So tonight, after dodging the bullet for months now, we had our first (and only) test screening with a general audience for “Clerks II”.

Let me say a few words about test screenings: I hate them. Fuck, do I hate them. I don’t mind the actual screening portion, where you’re sitting there with an audience watching the flick and listening to their reactions; that part’s totally cool. It’s when the screening ends, the lights come up, and the folks in charge start handing out survey cards for the audience to fill out… that’s when shit usually goes south for me. And even worse, twenty or twenty five people are kept behind to take part in what’s known as a “focus group”, where they’re asked pointed questions about the movie (”Did you like it?” and “What didn’t you like about it?” and “Would you recommend it to people, and if not, why not?”) and the filmmakers are forced to hide in the back of theater and listen to an audience eviscerate something they’ve worked so hard on for so long, without being able to get up and defend themselves or the flick. Of all the aspects of filmmaking that go into the gestalt of cinematic storytelling, this is definitely the least appetizing. I don’t know any filmmaker who enjoys it.

Now normally, one test screens (or is forced to test screen by the studio) in an effort to look for cuts or make changes in the flick, based on how audiences react to the screening. On “Jersey Girl”, we endured ten of these screenings, in a failed effort to make the movie more palatable to a mainstream audience. With “Clerks II”, the idea wasn’t to look for cuts or changes (indeed, the prints are locked at this point); tonight’s test screening was purely a marketing screening, set up by the Weinstein Company in an effort to shed some light on how to go about selling the flick.

Based on that, there was no real risk to us: if the audience hated the flick, we weren’t going to be forced to make changes. After all, the flick only cost five million to make, so the financial risks facing the Weinstein Company are minimal at best. And with the lion’s share of our foreign pre-sales taken care of at Cannes 2005 (a year before we’d screen at the fest to an eight minute standing ovation, plug, plug) the movie’s budget, it’s been revealed, was already taken care of; in essence, the movie’s in profit before opening day.

Still, any screening in which cards are gonna be filled out and comments about the qualities (or lack thereof) of the flick are gonna be made is nerve-wracking to a filmmaker. So when the lights dimmed in this Kansas City theater (chosen because the Weinstein Company wanted to see how the movie would play in the heartland), I was sweating it. This wasn’t a room comprised of hardcore fans. The audience recruit for the test screening didn’t list any of our previous flicks on the list of movies potential attendees had to have seen theatrically to be considered for inclusion. The “Qualifying Films” list (of which the audience Must Have Seen at least three) looked like this: “Bad Santa”, “Malibu’s Most Wanted”, “The 40 Year Old Virgin”, “Dodgeball”, “White Chicks”, “Team America: World Police”, “The Ringer”, “Old School”, “Anchorman”, “High Fidelity”, “Napoleon Dynamite”, and “Wedding Crashers”. Not a “Chasing Amy” or “Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back” anywhere in sight.

The Demographics they were looking for were 60% Male, 40% Female, 17-34 (60% under 25). Essentially, a mainstream comedy audience – something, I feel, our flick really isn’t.

The good news is that it was, apparently, an easy recruit. They had a line that wrapped the building of people looking to get in. 30 or 40 potential attendees had to be turned away. We had a packed house of close to 400. But when the “Clerks II” title card came up, there was no raucous applause (a normally great indicator that the room is full of friendlies).

However, that was about the only point in the screening when there weren’t applause.

Man, that screening rocked. The audience was with the flick every step of the way. It played even better, I dare say, than it did in Cannes (which I guess isn’t that surprising, since the entire audience, unlike the Cannes screening, was comprised of folks whose first language was English). There were only three walk-outs (one of whom was a mid-30’s woman who felt the film was “disgusting”), and they all left in the first twenty minutes (by which time anybody who feels the flick isn’t their kinda poison heads for the hills). After that first twenty minutes, nobody left. That’s rare for us and our flicks (especially considering how out there our flicks can get; this one in particular).

When the flick ended, there was resounding applause (also pretty fucking rare in a test screening). The audience filled out their cards, and twenty five folks were kept behind for the focus group.

The focus group didn’t seem to match the audience reaction we heard while watching the flick. Folks were a bit more reserved in their praise. But the majority of the focus group rated the flick “excellent”, “very good”, and “good”. Only one person rated it “fair”. Nobody chose “poor”. Marketing data gleaned from the screening: folks felt (thank Christ) that no subtitle (i.e. “Clerks II: The Second Coming”) was needed; “Clerks II” said it all. And much to the delight of the Weinstein Company, no one in the focus group felt that seeing the first “Clerks” was necessary in order to dig “Clerks II”.

That top two boxes score is key in the test screening process: it’s the figure that represents the percentage of people who rated the flick “excellent” and “very good”. When the scores are tallied from the survey sheets, there are two figures everyone immediately wants to know: the top two boxes score, and the “definite recommends” (the percentage of those surveyed who say they would definitely recommend the flick to friends). Based on the focus group, Scott and I felt that we were looking at a score of 70% in the top two boxes, but neither of us could imagine what the definite recommends figure would be.

When Laurie Eddings brought us the score sheet, she had a smile on her face. Scott and I had told her we thought it was a 70% top two box score, and Laurie held up the sheet and said “It’s better than that.”

The percentage of that audience who rated the film “excellent” was 56%. The normal average is 25%. The combined score of the top two boxes was 84%; the normal top two boxes average is 55%. We were 29% above the average (the average being the score that everyone breathes easier at). 13% of the audience rated the film as “good”. 2% rated the film as “fair”. Only 1% rated the film as “poor” (likely the “disgusted” woman).

The “definite recommends” score “norm” is 45%. “Clerks II” got a 74% – nearly thirty percent above the norm. 74% of that audience said they would definitely recommend the film to their friends, with a vast lion’s share of the remaining 26% saying they’d “probably” recommend the movie to their friends.

Considering where we were screening, for this flick to score an 84% with a 74% definite recommend is nothing short of astounding. Mainstream movies testing in Kansas City score 84%; a sequel to a black and white indie flick that’s filled with some of the crudest, weirdest shit you’ve ever seen and heard in a movie theater doesn’t score an 84%. And yet, tonight, it did. In the fucking heartland. In middle-America.

Needless to say, we’re all thrilled.

So thank you, Kansas City, Missouri, for an amazing, very memorable night; you’ve made my life considerably easier. And thanks to Harvey for forcing us to do the test screening; it was definitely worth all the worry leading up to it. And thanks to the cast and crew for all their hard work; without them, there’s no movie to score in the first place.

But most of all, thanks to that mid-30’s woman who walked out in disgust. Because, for a second there, I was beginning to think maybe I’d gone soft in my old age. I’m relieved to know that my sense of humor is still not to everyone’s taste.

Fuck, this movie’s been a sweet-ass ride thus far. God-willing, it’ll continue through ’til July 21st (and beyond).

Look for a 4-DVD package in Early September (that would be the 5th or 12th, we suppose) running at about $50-ish list price. Besides the 24 episodes aired during the first season, there will be a nice list of extras:

• “Bad Karma” is the newly-made, exclusive-to-the-DVD Family Guy-crossover episode previously reported, in which Earl’s life is influenced by Stewie instead of Carson Daly after that accident.
• Deleted Scenes
• Commentary Tracks on at least 8 episodes, including “Bad Karma”. Commentary is recorded by Cast, Producers and Guest Stars including Jon Favreau and Juliette Lewis.
• Blooper Reel: “Karma Is A Funny Thing”
• Featurette: “Making Things Right: Behind the Scenes of My Name Is Earl“

84. THIRTY-SIX? INCLUDING ME?

Genre fans had never been represented (positively) in flicks prior to Dante and Randall discoursing on all things Star Wars in Clerks. These two minimum wage-earners were the avatars for a generation. (October 19, 1994)

Clerks II
Lee Marshall in Cannes 05 June 2006 11:00

If it ain’t broke, milk it, as they say in Hollywood.

So why did New Jersey homeboy Kevin Smith wait all of 12 years before returning to the successful small-town-buddies formula of his cult debut, Clerks?

True, Smith has done strident variations on the theme – Mallrats – and lame spin-offs – Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back(JSBSB).

But this is the first time that he’s summoned his high-school friends Brian O’Halloran and Jeff Anderson back for a rematch as eternal clerks Dante Hicks and Randal Graves.

The result sometimes feels like an extended sitcom episode – but it’s a funny, fast-paced, risque sitcom with some great one-liners.

Unprudish slacker and post-slacker audiences will lap this up, though only die hard Smith fans will buy the (thankfully brief) doses of sentimental you’re-my-buddy schmaltz.

A surprise R rating (Smith was apparently braced for another NC-17 repeal battle) will help Clerks II to equal and perhaps top the $30m domestic takings of the director’s top grossers, JSBSB and Dogma; and auxiliary sales should be buoyant.

Smith’s films generally do only modestly in non-English-speaking territories overseas, if they get seen at all.

But Clerks II has enough standalone panache to overcome the lack of a serious fan base abroad and achieve at least comic curio status.

The opening scene switches neatly between black and white – a nostalgic homage to the original Clerks – and colour, as an older, paunchier Dante turns up for another day at the Quick Stop grocery store, only to discover that [SPOILER].

Responsible Dante and his sardonic, foul-mouthed, live-by-the-day buddy Randall are forced to take jobs at Mooby’s, a fast-food chain based on a golden calf character that is one of the recurring motifs in Smith’s comic Sim City (a world known as the Viewaskewniverse, after his View Askew production company).

Dante now has a [SPOILERS].

Outside the store, stoner drug dealers Jay (Jason Mewes) and Silent Bob (Smith himself), lounge around once more, unchanged after rehab except for [SPOILER].

In fan-service comedy franchises like this, just being seen is half the battle: hence the cameos by Smith regulars Ben Affleck and Jason Lee.

So much for the plot. The core business of this film (which was originally to have been called The Passion Of The Clerks) is to keep the laughs coming, and the badinage here is as good as anything Smith has written.

PC orthodoxies are sniped at in the extended [SPOILER] gags, there’s a running series of [SPOILER], and the gross-out sexual skits include [SPOILER] out-porks Porky’s.

But however smutty it gets, the humour is grounded in character and the dead-end tedium of small town America and its McJobs.

The look of the thing is televisual, and so is much of the acting; only a sensuous, screen-hogging Dawson drags the standard up a notch or two. Whatever: Clerks II is funny, and it moves along at a cracking pace. Which is more than you can say for most of the films Smith has made since the original Clerks.

3. “Chasing Amy” (1997)

A pre-Hollywood-makeover Ben Affleck stars as a New Jersey-based comic book creator who falls for a woman, played by Joey Lauren Adams, who happens to be gay. Some complained that an avowed lesbian choosing to date a straight man was the unenlightened fantasy of writer-director Kevin Smith. But they could take solace in the fact that the relationship does not outlast the film’s running time. No dishes get broken, and there’s only one screaming match.