experimental. A horror movie about a pastiche of the Westboro Baptist Church? I'm in. And he even filled with fantastic talent like John Goodman and Michael Parks. It sounded like it was going to be awesome. However, in practice, it was a very pedestrian horror flick that neither said enough about the WBC, or had enough scares to be good satire or horror. Instead, it was simply middling. Worse, there was an opportunity to really go gonzo-nuts and do some cool poo poo right at the end with the "twist" of the coming of the Rapture, but he promptly cops out at the last minute. It was really disappointing. Nevermind the fucky way he presented the movie to Sundance, and wasted everyone's time by using it as a platform for self-promotion, rather than actually selling it to a distributor.
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Dec 31, 2013 20:12
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