The little black and white movie that could

January 25, 2023 9:07 PM

Love it or hate it, there is no denying the influence and impact of one little movie from 1994. Join everyone involved with the movie in celebrating three decades of Clerks with the late 2022 documentary We're Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today [1h13m]. Covers the entire Clerks trilogy and some of the View Askewniverse, and is mostly a lot of people amazed this even happened. And wow, a lot happened!
posted by hippybear (42 comments total)

I have to say, the scene where Jay is on the phone ordering videos from the distributor is one of the most rotflmao moments in any movie.
posted by Thorzdad at 3:22 AM on January 26, 2023 [9 favorites]

my girlfriend made me watch clerks and mallrats back to back in 99, and we would quote from it all the time as our own inside jokes (she loved to tell me not to suck any dick on the way to the parking lot) so in a way that memory is incredibly formative, but rewatching them i can’t help but think their appeal stopped at the teenage years, and indeed maybe only teenagers from a certain era, of which i was the tail end. kevin smith certainly seems to have a peter pan thing going on. so now i only have ambivalence and cringe (really? i thought this was funny??)
posted by dis_integration at 6:03 AM on January 26, 2023 [2 favorites]

I think I was too old when these things came out to appreciate their humour, which aligns with dis_integration. In 1994 I was almost 30 and was married and had a house and kids and a decent job and lot of responsibilities. Actually I don't think I was ever a teenager, I'm not sure I was ever a child. But I definitely had friends who loved this kind of humour. I wonder what brain connections I'm missing.
posted by seanmpuckett at 6:23 AM on January 26, 2023 [5 favorites]

my girlfriend made me watch clerks and mallrats back to back in 99, and we would quote from it all the time as our own inside jokes (she loved to tell me not to suck any dick on the way to the parking lot) so in a way that memory is incredibly formative, but rewatching them i can’t help but think their appeal stopped at the teenage years, and indeed maybe only teenagers from a certain era, of which i was the tail end. kevin smith certainly seems to have a peter pan thing going on. so now i only have ambivalence and cringe (really? i thought this was funny??

I haven't seen Clerks in forever (and I remember it being better) but I rewatched Mallrats in college and even at merely 20 that was very much my reaction.

I do still occasionally say "that kid is BACK on the escalator" when the situation calls for it, though.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 6:30 AM on January 26, 2023 [5 favorites]

My live for you is like a truck, berserker!
posted by Artw at 6:38 AM on January 26, 2023 [26 favorites]

It’s great to have this black and white chunk of genX culture. In 94 I was the target demo. The whole ethos of ‘I’m not even supposed to be here today’. The monologues. White dudes talking and it’s not dialogue onscreen, which was how it was always raved about. No, it’s just Smith talking to the audience. Yea it’s embarrassing.

But I talked like that before it came out. And after. The audience turned out to be huge. At the time I worked at the student news paper and our featured writer was non other than Chuck Closterman. Drinking beers in a smokey basement while the Violent Fems played and while he yelled about serial killers. Our whole social scene could have been in that movie. But more unfiltered Lucky Strikes. Uggg.

This was back when there were lots of aimless dudes confused by women having agency and a history, obsessed with the entertainment from their childhood and stuck in pointless, meaningless jobs. Pure nihilism on that one. The lightening that Smith captured was a movie that was the bitter laments of the man child genX, and making those a dark comedy. Of course it’s ironic and jaded and tries so hard to be cool and sound smart.

Last I saw it I didn’t always laugh at all the old bits that amused me. I reminisced about being so carefree, stumbling into adulthood and struggling to navigate my own expectations and obligations. Part of me still is that guy who wants to overshare all my thoughts on juvenile entertainment, because it was my extended adolescence.

Some of us are just more stuck inside that movie than others.
posted by zenon at 6:52 AM on January 26, 2023 [24 favorites]

I don't think I watched Clerks more than a couple times; I was a hair older when it came out so I didn't sit around with a friend group who threw quotes around anymore the way I did with Repo Man and Spinal Tap and all the Monty Pythons, but I liked it enough that I could see it taking on a bigger place in my life if I'd caught it younger.

But I can't deny that when I saw Andor, (rot13 for possible spoiler:)
Gur svefg guvat V gubhtug bs jura V jngpurq gur svany ohggba fprar jvgu gur ebobgf vafgnyyvat gur fuvryqf jnf, qvq qvq gurl jevgr gung fcrpvsvpnyyl gb nqqerff gur pbairefngvba va Pyrexf nobhg gur pbzcyvpvgl / frafryrff gentrql bs gur vaqrcraqrag pbagenpgbef jub ohvyg gur Qrngu Fgne? ZNLOR GURER JRER AB PBAGENPGBEF! *oenva rkcybqrf*

Anyway thanks for the link - will definitely give this a watch.
posted by Mchelly at 7:11 AM on January 26, 2023 [1 favorite]

Some of us are just more stuck inside that movie than others.


seems like a very uncomfortable place.
posted by logicpunk at 7:34 AM on January 26, 2023 [14 favorites]

Like the backseat of a Volkswagen?
posted by sara is disenchanted at 8:02 AM on January 26, 2023 [22 favorites]

Yes, Mchelly, I thought the same thing. The one thing from Clerks that really stuck with me was the conversation about the second Death Star, and the contractors working on it. It's funny, it's a valid point, and the roofer's random contribution is perfect, plain, practical morality: "they knew who they were working for, I turned down a gig because of that." But what I really loved is the joke's context, which really captures GenX's insipid seriousness in the 90s: real moral consideration of wildly fictional situations presented in popcorn sci-fi movies.
posted by LooseFilter at 8:04 AM on January 26, 2023 [17 favorites]

I love early Kevin Smith and I love Clerks like whoa. It was just one of those movies that made me laugh like a goon, but also made me love the way it got made.

While I was working with Dreaming Tree Films, I wrote a movie called 24 Hour Service based on the alternate ending to CLERKS. It wasn't a comedy; it was a dramatic take on "I wasn't even supposed to be here today."

It's probably one of the best movies I ever wrote. It won a lot of festival awards and earned Academy Award eligibility in Short Subject. And it was all because CLERKS captured my attention and fired my imagination. I love seeing how this film got made; thank you so much for this post.
posted by headspace at 8:06 AM on January 26, 2023 [33 favorites]

Clerks is very much of its time, but it really nailed the zeitgeist. I haven't watched it in probably 20 years. I'm sure I would cringe at it the way I cringe at my younger self.

Still, there is some fondness for that time and place.
posted by Fleebnork at 8:23 AM on January 26, 2023 [2 favorites]

I still always surprised whenever I hear Kevin Smith talking.
posted by waving at 8:24 AM on January 26, 2023 [6 favorites]

I have to say, the scene where [Randall] is on the phone ordering videos from the distributor is one of the most rotflmao moments in any movie.

Not sure if this is mentioned in the documentary, but one of my favorite things about that scene is that there are numerous cuts because Randall was uncomfortable reading the porn titles in front of a small child, so that was shot separately.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 8:28 AM on January 26, 2023 [9 favorites]

GenX's insipid seriousness in the 90s: real moral consideration of wildly fictional situations presented in popcorn sci-fi movies

This is a perfect distillation of a very specific cultural moment, and yet somehow also describes like 75% of all conversations about pop culture today.
posted by Gerald Bostock at 8:49 AM on January 26, 2023 [4 favorites]

This is a great doc, highly worth watching. Like others, I haven't watched Clerks in probably 25 years, but it definitely holds a place in my heart as the movie that showed me that movies could be ... like that. And the animated series really was funny as hell, in my memory. The Flintstones List gag described here is uh ... really something.
posted by uncleozzy at 9:00 AM on January 26, 2023 [2 favorites]

Kevin Smith has long spoke of his love for John Hughes movies. I can’t help but think that the Clerks movies are a natural extension, nailing the dialogue of a very specific generation in all its often-problematic glory.

Smith also definitely caught the wave of the rising dominance of nerd culture. It was a trip to see cameos of actual working comics artists in Chasing Amy.

dis_integration really hits the nail on the head regarding Smith’s Peter Pan syndrome. I mean, he’s tried to do more ambitious films but just doesn’t seem to have the ability, hence, always coming back to the Clerks well (in addition, keeping his friends employed). I can’t remember where I saw it, but Smith himself has noted that his propensity to go on tour makes him more of a stand up comic and I think that fits.
posted by Eikonaut at 9:01 AM on January 26, 2023 [3 favorites]

This was back when there were lots of aimless dudes confused by women having agency and a history, obsessed with the entertainment from their childhood and stuck in pointless, meaningless jobs. Pure nihilism on that one. The lightening that Smith captured was a movie that was the bitter laments of the man child genX, and making those a dark comedy. Of course it’s ironic and jaded and tries so hard to be cool and sound smart.

This is such a true description of that era and those guys trying (or not) to grow up. You could easily remake Clerks as a low-key horror movie.
posted by rikschell at 9:04 AM on January 26, 2023 [8 favorites]

One of the amusing and slightly surprising things about Clerks is that both Siskel & Ebert liked it.

I was sort of the target demographic - I was 19 in 1994, but was generally too filled with anxiety and self-importance to fit the GenX "slacker" mentality. I'm much more a nihilist now than I was 30 years ago. Still, Clerks was on heavy rotation in our college apartment and I can still quote a whole bunch of it.

Regarding Kevin Smith writ large, Dogma will always be my favorite.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 9:16 AM on January 26, 2023 [11 favorites]

Jason Lee's delivery of "that kid is BACK on the escalator" still makes me laugh just thinking about it. It may be the only thing in that film or Clerks that holds up for me. I rewatched Clerks a couple of years ago, and so many of the jokes made me wince, like I was trying to duck for cover or something. Maybe it's just me.
posted by BigHeartedGuy at 9:25 AM on January 26, 2023 [1 favorite]

As a companion piece, maybe: I really enjoyed Nick Pinkerton's article on Kevin Smith and Clerks III. A personal journey through the Askewniverse - and growing up alongside it (for better and worse for the enjoyment of Kevin Smith's oeuvre). I could relate to a lot.
posted by bigendian at 10:02 AM on January 26, 2023 [5 favorites]

I have fond memories of seeing Clerks at my university town rep theatre at the time, and I'm disinclined to add any new ones by watching it again at the age of 49...especially since I don't think I liked any of Smith's other movies, even back in the day. But yeah, I was smack-dab in the middle of the target demographic and working a crappy customer service job when it was released, so it resonated.
posted by The Card Cheat at 11:00 AM on January 26, 2023 [1 favorite]

The thing that I find funny about the Kevin Smith story is that he attended the Vancouver Film school for two weeks, dropped out and took however much of his tution he could get back from them and used it to help fund Clerks. The funny thing is that to this day, the Vancouver Film School still advertises that Kevin Smith is a graduate of their program. The dirty scoundrels.
posted by hoodrich at 11:27 AM on January 26, 2023 [15 favorites]

VFS: We're so good you only need two weeks.
posted by Mitheral at 11:54 AM on January 26, 2023 [10 favorites]

Always sorta missing about the Smith films that were 'good' and the ones that were 'bad' is Scott Mosier as editor.
They seemed to have parted at least creatively after a bit and you can tell.
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 12:04 PM on January 26, 2023 [1 favorite]

He did do Jersey Girl though.
posted by Artw at 12:12 PM on January 26, 2023

I was absolutely the target demographic for this in 1994, and somehow I've never seen it or any of the other in the series.
posted by slogger at 12:32 PM on January 26, 2023

It's killing me that they still exactly talk the same way but look like my work colleagues. It's so jarring - it's an uncanny valley because if I close my eyes they're my tribe - the speech patterns, the language, everything. And then I open my eyes, and have to adjust.

This is true of me talking to myself in the mirror as well.
posted by BlueBlueElectricBlue at 2:23 PM on January 26, 2023 [3 favorites]

I think it's remarkable that Clerks was selected in 2019 to be part of the National Film Registry. I don't think anyone saw that coming.
posted by hippybear at 2:28 PM on January 26, 2023 [3 favorites]

I still use "I"m not even supposed to be here today!" as my go-to whine like 97% of the time when I'm called into work on what's supposed to be a home day.
posted by TwoStride at 2:37 PM on January 26, 2023 [4 favorites]

That documentary was really very good. My spouse (then boyfriend) and I saw Clerks in the theatrical run in 94, twice. We were exactly the demographic and really, one of the things about Clerks that made me a pretty dedicated Kevin Smith fan for a very long time was that that movie was also my life. Those were they guys in high school hanging out in the Burger King parking lot. Those were the film majors I knew in college. That movie was 100% relatable to me in 1994 and I thought it was hilarious and I had never experienced anything like that before.

I haven’t really kept up with Smith’s work for probably the last 10 years or so, I don’t know if I will watch Clerks III. I might now, after watching this documentary. I wonder if I will have the same reaction to the current film now, in middle age, as I did then to the first movie.
posted by DiscourseMarker at 3:34 PM on January 26, 2023 [1 favorite]

Yeah, I think I've seen each of the Kevin Smith films once (okay, Chasing Amy and Dogma more than once, which is super rare for me), and I was probably a little old and a little privileged in my early employment to really "get" Clerks, but having this documentary on in snippets while I'm working today has reminded me that... I got to the bit in the middle about Dante confronting Randall in the jail cell, and the turn of act III of Clerks 2, and I was reminded that the combination of dialog that could be Mamet's wordiness and rhythm if Mamet were writing about people I could imagine myself hanging out with and liking, and just acknowledging personal flaws and putting his heart on his sleeve, that I don't get from many filmmakers.

And the scenery chewing makes his films feel like the actors and the crew are having fun as a group in ways that I often don't feel.

So, yeah, I haven't seen Clerks 3 yet, but I will, and I'm really enjoying this, in snippets.
posted by straw at 5:02 PM on January 26, 2023

I am two weeks younger than Scott Mosier and I saw Clerks on the first date with the woman I’ve now been married to for a quarter-century and in 2006 we saw it screened outdoors in Red Bank and stood in line for 13 hours to meet Kevin Smith and I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’m a little too close to this movie to objectively evaluate its merits but I sure enjoyed the documentary, thanks for posting it.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 6:05 PM on January 26, 2023 [9 favorites]

I never worked retail hell but in the 90s all my friends were and one in particular worked at this lazy gas and service station where half the business was in cigarettes and I used to hang out there at times waiting for said friend to get off work at the end of his swing shift. Clerks really resonated for me and "I'm not even supposed to be here today" was all too relatable. Its got a lot of cringe nowadays but I still enjoy the the occasional nostalgic rewatch.
posted by Mitheral at 6:22 PM on January 26, 2023

Much as I love Kevin Smith and think he seems like a good egg in Hollywood, the quality of his movie ideas went waaaaaaaaaaaay down once he discovered the joys of pot. I'm not sure when he split with Mosier or if that's a factor, but he's one of the few people where I want to be like, "Kevin, please put the blunts down, the ideas you come up with on them are TERRIBLE." Like Tusk? Yoga Hosers? I can't even watch new Kevin Smith movies any more.

That said, I'll always love Dogma, with Chasing Amy and the Clerks/Mallrats after that.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:21 PM on January 26, 2023 [2 favorites]

I thought Red State was pretty effective for what it was.
posted by hippybear at 8:00 PM on January 26, 2023

VFS: We're so good you only need two weeks

…IN A ROW?
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 9:15 PM on January 26, 2023 [6 favorites]

I was 19 and working at a convenience store when this came out. This movie spoke to me. There is definitely a level of Sophomoric puerility to the film, but it does have an intellectually and emotionally satisfying core, even today. At least for me.

Chasing Amy came along a few years later when I was dating my now wife. While the movie really got really unstable around the characterization of the Joey Lauren Adams character and her sexuality, it has a depth that I didn’t see in Clerks — it showed maturation that I didn’t see in Mallrats, so I was hopeful and interested to see what Smith did next.

Dogma was, for me, a huge disappointment. This is when I realized Kevin Smith has no understanding of how to write a realistic, emotionally grounded female character. I realized Joey Lauren Adams and the actresses in Clerks had taken what were essentially caricatures and turned them into believable people. Kevin Smith is just too stuck in the 15 year-old D&D playing, gifted intellect but emotionally immature and shallow phase of development.

I guess what I’m saying is Clerks and Chasing Amy speak to me despite their flaws because I grokked where Smith was coming from and could make the connections in my mind that he couldn’t as a filmmaker. But the labor of making those connections wasn’t worth it for me on subsequent films.

In the end, I think I grew up and he did not.
posted by Big Al 8000 at 10:33 PM on January 26, 2023 [4 favorites]

Anyone with an ounce of appreciation for Clerks should really watch Clerks III. I expected it to be a bit tired, but instead it was thoughtful, funny and heartwarming.
posted by J-Garr at 11:58 AM on January 27, 2023 [2 favorites]

I discovered Clerks and Kevin Smith in the most nerdy way possible, because Star Wars Insider put up a small article on the contractor scene from it. That got me to rent it from my local videostore and made me a fan for a while.
posted by MartinWisse at 2:35 PM on January 27, 2023 [1 favorite]

I have not seen Tusk. I wonder if it's as bad as it is said to be.
posted by hippybear at 3:28 PM on January 27, 2023

I watched Clerks III a couple of months ago. Smith’s sophomoric humor has become stale, but he also has always had keen insights into the psyche of Reconstructionists.

There’s been some ups and downs, but I’m just as stuck as Dante. I had thought that my disconnection from time was a sequelae of Mom’s death. That avoiding holidays made one day run into the next and one year just like the last. That turned the entire last decade into one extruded chunk of time that had no beginning and no end.

Anyway, it’s not only a dumb movie with a bunch of dick jokes is what I’m saying. It’s given me something to think about, much like the original Clerks.
posted by ob1quixote at 4:36 PM on January 27, 2023