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Clerks - Collector's Edition

Clerks - Collector's Edition

List Price: $19.99
Your Price: $14.99
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Bored. Shrug.
Review: I finally broke down and bought this after a co-worker talked favorably about the Silent Bob series. I've read the mostly-favorable comments about Kevin Smith movies, so...

Why was I so bored? I don't know.
I've worked retail.
I like black and white movies - no problem there.
I can appreciate having no budget.
I can appreciate "dialogue-based" movies - I like to think.
I can make allowances for "first films" - congrats on getting any movie made.

I found this movie nearly unwatchable. I will listen to the commentary and the DVD extras, then sell it (with the other dud movies I buy) to a co-worker - cheap.

I give it a generous 2 stars for effort, I suppose. Although I would categorize it as "bad", it is not as truly horrifically bad as the few movies I have rated worse (Armageddon, Black and White, Lost and Delirious, The Smokers)

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Original, crude and funny
Review: This is an indie film (VideoHound gives a $27,575 budget) filmed in not so glorious black and white that is strikingly original, and I mean strikingly, and funny. Depicting the early twenties slacker set in suburban New Jersey a decade ago, it focuses on convenience store clerk Dante Hicks (Brian O'Halloran), who is adrift in that never-never land between high school and Making Something of Himself. He still pines for his high school hottie Caitlin Bree (Lisa Spoonhauer), especially when he learns that his current girl friend Veronica (Marilyn Ghigliotti) has, shall we say, had intimate rocket knowledge of thirty-seven different guys, although she had sex with only three of them, including him. Ah, well, what's a snowball or two between friends?

Next door to the convenience store is a video rental store clerked by Dante's best bud, Randal Graves (Jeff Anderson). Randal scares off the customers, rents his videos elsewhere and just generally slacks off and offends at all times, except when giving career and sexual advice to Dante. Hanging out outside and dealing are Jay (Jason Mewes) and Silent Bob (Kevin Smith). Kevin Smith also directed and wrote the script and probably did the catering and clean up as well. He is one very clever and talented dude who told it like it almost was while mildly satirizing the New Jersey denizens and the slacker mentality, but with affection and a kind of light-hearted aplomb.

There's some absurdity, Caitlin making love to a dead man and not realizing he's dead, the guys playing stick ball hockey on the roof of the convenience store, Randal selling cigs to a four-year-old who lights up, etc., mixed with the pathos of making minimum wage and going nowhere, and some sight gags and a whole lot of spiffy, crude, and dead-panned one-liners. Nothing is taken too seriously, including Kevin Smith and his film, so that when they run the final credits we are pleased with this slice of indeterminate life in the Garden State.

I was reminded of some other low budget films made about the same time including Bang (1995), Floundering (1994) and The Unbelievable Truth (1990), especially the latter, but none are as outrageously funny as Clerks. Incidentally, this is currently ranked in IMDb's Top 250.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Film That Formed Kevin Smith
Review: This classic low-budget, rudely humorous, 1994 film was the first done by director Kevin Smith. Most of the movie takes place in a small local convience store. Dante, the only clerk working in their was called in despite the other goings on that were happening that day. His girlfriend comes to cheer him up, only to have him find out that his girlfriend has (well, actually I can't say it here) to multiple other people. To annoy him even more is the irresponsible Randal who works in a video rental store across the street, even though he likes to go to another one miles away and is bearily in the one he works in. Randal spends the whole day pissing off both Dante and the customers, and also trying to get Jay and Silent Bob to stop dealing drugs outside of his video store with their heavy metal singing Russian friend.

Shot in black and white on an extreme low budget, this film would lead Kevin Smith into the mainstream eye, and he would begin to work with big name actors including George Carlin, Chris Rock, even Ben and Matt. With his follow ups Mallrats, Chasing Amy and Dogma, he would prove himself as one of the most independently influenced directors iin mainstream Hollywood (these movies are also hilarious). Smith would also continue to star in his moovies as the ever-quiet Silent Bob, who teamed up with his partner Jay (they would become the main interest in the movie because of their quick and vulger humor and classic one-liners). Kevin Smith will probably continue to make people laugh with his oddball brand of humor for years to come.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: the film that started it all
Review: this is such a great freaking movie! In my opinion this one was the 4th finest new jersey saga film. The dialogue is witty and very sarcastic (randall is the best) and the black and white filming really puts an interesting spin on the tone of the film. This movie follows two convenience store clerks throughout one of the worst days of one of their lives and paints caricatures of all the a**holes in society that we would love to have shot. funny funny stuff.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: CLERKS [review 1]
Review: CLERKS is a classic cult film.One of my favorite films ever made.Your missing out of an awsome film if you havn't ever seen CLERKS.You won't be dissiponted if you have an open mind.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: I Was Disappointed
Review: I know this is suppose to be a great classic of Kevin Smith, but I was not impressed. Although this is the first of the "Jay & Silent Bob/Kevin Smith Films" it is probably my least favorite. I give this movie 3 stars because there wasn't anything I really disliked about it, however, there wasn't anything that I thought was really great about it. Although I did like how it was in black and white and it was a good concept.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Amazing
Review: This is Kevin Smith's first flim and it is my favorite out of all of them. It was made on a very low budget with no experienced actors and was shot in black and white. There is hardly a plot, but its about two "clerks" dante and randall who hate their jobs and the people that come into their stores. That is basically the plot. It works well cause there all inexperienced actors, and it is just a funny funny movie. Recommended to anyone.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: And to think, he wasn't even supposed to be there that day..
Review: Let's get one thing straight: for the most part, I HATE independent films. Really. When I hear those words, I always think of a five-hour, beatnik-friendly black-and-white film of two french people talking and smoking cigarettes, while their conversation is subtitled in English, and the end card reads "Fin". Sometimes I think "independent film" refers to the movie being independent from having to make a lick of sense. Yes, this movie is in black-and-white, but in all honestly, that's the only thing it has in common with other "independent films". This movie is real, funny, and raw, and it helped to boost the career of a young filmmaker in the rough, Mr. Kevin P. Smith of Red Bank, NJ.

The movie focuses on the comings and goings and comings of the Quick Stop Convienience Store, and its head clerk, Dante Hicks (Brian O'Halloran). It is Dante's day off, but unfortunately for him, he gets called in to work. (I know how that feels, and believe me, it bites.) Hence his catchphrase: "I'm not even supposed to be here today!" The next 90 minutes deal with Dante's love life (37?!), his sarcastic (and witty as hell) friend Randal Graves who works at the nearby video store (Jeff Anderson), and of course, the dumb customers he gets. I am a cashier at a grocery store as well, so I know exactly what it's like to have to deal with these people. I can't tell you how many times I've gotten people like that and I just wanted to use one of Randal's lines against them. Also, watch the scene at the video store, when a mother asks Randal for a kid's video for her daughter (who is with her). What ensues... classic. Oh yeah, and how can I forget, this is also the flick that introduced America to Jay (Jason Mewes) and Silent Bob (Smith). Snoochie Boochie Noochies!

All in all, if you're a cashier/clerk, or even if you're not, this is a great movie, and should be seen by everyone, along with the rest of the movies in the View Askew-niverse.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: the epitome of a bad day at work
Review: Clerks is one of the funniest movies ever. Even for a debut, Kevin Smith proves that he is a comedic genius.

The cast of characters in Clerks is very diverse and realistic. The 'protagonist,' or 'main character' of the movie is Dante Hicks (Brian O'Halloran), who is a college dropout who has no ambition, and overcompensates for having to come to work on his day off (his ctach phrase throughout the movie: "I'm not even supposed to be here today!"). He's like Holden Caufield: he has potential, he is intelligent, he sees the problems wrong w/ society "Dealing with every backwards [person] on the planet" at one day of work, but, like Caufield, feels content with just lamenting about it, even though his girlfriend, Veronica (Marilyn Ghigliotti in her only known movie role), encourages him to get out of the rut he is in and return to school.

Then there is Randall (Jeff Anderson, a regular in Kevin Smith movies), the misanthropic employee of an adjacent video store, who is known for telling off customers, and regularly closing the video store to hang out w/ Dante and harass his customers. In a literary sense, you can see him as Nietzsche: he denounces his fellow man, believes that women are inferior (proven by his bizarre tastes in adult videos) and questions authority. He also tries his best to give his friend, Dante, a sense of direction in his life.

Throughout the movie, you are exposed to Dante's everyday problems, like the struggle of dealing with his situation (working in a convenient store for minimum wage), his girlfriend's rather promiscuous sex life (37!), and the feelings he still has for his ex-girlfriend, Caitlin Bree (Lisa Spoonhauer). Dante is exposed to a variety of people during his day at work, including a gum representative who incites a riot against cigarettes, his hokcey player friends, former high school classmates, and two regular stoners who spend their time hanging around the store harassing people (Jay and Silent Bob).

Clerks is a comedy classic that will be legendary. The free use of adult language and sexual themes may turn off some people, but the humor of this movie is undeniable. It's hilarious, as it is philosophical. This movie contains many notable quotes, and whether you like it or hate it, you will remember it.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: extra cheesy
Review: Sorry. I did not like this movie at all. Most of the dialogue sounded very scripted and contrived... reminded me of a high school play. Since when do customers go into a store and say 'a pack of cigarettes, please'. Quite frankly, I was bored through most of this film. I realize that this movie was made on a shoestring budget but the camera work was pretty lousy like there was a single camera used or something. Probably the only redeeming value of the movie is the modern-ish soundtrack and the fact that it was filmed in black and white.


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