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Looking Glass Favorite Movie Quote: "Once when I was little, my mother told me the lid to the toilet was down and rather than lift the lid, I sh*t my pants." I don't think it's possible for me to view and grade out Clerks with any semblance of objectivity. I rented some crappy independent VHS movie that had a trailer for Clerks on the front; it looked funny, so I rented it the first time that I saw it in the video store. At the time, I was working as a CSR (Customer Service Representative) for Diamond Shamrock - I was a clerk in a convenience store. Typically, people have little respect for movies which tread upon their areas of expertise. My father served on the USS Flying Fish nuclear submarine and, to this day, 'hurmphs' during the entirety of any movie that takes place on, within, or about a submarine. My sister? Cheerleading. My friend Pace? Anything computer oriented. My brother, having served in the Army, made me promise that if I ever made a film with an RPG or rocket launcher to NOT have the missile flying through the air (it shoots so fast as to be virtually instantaneous). Myself? As a writer that has done countless hours of research for the purposes of authenticity and my own background, football, baseball, police procedures, guns and ballistics, and people, people, people. As for Clerks? Kevin Smith was a clerk; they say write what you know and I concur that, aside from the assorted obvious lunacy, that is pretty much the job of being a convenience store clerk. Clerks does have a plot about our main character Dante's (Brian O'Halloran) inability to improve his station in life or to stop b*tching about it. He is assisted, or at least mocked, by fellow clerk Randal (Jeff Anderson) who, on the other hand, seems to take great pleasure in the moment and has no reservations about spending his current life making a crap wage while insulting his patrons. The movie really just serves as a stage for hilariously personal conversations about everything ranging from sex to Star Wars and for (Writer/Director) Kevin Smith to vent about the stupid customers with whom anyone in the service industry is familiar. The real charm of Clerks, however, is that the dialog has the ring of truth to it - it's not hard to imagine Smith having these exact same conversations with his friends - and brought to life by smooth-delivering, competent actors with good comedic timing and rhythm. For the budget, O'Halloran and Anderson are finds as well as Dante's two love interests played by Marilyn Ghigliotti and Lisa Spoonhauer. All four ramble through fairly complicated dialog at breakneck speed, often with no or few cuts; I am surprised that none of them emerged with a more successful acting career. Overall, I still love Clerks and not just for the nostalgia. It's still hilarious - Dante: "Thirty-seven! My girlfriend sucked thirty-seven dicks!" Customer: "In a row?" - and has a great revelation that I'm sure Smith had himself at one point - Randal: "We like to think we're so advanced, so much better than the average person that comes in here to buy coffee or - God forbid - cigarettes. Well if we're so advanced, what are we doing working here?" What indeed? email this review to a friend
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