Helmers by Day, Hucksters by Night

The Pitch:
He shot a series of Diet Coke ads that feature a young guy hanging around the kitchen being asked stupid questions by his annoying parents.

Does it Sell?
Forget Dogma-dog is the word for this campaign, which didn’t stay on the air long. “It was dreadful,” one agency source says.

Industry Buzz:
It wasn’t his fault. Sources close to the producion say Smith inherited a pointless script– and just failed to overcome it. On the bright side, he also shot a snappy MTV promo featuring his bud Matt Damon.

Tue, Sep 12 8:30pm MAX East TAIL LIGHTS FADE R 87 Drama, Crime DENISE RICHARDS
Mon, Sep 18 3:20am MAX East TAIL LIGHTS FADE R 87 Drama, Crime DENISE RICHARDS

18. Dogma (1999)Need to push some serious folks out the door? Or religious fundamentalists? This baby will do ‘em both, big time. Director Kevin Smith’s main preoccupations seem to be oral sex, necrophilia, farts, drinking, smoking, porn and analyzing Star Wars to death. In other words, he’s relatively normal for a guy from New Jersey. Dogma is his “intellectual” picture (i.e., one of the silliest and most immature movies in recent memory—since Mallrats anyway). The plot: Two disbarred angels (eternally smirky Matt Damon and Ben Affleck) try to get back into heaven through a loophole in God’s plan. Controversial sacrilege ensues. Zzz…

On Tuesday 8/29, at the annual Hollywood Video Store Directors retreat at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, we were treated to a surprise visit from Kevin Smith. The studios have a habit of bringing along surprise guests during their presentations, and a Columbia/Tristar VP of marketing stunned the crowd by introducing the writer/director/ star of Dogma!!!

After a thunderous standing ovation, Kevin made a few brief remarks and then took Q & A from the audience. Sadly, I had no camera or tape recorder available, so I can’t present any kind of transcript. So what follows are some paraphrased remarks from Kevin (sorry if they’re not exact).

He started by apologizing for being there: “I know you were expecting some real celebrities, and instead all you got was this fat guy who made Mallrats.”

After Kevin ripped up his Blockbuster Video card (to riotous applause) he remarked “As we said back in Jersey–”Fuck the Buster!!” He then apologized for such blatant pandering, but he said he needed to get in good graces with us, because “I lost all my money at the tables, and now I’m chugging cocks in the mens’ room for $5 chips.” He also confessed that 6 years ago, after the first Hollywood Video had come to the Red Bank area, he and a fellow RST employee had thrown a brick through Hollywood’s window. “But now I guess I’m all corporate corporate corporate….fuck the mom & pops!!”

He of course plugged the forthcoming Dogma SE DVD and the CLERKS TCS DVD, although he became confused because “Here I am plugging one of my discs put out by Buena Vista who is Disney who owns ABC who fucked us over in the first place.”

In response to a question, he said VA5 so far “is known merely as View Askew 5 to maintain a Star Warsian veil of secrecy, as if anyone gives a fuck.” He said it would start production in November or December.

He mentioned that the next project was “Fletch 3: Not a Trace of Chevy,” but then qualified that by saying no decisions had been made yet.

And he finished by thanking the video store directors, because VHS (and now DVD) was the best way for independent film makers to find an audience. His films, in particular, had really found their audience on video, and thanks to our support “I now have kind of a following, and they’re the ones always ripping off your copies of Clerks.”

Jet lag is preventing me from remembering much more at the moment. I can however, confirm that the Ben Affleck/blackjack story was the talk of everyone in Vegas. And since this puts Ben and Kevin and Matt in Las Vegas on the same day, I wonder if they were hanging out together?

EMPORIA — ‘Dogma’ director to speak at ESU — Kevin Smith, director of”Mall Rats,” “Clerks,” “Chasing Amy” and “Dogma,” will speak about themovie business this fall at Emporia State University.

The event, “Kevin Smith: When Silent Bob Speaks,” is expected to draw alarge crowd, event organizers said. Leslie Nigro, spokeswoman for theevent, said it may need to be moved to a bigger place. Currently it isscheduled for 8 p.m. Nov. 7 in Albert Taylor Hall, Emporia State campus.Ticket information will be announced at a later date.

There are works that shock because of their subject matter. There are works that shock almost inadvertently because they experiment with technique. There are those that shock intentionally for political reasons. Then there’s Bryan Johnson’s Vulgar, a film that pushes every button imaginable – and some that may not have even been imagined – but seems to lack any set agenda. Vulgar follows its own peculiar, wildly funny and demented course, simultaneously evoking and parodying everything from cheesy exploitation films, rape docudramas, revenge thrillers, domestic horror films and pot-fuelled hybrid films. It exists, quite brazenly, in a category of its own.

Produced by indy iconoclasts Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier, Vulgar details the misadventures of Will, a struggling professional clown. Eternally optimistic, he is determined to make a living performing at kids’ parties. He is the ultimate shlemazle – picked on by the neighbourhood juvenile delinquents, and encroached on by the local drunks (who like to sleep in his car and carouse on his lawn). And there’s his bedridden mother, a resident of the Broken Elms rest home, who verbally abuses him and then tries to beat him up.

In a moment of creative and economic hysteria (his mother’s run-down rest home is surprisingly expensive), he decides to re-invent himself as Vulgar, the transvestite clown who shows up to shock bachelor party denizens expecting sultry strippers. Unfortunately, his first gig isn’t exactly a success. Indeed, it may be one of the most shocking, extended and depraved film sequences in recent memory. When Will’s fortunes take a turn for the better, Vulgar becomes even more original. Is it about the rise of a sad-sack? A look at humanity’s boundless cruelty? Or is it a shockfest, plain and simple?

Of course, there wouldn’t be any discussion if the film weren’t propelled by a confidence rarely found in American independent cinema. Vulgar introduces a distinctive talent, all the more impressive because of the film’s weird, transgressive drive. Be forewarned though – it won’t be a film you will easily (or ever) forget.

“Spike Lee’s third film (or fourth if you count Joe’s Bed-Stuy Barber Shop – We Cut Heads) represented a quantum leap forward for a filmmaker who already had a lot on his mind and ample skills with which to communicate his ideas. It’s a film I was very inspired by, and cribbed from mercilessly for my first film. Just as Do the Right Thing takes place in a twenty-four-hour period on one small block, so too did Clerks. However, I didn’t have that much to say, whereas DTRT explodes with so much social commentary that the celluloid can hardly contain it all. Very seldom can a film artist craft a story in which everybody’s right and everybody’s wrong at the same time, and hang it on authentic and recognizable characters so wonderfully complex that their motivations are never as simple as black and white. If you’ve never seen this movie before, shame on you. Get your ass to the theatre for this special presentation that I’m proud to be introducing and get ready to be blown through the back of the theatre like a garbage can hurled through a pizza parlour window. Fight the power, eh.”

-Kevin Smith

A Kevin Smith movie without a comics reference is like a Twinkie withoutthe sploogy cream filling: it might still be good, but somehow would beamiss. In Smith’s latest offering, renegade angel Bartleby (Ben Affleck)has bad intentions for all of humanity in his quest to re-enter Heaven. At the film’s climax, Bartleby and Loki (Matt Damon) arrive at a churchto pass through its doors, only to find a security guard in their way. “Mister McGee, don’t make me angry,” Affleck warns him, in homage to BillBixby’s oft-spoken plea on TV’s “The Incredible Hulk.” “You wouldn’tlike me when I’m angry.” He doesn’t listen. Snap.

For a movie about lesbians and the men who love them, there sure an awfullot of comic references! Thank Kevin Smith for blending the best of bothworlds. To wit: Banky (Jason Lee) and Holden (Ben Affleck) work onBluntman and Chronic, a successful indie comic; numerous conversationsabound regarding the sexual preferences of Archie and Jughead, JimmyPalmiotti and Joe Quesada appear briefly to sign comics at a convention,Mike Allred does the same, and faux Bluntman comic panels done byQueseda, Allred and more big names appear during the credits. Forquality and quantity, this flick takes the cake.

Wizard: When you play Jay in Kevin Smith’s movies, things get prettycrazy. What would you have been like in the original Star Wars trilogy?

Jay Mewes: Man, I’d make up my own character. I’d be Luke’s sidekick butI’d have more of the “Force.” I’d be teaching him sh–, like a youngerObi-Wan. There’d be some sh– going down.

W: So, who’s your favorite actress in Hollywood?

Jim Carrey.

W: What about female actresses?

JM: For acting? I don’t know. For looks? Angelina Jolie.

W: She’s a hottie…

JM: Hell yeah, she is sexy. I’d stick with her.

W: I’d stick on her.

JM: Whooooooaaaa.

W: Okay, okay… what about superpowers…which ones do you want to have?

JM: I’d be the same as Superman — super-strength, super-speed. Maybe GreenLantern. His ring’s pretty phat. He can make anything he thinks of. That’s cool sh–.

W: You like to curse…what’s your favorite bad word?

JM: I don’t know…I like ‘em all, man.

W: What’s pissed you off the most? Like the worst thing that ever happened to you…

JM: I was thrown in jail for a stolen car I didn’t know was stolen. I was in jail for five days. That sucked.

W: I bet…but how much do you smoke a day?

JM: Like weed?

W: I ain’t talking cigarettes!

JM: I don’t smoke anymore…I’m on probation.

W: C’mon. Are you high right now?

JM: [pause] No…

W: Tell me a story about Kevin Smith know one else knows.

JM: I don’t think he’d like that. [laughs]

W: Come on, give me something.

JM: Nah…he’d get pissed.