DIRECTOR: Kevin Smith
CAST: Brian O’Halloran, Jeff Anderson, Marilyn Ghigliotti, Rosario Dawson, Trevor Fehrman, Jason Mewes, Kevin Smith, Amy Sedaris, Austin Zajur, Ben Affleck, Fred Armisen, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Michelle Buteau, Marc Bernardin, Justin Long
RUNNING TIME: 100 mins
CERTIFICATE: 15
BASICALLY…: After a near-fatal heart attack, Randal (Anderson) enlists his friend Dante (O’Halloran) to help make a movie about their lives as convenience store clerks…
NOW FOR THE REVIEW…
Since his 1994 indie breakout Clerks, much has happened to filmmaker Kevin Smith, most notably his near-fatal heart attack in 2018. This singular event, which prompted a major lifestyle change for the director (he has since shed a lot of weight due to a new all-vegan diet), is the clearest influence of all on his latest film, the trilogy-concluding Clerks III, which like many films set within Smith’s “View Askewniverse” contains plenty of lewd wackiness, movie references galore, and more than a few winks and nods to the audience – but also, in a surprising turn, a tremendous amount of hubris and bittersweet contemplation. It’s not without faults, especially for viewers who aren’t quite as well-versed in this ‘verse as others are, but as a wrap-up of an unlikely trilogy, it’s a strong enough one to go out on.
The film begins with our central convenience store employees, Dante (Brian O’Halloran) and Randall (Jeff Anderson), once again slacking off at the one place that neither of them can seem to properly escape from. On this fateful day, however, Randall suffers a major heart attack and is rushed to the hospital, where he realises that his life up to this moment has been wasted, with nothing to show for it. He decides that he will make a movie about his and Dante’s lives at the store – which, of course, ends up being the first Clerks movie – enlisting Dante, fellow employee Elias (Trevor Fehrman), and that famous duo Jay and Silent Bob (played as ever by Jason Mewes and Smith respectively) to help him film the simple tale of two convenience store clerks on a simple day in their lives.
When filmmakers like Kevin Smith revisit their own work under metatextual circumstances, it often teeters a fine line between reflective postmodernity and extravagant self-indulgence. With Clerks III, Smith straddles competently enough to ensure he falls head-first onto neither side, allowing a fair amount of room to indulge in plenty of fan-service for his own cinematic universe – expect cameos aplenty from past Smith affiliates like Ben Affleck and Justin Long, although not quite on the same level as Smith’s previous film Jay and Silent Bob Reboot – but also genuinely evolving some of his long-standing characters who have long been defined by their lack of evolution. Smith cleverly does this by recontextualising some classic scenes from his 1994 original, with the meta twist of them being filmed for Randall’s passion project, which results in some surprising and even shocking moments of drama that weren’t exactly possible to create nearly thirty years ago, because these characters didn’t carry the longevity and emotional breadth that they do today. Occasionally, there will be moments when you feel as though Smith is perhaps a bit too in love with his past work (particularly when it just starts showing clips from the first Clerks movie), but it’s still possible to see the noble intentions that he put into making this movie, especially when it reaches its gutsy conclusion.
The unfortunate irony is that, for a movie about characters making a movie, one of the weakest parts is the actual filmmaking. Similar to Jay and Silent Bob Reboot, there is little variety in how some of the shots are staged, with most of them consisting of two people standing in front of the camera before cutting to another shot of two people standing in front of the camera, with the editing making it seem as though these scenes are longer than they actually are. It’s not exactly a lazy style, but it is one where you feel that Smith, especially post-heart attack, has become a lot less ambitious in his filmmaking, and isn’t quite as willing to try new things with the camera and overall framing. There is also something about the cinematography that’s a bit too crisp and clean for this kind of movie, lacking the grittier edge that the previous Clerks films, especially that first one which they’re trying very hard to recreate here, were able to visually conceive. While it’s overall not a horribly made film – you forget, I had to watch Blackbird earlier this month – there is noticeably less of a real drive and ambition to it that Smith is often known for.
It may be uneven in the filmmaking and also its humour department – there are some funny lines here and there, but most of the comedy is hit-or-miss, with the one-joke subplot of devout Christian Elias converting to Satanism being a considerable miss – but when it works, Clerks III is a profound end to this trilogy that will hit the most loyal fans right in the chest. They will most likely get the most out of this film, but while the largely uninitiated might struggle to catch up, there’s still enough heart to make it a likeable experience.
SO, TO SUM UP…
Clerks III is a bittersweet if uneven conclusion to Kevin Smith’s trilogy, which sees the filmmaker take inspiration from his own health scares and past filmmaking experiences to make a meta commentary on his breakout feature, but while it has enough heart and emotion to satisfy long-term Smith fans, the uninitiated may be more inclined to notice the unambitious filmmaking and hit-or-miss humour.
