While everyone else was just thinking about it, Kevin Smith took a credit card and did it. Here was a guy who spent hihs weekends working in a convenience store in New Jersey, talking to his pals who dropped by about all the important things in his life - Star Wars, movies, Daredevil comic books, hockey... even, occasionally, girls. And, of course, making movies. Cool movies that reflected their point of view - slackers, Generation X-ers, call them what you like. Smith took that Credit card, put a modestly budgeted film on it and the rsult was Clerks, the black and white, award-winning, convenience store-set indie sensation of 1994. The follow-up moved from black and white to colour, from the local store to the mall. And got slated. While Mallrats (1995) may have been an odd hybrid of what Smith had to say and what the studio thought he should be saying, the writer-actor-director - Silent Bob, take a bow - used his messed-up relationship with actress Joey Lauren Adams as the basis for his next triumph: the world of messed-up relationships as viewed, discussed, and fought over by the characters of the wonderful Chasing Amy. In between, Smith managed to help to kick-start the careers of Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, encouraged Miramax's Harvey and Bob Weinstein to go for some script Ben'n'Matt had written about a maths genius, and indulged his life-long love of comic books by writing everything from Marvel's Daredevil to his own Jay and Silent Bob series. He also picked up some considerable change by penning big budget scripts for the yet as unfilmed new big screen adventures of Superman and The Six Million Dollar Man. Throughout this time, however, all Smith wanted to do was bring his unique take on religious faith to the big screen. The resultant Dogma is now with us, and with it comes the kind of ire and protest that accompanied Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979) and Martin Scorsese's The Last Temptation Of Christ (1988). Life behind the counter was never like this.

Q : You wanted to make a movie about faith, yet you've been actively attacked and picketed by the right wing religious element in the states for doing so...

A : The people who aren't happy with it are - par for the course in this country - the people who haven't seen it. I guess they assume that since I made Clerks and this movie is a comedy about faith, it must be mocking faith or being sarcastic. But it's not. The controversy stuff started with a group called the Catholic League and they're known historically for being the organisation that go after Disney - they went after Disney for Priest, and they went after them for "Gay Day" at Disneyland, one day a year where supposedly the park is overrun by the gay community. And seeing that this is a Miramax film (who are tied to Disney), it ws kind of the way to go after Disney that week. It's an organisation that's not sanctioned by the Catholic Church. The Catholic League, however, are self appointed media watchdogs. I think this campaign was another chance to go against Disney. They're a way bigger target than me.

Q : Shades of Life Of Brian as well, don't you think?

A : Absolutely nothing has changed. At least in the case in the Life Of Brian, those guys were generally ribbing organised religion, pretty hardcore - we don't even do the hardcore in this movie. I'm a filmmaker who's going, "Hey, I believe in God and Christ and I go to church," but I'm trying to tell a story about faith, and in the course of organised religion, some things have to be tweaked. It is confounding - 20 years later, we still can't talk about religion without rustling feathers. The guy who runs the Catholic League -Bill Donahue - has been riding it pretty hardcore and saying some nasty shit about me the last six or seven months in the press. His office finally called our office after all this time and I got this message. I wanted to frame it 'cause it was so delicious - "Dr. Donahue requests a screening of the movie so he can talk about it intelligently." What's he been doing for the last seven months?!

Q : The perception is that Disney subsequently off-loaded the film, even though Miramax were still backing you. Did you feel left down by that?

A : When the campaign started heating up, Michael Eisner called up Miramax head Harvey Weinstein and said, "What is this movie?" And we had to send a tape to Disney Corporate. We sent one to Joe Roth, who is the head of production over there, and he said, "It's funny, but it's one of the most subversive movies I've ever seen and I would be afraid to have my name on it if I were you guys." And Harvey said, " As long as it's not an NC-17 film I can release it under our charter with Disney, it doesn't matter." But we started having discussions as to how wise it was to be in the Disney family with this movie, because Disney was attracting undue attention. Once Harvey and Bob bought the film back, and ensured it would see the light of day, the other studios wouldn't go near it - these are the large corporations with shareholders, nobody wanted the attention, or the appearance of being Catholic-bashers. So we went to Cannes with no distributor. I felt let down by Disney absolutely, but Harvey and Bob saved it from being shelved. With Disney, it's big business - what do they give a fuck about my $10 million dollar movie about religion? Nobody ever accused Disney of being a bastion of art or free speech.

Q : The return of Jay and Silent Bob was being proclaimed - Bond style - at the end of Clerks, heralding Dogma. Obviously this is a project that has been on your mind for ages. How did it evolve?

A : We were orignially going to do it right after Clerks but decided not to because the second movie was going to be bashed. There was no way we could live up to the great reviews we had on the first movie - which were overly generous. So we said, " Let's hold onto it." We did Mallrats, and it did get bashed and it didn't do any business. Then I met Joey (Lauren Adams) and we were dating and that's sort of where Chasing Amy came from, so Dogma got pushed back again. But in 1997 we had Chasing Amy come out and we got some great notices based on the mixture of comedic and dramatic in the film, and it did some decent business. Then we did Good Will Hunting ( Smith co-executive produced), so it jsut seemed the right time to do Dogma.

Q : It is easier to sell a movie that, if not attacks, then certainly satirises modern religious organisations if you have Ben and Matt on board?

A : Absolutely. But Harvey had read the script back in '94 and dug it, so we always knew we were going to do it. But having those guys certainly didn't hurt - Ben wanted to do it in '95 before we started Chasing Amy. And Matty came on after they finished shooting Good Will Hunting but before it came out and they got real famous. It's a strong testimony to both of those guys that they stuck with that film even after they'd exploded, 'cause they could've have easily turned around and said, "I'm sorry, we can't do your little Jesus picture." But it also helped that the movie was inexpensive. I think it was $9.8 million when all was said and done. Everyone worked for scale. So it spoke volumes about the script, I guess - either the actors really like the material or they have really bad agents.

Q : Rumour has it that while you left Jersey for all that Hollywood had to offer, Jay - Jason Mewes - was left behind running your newly purchased comic book store.

A : First off, I was never off to Hollywood. We go the comic book store about three years ago and for a while he was working there. But he's not really interested in acting. He's not one of these guys who's constantly "working on his craft". I think it's only now, after Dogma and people's reactions to his performance - which is a really great, stand-out performance - that he's now thinking, " I should maybe do this for a living."

Q : Since the success of Clerks, you've been able to get into the comic book world as a writer and character, with the Clerks and Jay and Silent Bob books. What else have you done?

A : Last year I got to work on a story arc for Marvel's Daredevil. They re-launched the title and I did the first 8 issues which was great, and it sold really well. And also at the same time, we were doing adaptions based around characters from the movies. It's certainly not stuff that pays the rent or puts clothes on your back, but it was kind of for me and the fans. They're kind of fringe stories and I get to build the mythos alittle more. It's fun.

Q : Were you always going to be Silent Bob?

A : It just kind of happened. In Clerks I was initially thinking of playing Randall, which is why he has all the best lines. But as I got closer to production I just thought, " I can't learn all this dialogue and work at the store and try to direct the movie," so I gave Jeff Anderson the movie and looked for something smaller. 'Cause this was the only the only movie we were going to make. The Silent Bob role was still there so I kind of slid into that because I didn't have to learn the dialogue.

Q : You seem to have picked up a good few gigs as a screenwriter for hire, with Superman Lives, Reborn and The Six Million Dollar Man amongst your writing projects...

A : Yeah, but nothing's panned out. Working on Superman Lives was fun to do and for a while it looked like it was going to happen. The studio was happy with what I was doing and Nic Cage got involved. And then Tim Burton got involved and when he signed his pay or play deal he turned around and said he wanted to do his version of Superman. So who is Warner Brothers going to back - the guy who made Clerks or the guy who made them half a billion dollars on Batman? It was fun while it lasted and Lord knows, I made a lot of money and learned a few things about the business, but ultimately, nothing was really yielded from it.

Q : You seem to be ploughing more of a John Sayles path than, say, a Steven Spielberg...

A : I always admired how Sayles got to do the the stuff he wanted to do and also work for the studio. It's a nice balance to strike - to work on your stuff and then to work on their stuff, and charge them up the ass. But right now I'm not even thinking about the next m ovie. I think it's time to rest and relax. I don't know how much longer I'm gonna wind up doing film, 'cause I'm not one of those guys who's a born filmmaker. I just kind of fell into it when I was 21,22, and I don't know if I'll try and keep doing it my entire life. I'm not very talented in that department and so what makes up the flicks I do is the characters and the content. And that's about having something to say, so if I don't have anything to say, I'll quit.

Q : Do you not see your characters growing up/old with you?

A : Well, there's definitely a point where I'm going to stop writing about guys in their 20s. The movies kind of work as snapshots of what's going on in my life at that time, so I imagine there'll be a place where my characters would age with me. And I promised myself I wouldn't overstay the welcome.

Q : Finally, having argued the relative merits of Star Wars movies in Clerks, how did you rate Phantom Menance?

A : It was a flick that when I saw it I went into it with low expectations. And when I saw it, I was presently surprised.I like Star Wars and I imagine I would have felt passionately about it if I was a child, and that helped put it into perspective for me, that Star Wars and Empire and Jedi are kid's films. And we took them with us into our adulthood because they were such a large part of our childhood. I heard a lot of people grumbling about Phantom Menance, but I just think if those people were six to ten seeing that movie for the first time, they'd have a completely different point of view.I can't wait for the next one - it's gonna be really hot.