list http://www.spout.com/ Recent community activity around Chasing Amy on Spout Copyright 2005-9 Spout, LLC Spout RSS http://www.spout.com/images/SpoutLogoRSS.jpg http://www.spout.com/ 136 30 http://www.spout.com/films/Chasing_Amy/110665/default.aspx Title: Chasing Amy
Year: 1997
Director: Kevin Smith
Plot: After a pair of films about hipster slackers, the work of writer-director Kevin Smith matured and gained critical respect with this low budget, independent comedy-drama about love, sex and the fine line between the two. Ben Affleck stars as Holden McNeil, a New Jersey comic book writer who is roommates with his best friend and professional partner, artist Banky Edwards (Jason Lee). Their hit comic book series, "Bluntman and Chronic," is loosely patterned after a pair of acquaintances, Jay (Jason Mewes) and Silent Bob (played by Smith), two characters already familiar as supporting players in several Smith films. Into Holden's life comes Alyssa Jones (Joey Lauren Adams), a lesbian and fellow comic book creator who quickly becomes a close friend, although Holden is powerfully attracted to her. Eventually, Alyssa realizes that she is attracted to Holden as well and they begin a physical relationship, much to the consternation of Banky, whose ire over losing his best friend to a lesbian seems to border on romantic jealousy. After he learns something about Alyssa's sexual past, however, Holden's immature response to his new knowledge destroys both his romance with Alyssa and his friendship with Banky. Chasing Amy (1997) was the third film in what Smith referred to as his "New Jersey series," films set at least partly in the Garden State and featuring the Jay and Silent Bob characters. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide
Times Tagged: 78
Number of Lists: 87
Number of blog posts: 9
Number of discussion threads: 9
SpoutRating: 3
]]>Mon, 13 Jul 2009 01:54:23 GMTChasing Amy1997Kevin SmithAfter a pair of films about hipster slackers, the work of writer-director <a href="/players/P___111916/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Kevin Smith</a> matured and gained critical respect with this low budget, independent comedy-drama about love, sex and the fine line between the two. <a href="/players/P______426/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Ben Affleck</a> stars as Holden McNeil, a New Jersey comic book writer who is roommates with his best friend and professional partner, artist Banky Edwards (<a href="/players/P___215686/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Jason Lee</a>). Their hit comic book series, "Bluntman and Chronic," is loosely patterned after a pair of acquaintances, Jay (<a href="/players/P___200477/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Jason Mewes</a>) and Silent Bob (played by Smith), two characters already familiar as supporting players in several Smith films. Into Holden's life comes Alyssa Jones (<a href="/players/P___124429/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Joey Lauren Adams</a>), a lesbian and fellow comic book creator who quickly becomes a close friend, although Holden is powerfully attracted to her. Eventually, Alyssa realizes that she is attracted to Holden as well and they begin a physical relationship, much to the consternation of Banky, whose ire over losing his best friend to a lesbian seems to border on romantic jealousy. After he learns something about Alyssa's sexual past, however, Holden's immature response to his new knowledge destroys both his romance with Alyssa and his friendship with Banky. Chasing Amy (1997) was the third film in what Smith referred to as his "New Jersey series," films set at least partly in the Garden State and featuring the Jay and Silent Bob characters. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide78Tag Target (>10)87993http://www.spout.com/ProductImages/t06818lvu4v.jpghttp://www.spout.com/films/Chasing_Amy/110665/default.aspxFilm http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2008/11/6/37036.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 11/6/2008 5:01:07 PM
Body: While watching Zack and Miri Make a Porno, it is possible to occasionally forget that you are watching a Kevin Smith movie. Mainly because he doesn’t show up in the film, a rare and appreciated move for the guy who has played “Silent Bob” in 6 out of the 8 theatrical releases he’s directed. Then there’s the cast that is involved, which makes Z&M seem like the offspring of Judd Apatow and John Waters. But there are a number of things that do make it clearly a Smith joint, such as the obligatory employment of Jason Mewes — in the role he was born to play, even moreso than “Jay” — and the potentially pitying use of Jeff Anderson, who may have been the only actor to agree to receiving that accidental Hot Carl. And then there’s the most recognizable element: Smith’s inability let the poop jokes go in order to concentrate on his characters, and the relationships between them. It’s the filmmaker’s Achilles heel, and it’s one of five we at SpoutBlog have noticed are holding back the esteem of five would-be better directors. Director: Kevin Smith Achilles Heel: Interest in sex and shit over character and story Contrast often creates comedy, and in Z&M Smith acquires some of his best, most shock-inspired laughs when two significantly saccharine moments are interrupted by some incredibly foul scenarios. But despite the comedic benefit of pushing the contrived rom-com plot points to the back burner in favor of scat and scrotum, Smith proves that he doesn’t really care about what is going on with his characters, and so neither may his audience. The irony is that one of the major themes in Z&M is the triumph of love over meaningless sex, yet Smith doesn’t love his characters; he simply uses them as tools for his tasteless jokes and gags. And he’s been doing this since the beginning, though he has made two distinct attempts at giving more attention to characters than crudeness (Chasing Amy; Jersey Girl), which resulted in differing effectiveness. After eight features, it seems to actually be best for him to continue concentrating on the sex and shit and leave all his need to be sweet behind. Unfortunately, he’s too nice a guy to go completely balls out (like his friend Mewes), and anyway if he left all care for his characters behind, he’ll just seem like a second-rate John Waters. Director: Michael Moore Achilles Heel: Self-satisfying need to be comedic and important When Michael Moore began making documentaries, his brand of first-person, subjective non-fiction narrative was fresh and satisfying as far as the subject matter of Roger & Me is concerned. And his comedic touch was much appreciated, because he seemed more humorist than activist. But as he kept expanding his scope to more objective issues that are more important or significant to his audience, and as he seemed to become more interested in changing the world, he should have put the jokes up on the shelf, to some extent anyway. Compared to something like The Daily Show, Moore’s films are more intent on presenting an argument than comedy, and they’re sold as more documentary than The Daily Show is sold as actual news. Therefore, Moore should make up his mind. He’s good at humor, and he’s also good at serious documentary — look at a lot of the stuff in Bowling for Columbine in which Moore’s need for self-importance is pulled back. He can keep on mixing the two together, but he’s not going to win any arguments when he’s twisting facts for the benefit of a gag. Director: M. Night Shyamalan Achilles Heel: Last-minute reveals There’s nothing wrong with twist endings, or twists in general. But the way Shyamalan works them, they come off as punch lines to really long jokes. And most of the time, such as with Signs, The Village and The Happening, the whole movie ends up a joke (in the bad sense) in retrospect after knowing. Even The Sixth Sense, which does still have its supporters (and its Oscar nomination clout), is difficult to rewatch once you’re conscious of how it ends. Shyamalan’s best film, Unbreakable, disappointed many for having a relatively anticlimactic ending, but that’s because the twist wasn’t as much of a reveal as it was a logical direction for the story. Shyamalan should go back to that sort of reveal while also learning that a story (and movie) should be more about the road than the destination. Director: Cameron Crowe Achilles Heel: Writing manic, pixie dream girls as female leads Watching a film by Cameron Crowe, it’s possible to wonder just how he sees his own leading lady, rocker Nancy Wilson. Is she a dumb, obnoxiously flaky girl, like most of the female leads in his movies? Does she say cute but idiotic things like “We peaked on the phone,” “You had me at hello,” and “I’ll tell you in another life, when we are both cats”? I doubt she’s anything like those female characters from Elizabethtown, Jerry Maguire and Vanilla Sky, because otherwise Crowe wouldn’t have been married to her for 22 years. He would have realized after a week that she’s only exciting from a distance, or for as long as an interesting story arc that will later be nestled into one’s past, because she’s too insane, too desperate, too irritating, and not dependable enough to stick with. It might be interesting to see a sequel to any one of Crowe’s films, because it’s hard to believe any of the couples he’s written have lasted long past the credits. Director: Uwe Boll Achilles Heel: Doesn’t care what anybody thinks of his movies It’s understandable that true artists don’t need to please anyone but themselves. But even Boll would likely agree that he’s no artist. So, then is he an entertainer? Nope, he’s not that either, because he clearly isn’t interested in pleasing his audience with entertaining movies. It’s doubtful that Boll could be a good let alone great filmmaker if he started listening to his critics and improved on his flaws. However, by learning from his mistakes he could at least make action movies that could pass with the standard of Hollywood fare these days. Maybe that’s not what he wants. It would surely keep him out of the public consciousness to no longer be “the worst living filmmaker in the world.” But one day the money is going to run out for his brand of film production, and if he truly wants to be a movie director, he’ll have to eventually display some kind of talent for the work. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Thu, 06 Nov 2008 22:01:07 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com11/6/2008 5:01:07 PMWhile watching Zack and Miri Make a Porno, it is possible to occasionally forget that you are watching a Kevin Smith movie. Mainly because he doesn’t show up in the film, a rare and appreciated move for the guy who has played “Silent Bob” in 6 out of the 8 theatrical releases he’s directed. Then there’s the cast that is involved, which makes Z&M seem like the offspring of Judd Apatow and John Waters. But there are a number of things that do make it clearly a Smith joint, such as the obligatory employment of Jason Mewes — in the role he was born to play, even moreso than “Jay” — and the potentially pitying use of Jeff Anderson, who may have been the only actor to agree to receiving that accidental Hot Carl. And then there’s the most recognizable element: Smith’s inability let the poop jokes go in order to concentrate on his characters, and the relationships between them. It’s the filmmaker’s Achilles heel, and it’s one of five we at SpoutBlog have noticed are holding back the esteem of five would-be better directors. Director: Kevin Smith Achilles Heel: Interest in sex and shit over character and story Contrast often creates comedy, and in Z&M Smith acquires some of his best, most shock-inspired laughs when two significantly saccharine moments are interrupted by some incredibly foul scenarios. But despite the comedic benefit of pushing the contrived rom-com plot points to the back burner in favor of scat and scrotum, Smith proves that he doesn’t really care about what is going on with his characters, and so neither may his audience. The irony is that one of the major themes in Z&M is the triumph of love over meaningless sex, yet Smith doesn’t love his characters; he simply uses them as tools for his tasteless jokes and gags. And he’s been doing this since the beginning, though he has made two distinct attempts at giving more attention to characters than crudeness (Chasing Amy; Jersey Girl), which resulted in differing effectiveness. After eight features, it seems to actually be best for him to continue concentrating on the sex and shit and leave all his need to be sweet behind. Unfortunately, he’s too nice a guy to go completely balls out (like his friend Mewes), and anyway if he left all care for his characters behind, he’ll just seem like a second-rate John Waters. Director: Michael Moore Achilles Heel: Self-satisfying need to be comedic and important When Michael Moore began making documentaries, his brand of first-person, subjective non-fiction narrative was fresh and satisfying as far as the subject matter of Roger & Me is concerned. And his comedic touch was much appreciated, because he seemed more humorist than activist. But as he kept expanding his scope to more objective issues that are more important or significant to his audience, and as he seemed to become more interested in changing the world, he should have put the jokes up on the shelf, to some extent anyway. Compared to something like The Daily Show, Moore’s films are more intent on presenting an argument than comedy, and they’re sold as more documentary than The Daily Show is sold as actual news. Therefore, Moore should make up his mind. He’s good at humor, and he’s also good at serious documentary — look at a lot of the stuff in Bowling for Columbine in which Moore’s need for self-importance is pulled back. He can keep on mixing the two together, but he’s not going to win any arguments when he’s twisting facts for the benefit of a gag. Director: M. Night Shyamalan Achilles Heel: Last-minute reveals There’s nothing wrong with twist endings, or twists in general. But the way Shyamalan works them, they come off as punch lines to really long jokes. And most of the time, such as with Signs, The Village and The Happening, the whole movie ends up a joke (in the bad sense) in retrospect after knowing. Even The Sixth Sense, which does still have its supporters (and its Oscar nomination clout), is difficult to rewatch once you’re conscious of how it ends. Shyamalan’s best film, Unbreakable, disappointed many for having a relatively anticlimactic ending, but that’s because the twist wasn’t as much of a reveal as it was a logical direction for the story. Shyamalan should go back to that sort of reveal while also learning that a story (and movie) should be more about the road than the destination. Director: Cameron Crowe Achilles Heel: Writing manic, pixie dream girls as female leads Watching a film by Cameron Crowe, it’s possible to wonder just how he sees his own leading lady, rocker Nancy Wilson. Is she a dumb, obnoxiously flaky girl, like most of the female leads in his movies? Does she say cute but idiotic things like “We peaked on the phone,” “You had me at hello,” and “I’ll tell you in another life, when we are both cats”? I doubt she’s anything like those female characters from Elizabethtown, Jerry Maguire and Vanilla Sky, because otherwise Crowe wouldn’t have been married to her for 22 years. He would have realized after a week that she’s only exciting from a distance, or for as long as an interesting story arc that will later be nestled into one’s past, because she’s too insane, too desperate, too irritating, and not dependable enough to stick with. It might be interesting to see a sequel to any one of Crowe’s films, because it’s hard to believe any of the couples he’s written have lasted long past the credits. Director: Uwe Boll Achilles Heel: Doesn’t care what anybody thinks of his movies It’s understandable that true artists don’t need to please anyone but themselves. But even Boll would likely agree that he’s no artist. So, then is he an entertainer? Nope, he’s not that either, because he clearly isn’t interested in pleasing his audience with entertaining movies. It’s doubtful that Boll could be a good let alone great filmmaker if he started listening to his critics and improved on his flaws. However, by learning from his mistakes he could at least make action movies that could pass with the standard of Hollywood fare these days. Maybe that’s not what he wants. It would surely keep him out of the public consciousness to no longer be “the worst living filmmaker in the world.” But one day the money is going to run out for his brand of film production, and if he truly wants to be a movie director, he’ll have to eventually display some kind of talent for the work. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/blogs/usesoap/archive/2008/11/3/36920.aspx Post By: usesoap
Post To: usesoap Blog
Post Date: 11/3/2008 9:43:48 PM
Body: Kevin Smith has a right to be pretty bitter right now. For years, he's been blending raunch and romance with equal measure, to middling box office results. From his grungy little breakthrough, “Clerks,” in 1994, to the polished “Chasing Amy” to the not-as-bad-as-it's-rumored-to-be “Jersey Girl,” Smith has never shied from the messy sexual side of relationships in dialogue that some of the closest couples dare not discuss. Meanwhile, writer/director Judd Apatow snuck into the kingdom and stole the crown, basically covering the very same turf in films such as “The 40-Year-Old Virgin,” “Knocked Up” and “Forgetting Sarah Marshall.” Yet again, sex and sentimentality collide with generally hilarious, heartfelt results in his latest “Zack and Miri Make a Porno,” which takes the standard romantic comedy and tarts it up with g-strings, thigh highs and body glitter. Apatow mainstay Seth Rogan plays Zack and “W.'s” Elizabeth Banks is his platonic roommate Miri, two 20-something slackers who are reminded at their 10-year high school reunion just how little they have to offer the world a decade after their departure. And if the hysterical humiliations they suffer during the reunion don't drive the point home to them, then the return to their dingy Monroeville, Pennsylvania apartment – where the heat, electricity and water have just been shut off – should do the trick. In an act of desperation they embark on the eponymous mission (in a plot very similar to last year's Jeff Bridges film, “The Amateurs”) in order to cough up the cash needed to keep them off the streets. As typical of a Kevin Smith comedy, the film comes from a very personal place and it's not long before the smut is swept up in sentimentality. Just as “Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back” was really a travelogue of his brush with mainstream Hollywood, “Zack and Miri” (as it's been advertised for our prurient television audiences) is Smith's love letter to making movies. It just happens that the movies in this feature typically end with a money shot. But just as Smith assembled the cast of “Clerks” with his pals from his Jersey neighborhood, Zack and Miri enlist a number of participants from their inner circle to help bring their bump-and-grind opus to life. Included in the cast are Smith standbys Jason Mewes (who boldly pulls a full monty and who always brings the funny) and original “Clerk” Jeff Anderson. Smith also has the smarts to include scene-stealing “Office” mate Craig Robinson, rehabbed porn princess Traci Lords and Katie Morgan, who you may remember from such memorable turns in “Big Bottom Sadie,” “Whore of the Rings” and “Busty Beauties 20” (and about 200 other similarly titled films...if you care to “research” them). Smith also nabbed Justin Long, another go-to laugh-getter, whose cameo in the film will forever erase any annoying Mac ad image you may have of him. It will come as little surprise that our two leads become romantically involved when called upon to perform their climactic scene (meant in every sense of the word). And the final act of the film deals with the awkwardness that can follow that moment where friends decide to take their relationship one step further (normally, though, it's not done in front of a handful of onlookers and a rolling video camera... unless you're a Hilton). And this is where Smith – and Apatow, and John Hughes, for that matter – typically falter. For the male leads, there are plenty of bulls-eye masculine observations, while leaving the women with very little room to move outside their scripted confines. It's not that Banks does not try, she radiates much the same way Rosario Dawson did in “Clerks II.” But Smith's more comfortable giving his gals equally foul-mouthed dialogue that makes them “just one of the guys,” and then turning them into jealous emotional Jello when more complex matters arise. The entire plot itself is based nowhere close to reality, even given the current Warhol-intuited “15 minutes of fame” culture in which we live, and Miri just seems way too together to fall for such a slovenly mess such as Zack, much less agree to let herself be filmed having sex with him to be mass marketed. And honestly, with porn so easily accessible online, do they really think their little homegrown DVD is going to be their financial salvation? But those minor grievances aside, “Zack and Miri” has just enough cheer to overcome its more flaccid moments. And if he can enlist a female writer for his next feature that could solidify his lady characters of his next film, Smith may be able to not only satisfy his audience throughout, but also provide them with, appropriately, a happy ending.
]]>Tue, 04 Nov 2008 02:43:48 GMTusesoapusesoap Blog11/3/2008 9:43:48 PMKevin Smith has a right to be pretty bitter right now. For years, he's been blending raunch and romance with equal measure, to middling box office results. From his grungy little breakthrough, &ldquo;Clerks,&rdquo; in 1994, to the polished &ldquo;Chasing Amy&rdquo; to the not-as-bad-as-it's-rumored-to-be &ldquo;Jersey Girl,&rdquo; Smith has never shied from the messy sexual side of relationships in dialogue that some of the closest couples dare not discuss. Meanwhile, writer/director Judd Apatow snuck into the kingdom and stole the crown, basically covering the very same turf in films such as &ldquo;The 40-Year-Old Virgin,&rdquo; &ldquo;Knocked Up&rdquo; and &ldquo;Forgetting Sarah Marshall.&rdquo; Yet again, sex and sentimentality collide with generally hilarious, heartfelt results in his latest &ldquo;Zack and Miri Make a Porno,&rdquo; which takes the standard romantic comedy and tarts it up with g-strings, thigh highs and body glitter. Apatow mainstay Seth Rogan plays Zack and &ldquo;W.'s&rdquo; Elizabeth Banks is his platonic roommate Miri, two 20-something slackers who are reminded at their 10-year high school reunion just how little they have to offer the world a decade after their departure. And if the hysterical humiliations they suffer during the reunion don't drive the point home to them, then the return to their dingy Monroeville, Pennsylvania apartment &ndash; where the heat, electricity and water have just been shut off &ndash; should do the trick. In an act of desperation they embark on the eponymous mission (in a plot very similar to last year's Jeff Bridges film, &ldquo;The Amateurs&rdquo;) in order to cough up the cash needed to keep them off the streets. As typical of a Kevin Smith comedy, the film comes from a very personal place and it's not long before the smut is swept up in sentimentality. Just as &ldquo;Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back&rdquo; was really a travelogue of his brush with mainstream Hollywood, &ldquo;Zack and Miri&rdquo; (as it's been advertised for our prurient television audiences) is Smith's love letter to making movies. It just happens that the movies in this feature typically end with a money shot. But just as Smith assembled the cast of &ldquo;Clerks&rdquo; with his pals from his Jersey neighborhood, Zack and Miri enlist a number of participants from their inner circle to help bring their bump-and-grind opus to life. Included in the cast are Smith standbys Jason Mewes (who boldly pulls a full monty and who always brings the funny) and original &ldquo;Clerk&rdquo; Jeff Anderson. Smith also has the smarts to include scene-stealing &ldquo;Office&rdquo; mate Craig Robinson, rehabbed porn princess Traci Lords and Katie Morgan, who you may remember from such memorable turns in &ldquo;Big Bottom Sadie,&rdquo; &ldquo;Whore of the Rings&rdquo; and &ldquo;Busty Beauties 20&rdquo; (and about 200 other similarly titled films...if you care to &ldquo;research&rdquo; them). Smith also nabbed Justin Long, another go-to laugh-getter, whose cameo in the film will forever erase any annoying Mac ad image you may have of him. It will come as little surprise that our two leads become romantically involved when called upon to perform their climactic scene (meant in every sense of the word). And the final act of the film deals with the awkwardness that can follow that moment where friends decide to take their relationship one step further (normally, though, it's not done in front of a handful of onlookers and a rolling video camera... unless you're a Hilton). And this is where Smith &ndash; and Apatow, and John Hughes, for that matter &ndash; typically falter. For the male leads, there are plenty of bulls-eye masculine observations, while leaving the women with very little room to move outside their scripted confines. It's not that Banks does not try, she radiates much the same way Rosario Dawson did in &ldquo;Clerks II.&rdquo; But Smith's more comfortable giving his gals equally foul-mouthed dialogue that makes them &ldquo;just one of the guys,&rdquo; and then turning them into jealous emotional Jello when more complex matters arise. The entire plot itself is based nowhere close to reality, even given the current Warhol-intuited &ldquo;15 minutes of fame&rdquo; culture in which we live, and Miri just seems way too together to fall for such a slovenly mess such as Zack, much less agree to let herself be filmed having sex with him to be mass marketed. And honestly, with porn so easily accessible online, do they really think their little homegrown DVD is going to be their financial salvation? But those minor grievances aside, &ldquo;Zack and Miri&rdquo; has just enough cheer to overcome its more flaccid moments. And if he can enlist a female writer for his next feature that could solidify his lady characters of his next film, Smith may be able to not only satisfy his audience throughout, but also provide them with, appropriately, a happy ending. http://www.spout.com/blogs/karina/archive/2008/10/30/36818.aspx Post By: Karina
Post To: Karina on SpoutBlog
Post Date: 10/30/2008 5:00:45 PM
Body: This review originally appeared during Fantastic Fest. Zack and Miri opens wide (no pun intended) tomorrow. Believe the hype––at least, to a certain extent. Zack and Miri Make a Porno is Kevin Smith’s all-around high score for the current decade, and as a date movie for the demographic looking for a formula of 5% genuine romance underneath 95% poop and dick jokes, it’s way more fun than the film that made Seth Rogen a plausible leading man, Knocked Up. But what’s really exciting about is its seemingly autobiographical subtext referencing Smith’s own career –– which, unfortunately, is thrown in the flaming trash can of traditional romantic comedy in the film’s final twenty minutes, but which nonetheless makes Zack and Miri seem more heartfelt than any View Askew production since Chasing Amy. It’s the night before Thanksgiving, and all through the town, everyone’s bitter and desperate to get laid. In a working class suburb of Pittsburgh, in the midst of a realistically icy, muddy, shitty winter, lifelong best friends and roommates Zack (Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth Banks, finally proving to me that she’s a different person than Rachel McAdams) work menial jobs and are nowhere near able to pay their bills. (Side note: it’s interesting that Smith, currently at his most bloated in memory––he’s been thrilling crowds for months with a story of being so fat that he broke a toilet––has made his most convincing film yet about the frustrations of being skint.) At their exceptionally depressing high school reunion set to the pop hits of 1998 (Marcy Playground and MASE, finally playlist bedmates once again), Zack and Miri discover from a former classmate’s porn star significant other that they (and Miri’s pair of oversized granny panties) have become accidental YouTube stars. Zack has an epiphany: if people are already looking at their asses on the internet for free, why not get paid for it? By this point, Zack and Miri have had their heat, water and power shut off, so they discuss the moral finer points whilst huddled around a trashcan hobo fire in their living room. If being a DIY porn star is such a simple route to quick cash, Miri wonders, “Why doesn’t everyone do it?” In fact, Zack and Miri would appear to be uniquely qualified for the job: they’re poor, but unlike most poor people, they’re media savvy, free of the moral constraints of any particular religious or ideological affiliation, and, essentially, alone in the universe, with no family or significant other to impress or disappoint aside from each other. These are, of course, some of the same factors that will lead Zack and Miri to inevitably fall in love. For a film in which the two leads discover their mutual true love via sex work, the convolutions of Zack and Miri’s romantic narrative are sadly old hat. What’s really exciting about the film is the glimpses it offers into the mind and soul of a garden variety suburban loser who finds his true talent behind the camera. In some ways a Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland “let’s put on a show!” movie with lightsaber dildos instead of a barn, Zack and Miri feels like a personal portrait of a nerd who figures out how to be somebody by turning on other nerds for a living. There are even patches of dialogue that seem like they could have been lifted from Smith’s days preparing Clerks. “You want to shoot a dirty movie here? Where we work?” asks Zack’s incredulous fellow barista. “You don’t know how many stories I have just from working here,” Zack responds with a weary shake of the head. Later, when Zack’s own spirit needs lifting, the same co-worker reminds him that their pornographic exploits have opened them up to “a world of possibilities, where plain old people like us could do something special.” Could there be a plainer reference to Smith’s own charmed career path from suburban comic nerd to God of Suburban Comic Nerds? But though Rogen and Banks have surprisingly convincing sexual tension and their relationship itself is one of the film’s selling points, it’s Smith’s handling of the romance in relation to the porno that ultimately steers the film into disappointing territory. In unnecessarily tearing the couple apart at the exact moment when they should be deciding to be together, Smith accomplishes two things: he makes his film twenty minutes longer than it needs to be, and he completely abandons the idea that making porn movies (or, metaphorically speaking, any kind of movie) is not only a valid occupation, but the outlet through which Zack finds himself as a creative person and as a man. In the end, Zack and Miri’s romance reaches its predictable (and satisfying) resolution, but their porno remains in limbo, and with it languishes the idea that art––however depraved––can save a loser’s life. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog » Karina Longworth
]]>Thu, 30 Oct 2008 21:00:45 GMTKarinaKarina on SpoutBlog10/30/2008 5:00:45 PMThis review originally appeared during Fantastic Fest. Zack and Miri opens wide (no pun intended) tomorrow. Believe the hype––at least, to a certain extent. Zack and Miri Make a Porno is Kevin Smith’s all-around high score for the current decade, and as a date movie for the demographic looking for a formula of 5% genuine romance underneath 95% poop and dick jokes, it’s way more fun than the film that made Seth Rogen a plausible leading man, Knocked Up. But what’s really exciting about is its seemingly autobiographical subtext referencing Smith’s own career –– which, unfortunately, is thrown in the flaming trash can of traditional romantic comedy in the film’s final twenty minutes, but which nonetheless makes Zack and Miri seem more heartfelt than any View Askew production since Chasing Amy. It’s the night before Thanksgiving, and all through the town, everyone’s bitter and desperate to get laid. In a working class suburb of Pittsburgh, in the midst of a realistically icy, muddy, shitty winter, lifelong best friends and roommates Zack (Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth Banks, finally proving to me that she’s a different person than Rachel McAdams) work menial jobs and are nowhere near able to pay their bills. (Side note: it’s interesting that Smith, currently at his most bloated in memory––he’s been thrilling crowds for months with a story of being so fat that he broke a toilet––has made his most convincing film yet about the frustrations of being skint.) At their exceptionally depressing high school reunion set to the pop hits of 1998 (Marcy Playground and MASE, finally playlist bedmates once again), Zack and Miri discover from a former classmate’s porn star significant other that they (and Miri’s pair of oversized granny panties) have become accidental YouTube stars. Zack has an epiphany: if people are already looking at their asses on the internet for free, why not get paid for it? By this point, Zack and Miri have had their heat, water and power shut off, so they discuss the moral finer points whilst huddled around a trashcan hobo fire in their living room. If being a DIY porn star is such a simple route to quick cash, Miri wonders, “Why doesn’t everyone do it?” In fact, Zack and Miri would appear to be uniquely qualified for the job: they’re poor, but unlike most poor people, they’re media savvy, free of the moral constraints of any particular religious or ideological affiliation, and, essentially, alone in the universe, with no family or significant other to impress or disappoint aside from each other. These are, of course, some of the same factors that will lead Zack and Miri to inevitably fall in love. For a film in which the two leads discover their mutual true love via sex work, the convolutions of Zack and Miri’s romantic narrative are sadly old hat. What’s really exciting about the film is the glimpses it offers into the mind and soul of a garden variety suburban loser who finds his true talent behind the camera. In some ways a Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland “let’s put on a show!” movie with lightsaber dildos instead of a barn, Zack and Miri feels like a personal portrait of a nerd who figures out how to be somebody by turning on other nerds for a living. There are even patches of dialogue that seem like they could have been lifted from Smith’s days preparing Clerks. “You want to shoot a dirty movie here? Where we work?” asks Zack’s incredulous fellow barista. “You don’t know how many stories I have just from working here,” Zack responds with a weary shake of the head. Later, when Zack’s own spirit needs lifting, the same co-worker reminds him that their pornographic exploits have opened them up to “a world of possibilities, where plain old people like us could do something special.” Could there be a plainer reference to Smith’s own charmed career path from suburban comic nerd to God of Suburban Comic Nerds? But though Rogen and Banks have surprisingly convincing sexual tension and their relationship itself is one of the film’s selling points, it’s Smith’s handling of the romance in relation to the porno that ultimately steers the film into disappointing territory. In unnecessarily tearing the couple apart at the exact moment when they should be deciding to be together, Smith accomplishes two things: he makes his film twenty minutes longer than it needs to be, and he completely abandons the idea that making porn movies (or, metaphorically speaking, any kind of movie) is not only a valid occupation, but the outlet through which Zack finds himself as a creative person and as a man. In the end, Zack and Miri’s romance reaches its predictable (and satisfying) resolution, but their porno remains in limbo, and with it languishes the idea that art––however depraved––can save a loser’s life. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog » Karina Longworth http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2008/10/30/36816.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 10/30/2008 5:00:33 PM
Body: This review originally appeared during Fantastic Fest. Zack and Miri opens wide (no pun intended) tomorrow. Believe the hype––at least, to a certain extent. Zack and Miri Make a Porno is Kevin Smith’s all-around high score for the current decade, and as a date movie for the demographic looking for a formula of 5% genuine romance underneath 95% poop and dick jokes, it’s way more fun than the film that made Seth Rogen a plausible leading man, Knocked Up. But what’s really exciting about is its seemingly autobiographical subtext referencing Smith’s own career –– which, unfortunately, is thrown in the flaming trash can of traditional romantic comedy in the film’s final twenty minutes, but which nonetheless makes Zack and Miri seem more heartfelt than any View Askew production since Chasing Amy. It’s the night before Thanksgiving, and all through the town, everyone’s bitter and desperate to get laid. In a working class suburb of Pittsburgh, in the midst of a realistically icy, muddy, shitty winter, lifelong best friends and roommates Zack (Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth Banks, finally proving to me that she’s a different person than Rachel McAdams) work menial jobs and are nowhere near able to pay their bills. (Side note: it’s interesting that Smith, currently at his most bloated in memory––he’s been thrilling crowds for months with a story of being so fat that he broke a toilet––has made his most convincing film yet about the frustrations of being skint.) At their exceptionally depressing high school reunion set to the pop hits of 1998 (Marcy Playground and MASE, finally playlist bedmates once again), Zack and Miri discover from a former classmate’s porn star significant other that they (and Miri’s pair of oversized granny panties) have become accidental YouTube stars. Zack has an epiphany: if people are already looking at their asses on the internet for free, why not get paid for it? By this point, Zack and Miri have had their heat, water and power shut off, so they discuss the moral finer points whilst huddled around a trashcan hobo fire in their living room. If being a DIY porn star is such a simple route to quick cash, Miri wonders, “Why doesn’t everyone do it?” In fact, Zack and Miri would appear to be uniquely qualified for the job: they’re poor, but unlike most poor people, they’re media savvy, free of the moral constraints of any particular religious or ideological affiliation, and, essentially, alone in the universe, with no family or significant other to impress or disappoint aside from each other. These are, of course, some of the same factors that will lead Zack and Miri to inevitably fall in love. For a film in which the two leads discover their mutual true love via sex work, the convolutions of Zack and Miri’s romantic narrative are sadly old hat. What’s really exciting about the film is the glimpses it offers into the mind and soul of a garden variety suburban loser who finds his true talent behind the camera. In some ways a Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland “let’s put on a show!” movie with lightsaber dildos instead of a barn, Zack and Miri feels like a personal portrait of a nerd who figures out how to be somebody by turning on other nerds for a living. There are even patches of dialogue that seem like they could have been lifted from Smith’s days preparing Clerks. “You want to shoot a dirty movie here? Where we work?” asks Zack’s incredulous fellow barista. “You don’t know how many stories I have just from working here,” Zack responds with a weary shake of the head. Later, when Zack’s own spirit needs lifting, the same co-worker reminds him that their pornographic exploits have opened them up to “a world of possibilities, where plain old people like us could do something special.” Could there be a plainer reference to Smith’s own charmed career path from suburban comic nerd to God of Suburban Comic Nerds? But though Rogen and Banks have surprisingly convincing sexual tension and their relationship itself is one of the film’s selling points, it’s Smith’s handling of the romance in relation to the porno that ultimately steers the film into disappointing territory. In unnecessarily tearing the couple apart at the exact moment when they should be deciding to be together, Smith accomplishes two things: he makes his film twenty minutes longer than it needs to be, and he completely abandons the idea that making porn movies (or, metaphorically speaking, any kind of movie) is not only a valid occupation, but the outlet through which Zack finds himself as a creative person and as a man. In the end, Zack and Miri’s romance reaches its predictable (and satisfying) resolution, but their porno remains in limbo, and with it languishes the idea that art––however depraved––can save a loser’s life. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Thu, 30 Oct 2008 21:00:33 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com10/30/2008 5:00:33 PMThis review originally appeared during Fantastic Fest. Zack and Miri opens wide (no pun intended) tomorrow. Believe the hype––at least, to a certain extent. Zack and Miri Make a Porno is Kevin Smith’s all-around high score for the current decade, and as a date movie for the demographic looking for a formula of 5% genuine romance underneath 95% poop and dick jokes, it’s way more fun than the film that made Seth Rogen a plausible leading man, Knocked Up. But what’s really exciting about is its seemingly autobiographical subtext referencing Smith’s own career –– which, unfortunately, is thrown in the flaming trash can of traditional romantic comedy in the film’s final twenty minutes, but which nonetheless makes Zack and Miri seem more heartfelt than any View Askew production since Chasing Amy. It’s the night before Thanksgiving, and all through the town, everyone’s bitter and desperate to get laid. In a working class suburb of Pittsburgh, in the midst of a realistically icy, muddy, shitty winter, lifelong best friends and roommates Zack (Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth Banks, finally proving to me that she’s a different person than Rachel McAdams) work menial jobs and are nowhere near able to pay their bills. (Side note: it’s interesting that Smith, currently at his most bloated in memory––he’s been thrilling crowds for months with a story of being so fat that he broke a toilet––has made his most convincing film yet about the frustrations of being skint.) At their exceptionally depressing high school reunion set to the pop hits of 1998 (Marcy Playground and MASE, finally playlist bedmates once again), Zack and Miri discover from a former classmate’s porn star significant other that they (and Miri’s pair of oversized granny panties) have become accidental YouTube stars. Zack has an epiphany: if people are already looking at their asses on the internet for free, why not get paid for it? By this point, Zack and Miri have had their heat, water and power shut off, so they discuss the moral finer points whilst huddled around a trashcan hobo fire in their living room. If being a DIY porn star is such a simple route to quick cash, Miri wonders, “Why doesn’t everyone do it?” In fact, Zack and Miri would appear to be uniquely qualified for the job: they’re poor, but unlike most poor people, they’re media savvy, free of the moral constraints of any particular religious or ideological affiliation, and, essentially, alone in the universe, with no family or significant other to impress or disappoint aside from each other. These are, of course, some of the same factors that will lead Zack and Miri to inevitably fall in love. For a film in which the two leads discover their mutual true love via sex work, the convolutions of Zack and Miri’s romantic narrative are sadly old hat. What’s really exciting about the film is the glimpses it offers into the mind and soul of a garden variety suburban loser who finds his true talent behind the camera. In some ways a Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland “let’s put on a show!” movie with lightsaber dildos instead of a barn, Zack and Miri feels like a personal portrait of a nerd who figures out how to be somebody by turning on other nerds for a living. There are even patches of dialogue that seem like they could have been lifted from Smith’s days preparing Clerks. “You want to shoot a dirty movie here? Where we work?” asks Zack’s incredulous fellow barista. “You don’t know how many stories I have just from working here,” Zack responds with a weary shake of the head. Later, when Zack’s own spirit needs lifting, the same co-worker reminds him that their pornographic exploits have opened them up to “a world of possibilities, where plain old people like us could do something special.” Could there be a plainer reference to Smith’s own charmed career path from suburban comic nerd to God of Suburban Comic Nerds? But though Rogen and Banks have surprisingly convincing sexual tension and their relationship itself is one of the film’s selling points, it’s Smith’s handling of the romance in relation to the porno that ultimately steers the film into disappointing territory. In unnecessarily tearing the couple apart at the exact moment when they should be deciding to be together, Smith accomplishes two things: he makes his film twenty minutes longer than it needs to be, and he completely abandons the idea that making porn movies (or, metaphorically speaking, any kind of movie) is not only a valid occupation, but the outlet through which Zack finds himself as a creative person and as a man. In the end, Zack and Miri’s romance reaches its predictable (and satisfying) resolution, but their porno remains in limbo, and with it languishes the idea that art––however depraved––can save a loser’s life. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/groups/Filmgaming/Re_Recast_GARDEN_STATE_2004/563/36583/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: seely
Post To: Filmgaming
Post Date: 10/22/2008 2:36:05 PM
Body: I think I'm up for this one. 'Garden State' always made me think of the 80's Brat Pack films, especially St. Elmo's Fire. Therefore, in honor of that great time in history, I submit to you: Brat Pack Garden State, written and directed by John Hughes -Andrew Largeman: John Cusack (think 'Say Anything' but a few years older) -Gideon Largeman: Peter Falk -Aunt Sylvia Largeman: Miriam Flynn -Sam: Juliette Lewis (she had that mysterious/intriguing aura about her)* *I need to ammend this. Juliette Lewis, although clearly good for the role, would have been about 10 at this time. I originally was going to use Ally Sheedy, and I think I'm going to have to go back to her. I think she'd be just as good, honestly. -Olivia: Beverly d'Angelo -Titembay: Gedde Watanabe (he would probably be called 'Wang Chung' or something stereotypical, instead of 'Titembay' in keeping with his being Asian) -Mark: Judd Nelson, of course. -Dave: Andrew McCarthy -Doorman/Diego: John Candy (a departure from the original vision, but I think he would have been hilarious) Bonus Alternate: Slick Rick (80's rapper w/ double bonus eyepatch) -Carol: Amy Madigan -Tim: Anthony Michael Hall, naturally. Bonus Cameos: -Kelly: Molly Ringwald (its obvious) -Receptionist: Edie McClurg (only role she ever plays it seems) [quote user="SkyPilot"] Let's recast Garden State (2004) in honor of Kevin Smith. I know what you're thinking: why would we recast a Zach Braff movie in honor of Kevin Smith? Let me explain...Smith became famous for his "New Jersey series," which includes the cult classics Clerks (1994), Mallrats (1995), and Chasing Amy (1997). As you may know, New Jersey is known as "the Garden State." So yeah, the connection's a stretch. If you want to recast a Kevin Smith movie, have at it. Spout will give away two prizes, one for the best Garden State recast and one for the best Kevin Smith movie recast. Are you guys excited for Kevin Smith's Zack and Miri Make a Porno (10/31)? To be honest, I've never liked Kevin Smith. I really like Seth Rogen though, so I might end up seeing it. GARDEN STATE Zach Braff ... Andrew Largeman Natalie Portman ... Sam Peter Sarsgaard ... Mark (the gravedigger) Armando Riesco ... (the flaming arrow archer Ian Holm ... Gideon Largeman Jean Smart ... Carol Method Man ... Diego Ann Dowd ... Olivia Ato Essandoh ... Titembay Jackie Hoffman ... Aunt Sylvia Largema Jim Parsons ... Tim Denis O'Hare ... Albert [/quote]
]]>Wed, 22 Oct 2008 18:36:05 GMTseelyFilmgaming10/22/2008 2:36:05 PMI think I'm up for this one. 'Garden State' always made me think of the 80's Brat Pack films, especially St. Elmo's Fire. Therefore, in honor of that great time in history, I submit to you: Brat Pack Garden State, written and directed by John Hughes -Andrew Largeman: John Cusack (think 'Say Anything' but a few years older) -Gideon Largeman: Peter Falk -Aunt Sylvia Largeman: Miriam Flynn -Sam: Juliette Lewis (she had that mysterious/intriguing aura about her)* *I need to ammend this. Juliette Lewis, although clearly good for the role, would have been about 10 at this time. I originally was going to use Ally Sheedy, and I think I'm going to have to go back to her. I think she'd be just as good, honestly. -Olivia: Beverly d'Angelo -Titembay: Gedde Watanabe (he would probably be called 'Wang Chung' or something stereotypical, instead of 'Titembay' in keeping with his being Asian) -Mark: Judd Nelson, of course. -Dave: Andrew McCarthy -Doorman/Diego: John Candy (a departure from the original vision, but I think he would have been hilarious) Bonus Alternate: Slick Rick (80's rapper w/ double bonus eyepatch) -Carol: Amy Madigan -Tim: Anthony Michael Hall, naturally. Bonus Cameos: -Kelly: Molly Ringwald (its obvious) -Receptionist: Edie McClurg (only role she ever plays it seems) [quote user="SkyPilot"] Let's recast Garden State (2004) in honor of Kevin Smith. I know what you're thinking: why would we recast a Zach Braff movie in honor of Kevin Smith? Let me explain...Smith became famous for his "New Jersey series," which includes the cult classics Clerks (1994), Mallrats (1995), and Chasing Amy (1997). As you may know, New Jersey is known as "the Garden State." So yeah, the connection's a stretch. If you want to recast a Kevin Smith movie, have at it. Spout will give away two prizes, one for the best Garden State recast and one for the best Kevin Smith movie recast. Are you guys excited for Kevin Smith's Zack and Miri Make a Porno (10/31)? To be honest, I've never liked Kevin Smith. I really like Seth Rogen though, so I might end up seeing it. GARDEN STATE Zach Braff ... Andrew Largeman Natalie Portman ... Sam Peter Sarsgaard ... Mark (the gravedigger) Armando Riesco ... (the flaming arrow archer Ian Holm ... Gideon Largeman Jean Smart ... Carol Method Man ... Diego Ann Dowd ... Olivia Ato Essandoh ... Titembay Jackie Hoffman ... Aunt Sylvia Largema Jim Parsons ... Tim Denis O'Hare ... Albert [/quote] http://www.spout.com/groups/Filmgaming/Recast_GARDEN_STATE_2004/563/36461/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: SkyPilot
Post To: Filmgaming
Post Date: 10/17/2008 3:52:51 PM
Body: Let's recast Garden State (2004) in honor of Kevin Smith. I know what you're thinking: why would we recast a Zach Braff movie in honor of Kevin Smith? Let me explain...Smith became famous for his "New Jersey series," which includes the cult classics Clerks (1994), Mallrats (1995), and Chasing Amy (1997). As you may know, New Jersey is known as "the Garden State." So yeah, the connection's a stretch. If you want to recast a Kevin Smith movie, have at it. Spout will give away two prizes, one for the best Garden State recast and one for the best Kevin Smith movie recast. Are you guys excited for Kevin Smith's Zack and Miri Make a Porno (10/31)? To be honest, I've never liked Kevin Smith. I really like Seth Rogen though, so I might end up seeing it. GARDEN STATE Zach Braff ... Andrew Largeman Natalie Portman ... Sam Peter Sarsgaard ... Mark (the gravedigger) Armando Riesco ... Jesse (the flaming arrow archer) Ian Holm ... Gideon Largeman Jean Smart ... Carol Method Man ... Diego Ann Dowd ... Olivia Ato Essandoh ... Titembay Jackie Hoffman ... Aunt Sylvia Largema Jim Parsons ... Tim Denis O'Hare ... Albert
]]>Fri, 17 Oct 2008 19:52:51 GMTSkyPilotFilmgaming10/17/2008 3:52:51 PMLet's recast Garden State (2004) in honor of Kevin Smith. I know what you're thinking: why would we recast a Zach Braff movie in honor of Kevin Smith? Let me explain...Smith became famous for his "New Jersey series," which includes the cult classics Clerks (1994), Mallrats (1995), and Chasing Amy (1997). As you may know, New Jersey is known as "the Garden State." So yeah, the connection's a stretch. If you want to recast a Kevin Smith movie, have at it. Spout will give away two prizes, one for the best Garden State recast and one for the best Kevin Smith movie recast. Are you guys excited for Kevin Smith's Zack and Miri Make a Porno (10/31)? To be honest, I've never liked Kevin Smith. I really like Seth Rogen though, so I might end up seeing it. GARDEN STATE Zach Braff ... Andrew Largeman Natalie Portman ... Sam Peter Sarsgaard ... Mark (the gravedigger) Armando Riesco ... Jesse (the flaming arrow archer) Ian Holm ... Gideon Largeman Jean Smart ... Carol Method Man ... Diego Ann Dowd ... Olivia Ato Essandoh ... Titembay Jackie Hoffman ... Aunt Sylvia Largema Jim Parsons ... Tim Denis O'Hare ... Albert http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2008/9/21/35347.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 9/21/2008 3:01:06 PM
Body: Kevin Smith has directed his most emotional film with a decidedly non-emotional title with Zack & Miri Make A Porno. Rife with penis and poop jokes, it’s not really a departure from his entire Askew-niverse, but the film does hit some emotional chords that Smith had only really hit before in Chasing Amy. Granted, I wasn’t a big fan of Clerks 2 (although I loved the original), but I found myself really liking Zack & Miri. In our in-depth interview, Kevin Smith talks about Jason Mewes’ penis and Ben Affleck’s reaction to it, dealing with the MPAA’s obsession with poop, and how this movie came together. He also talks a bit about his next project, Red State. Don your flak vests and kevlar helmets, because there’s quite a few f-bombs in here, as well as a slew of spoilers from Zack & Miri. How’s it going? It’s going well, sir, it’s going well. Did you come straight here from Toronto, or did you get to go home for awhile? No. After Toronto I went to Jersey, and we were based out of Jersey for about a week. I had things to do at the latest screening in Westchester for Janet Maslin and her theater group, and then I went to the IFP, Independent Film Week for the 15th anniversary for Clerks and a keynote. Then I did a Q&A, a college gig at South Carolina last night, and I got on a plane and came here. So, tomorrow I get to go home for the first time in two weeks. I’m really looking forward to it. So, did you get to see the movie yet? I did, I saw it yesterday in a press screening. Right on, thank you. How did it play with the small group? It was really small, like ten people. Harry Knowles seemed to love it. Did he? Right on! I mean when you see him laughing you’re like, “Oh, you know that’s going to be five more exclamation points in the header.” [laughs] It’s always frightening when you have a screening of a comedy for a very small group, because laughter is kind of infectious. When you’ve got 300 people laughing, people who were maybe on the fence who don’t like it will be more kind to it. They’re inclined to be more kind, because “Obviously, I’m missing something.” But if you get a small group and nobody is laughing, your all unified frontward, just like, “This sucks!” I’ve never sat through it with a full audience. I mean I guess I did at the test screenings, but I didn’t sit; I just kind of skulked in the back. At Toronto I just popped in for the key sequences. I’m like if the reunion sequence works, then the rest of the movie is going to work. If I ever get nervous I pop in on the first porno, and if that works I feel good. And then I’m like, “I got to see how the love story plays,” so I go back for their love-making scene, and then I check out until the end. This is probably your most emotional film. I mean it’s close to Chasing Amy, because that had some emotional moments, but this one was like this had like naked, open emotion in it. Was that the hardest part of it for you, or the porno part the hardest part? The porno part was definitely the hardest. The naked emotion stuff, I feel like we had in Chasing Amy, I feel like even in the last movie Clerks 2 they’re sitting between Dante and Randal in the jail scene, which is just emotionally devastating. You watch one dude who’s always confident, always a wise ass, like laid bare. That to me is like devastating, because that’s a dude completely unguarded. So doing a version, not a version of that, but doing a girl-boy type emotion that lay bare, that was easy. Shooting fake sex––that was definitely something I wasn’t ready for. Mercifully, the first scene we shot was Lester and Stacy, was Mewes and Katie Morgan. You couldn’t ask for two better people in the scene, your first sex scene to kick it off with. Because you have one person who sprang forth from the womb pretending to fuck everything in the room anyway, and you have someone else who’s day job is the adult film industry, and nothing you ask her to do in your movie will ever compare to like the lightest day in her day job so to speak. So I felt like I was in good hands. So I cleared the set, and just talked to those two for about 15 minutes, and we kind of mapped out everything. I was always like, “Is everyone comfortable with this?” They’re looking at me like, “What, are you insane? Of course we’re comfortable with this.” So once we got into it, it was fun and weird. You felt like you were really directing porn, because from the vantage point of the monitor he could have been in her for all we knew. I knew he wasn’t, but it just looked convincing. Yeah. Everyone was just kind of standing around and not like, “This is fucked up, isn’t it?” and like everyone is just kind of concentrating on their jobs. It just seemed like a porno set for some reason. So it kind of worked out, but that was the one I was most nervous about going into. Well, Jay in Clerks 2, he’s got that Silence of the Lambs scene. He looks pretty heroin thin and everything, and now he looks all buff. [laughs] Yeah. Did he buff up for this movie, or is that just what he looks like? I think that’s kind of what he looks like. What, you don’t see him naked all the time? I’ve seen that dude’s dick, more than I’ve seen my own to be honest with you. And in this movie, that’s the biggest I’ve ever seen his dick. Because in real life, it’s an average dick. When we were shooting that sequence and he comes out that door, like he was hanging low! I was just like, “Did Mewes sneak a prosthetic onto the set, because that doesn’t look like Mewes…” Maybe he got fluffed backstage or something. He was fluffing himself, sir. He was fucking tugging furiously. Although he’s fond of saying, “That wasn’t on its way up; I was on its way down,” and I was like, “I don’t want to know about that.” I had it confirmed too by Affleck. Affleck came over the house to watch the movie. He hadn’t read the script or anything, so he kind of went in fresh. The third thing he said about it after it was done, he was like “You realize Mewes was one pump away from being totally hard.” I was like, “Right!” He said, “Because his dick has never been that big.” I said, “I realize that.” I don’t know if it’s frightening that you guys know that much about Jason’s dick. It’s a sad commentary really, because either it means that he is way too comfortable in exposing himself, or that my gut is so big I haven’t seen my dick in years. So I’m just more familiar with his dick than my own by this point. Did he have to work on his porn faces? He nailed those. Dude, he has been that guy forever. In many ways even more so than Jay, in Jay and Silent Bob, he was born to play this role. It caters to all of his shrines: cluelessness, sweetness, utter filth and raunchy, pretend fucking. It was just so right up his alley. Yeah, it seems like he could pick up the porn and the business tomorrow if he needed to. Totally. So, you put Jeff Anderson in this film. How did that happen? Was that sort of natural? Did you always want to put him in, or did you just think “Hey, let’s stick Jeff in this role”? When I was writing it I was like, “I’m going to write this role, the Deacon role for Jeff,” just because I love working with Jeff. I thought he did a bang up on job on Clerks 2, but I just wanted to have him for the next flick as well. I was worried when I gave him the script that he would be like, “I don’t know, it’s kind of a small part comparatively,” but he was so elated to like not have to carry the movie. He was just like, “It’s going to be fun to just kick back and watch somebody else carry the movie, and just come in when I need to come in.” So, it kind of worked out. Yeah, he was good in that. I was reading in the notes how you were kind of really jazzed when Seth Rogen wanted to do this, and you hand delivered the script to his house, which you’d never done before. Then by a weird chain of events he had turned out to be a huge fan of yours, having grown up quoting Clerks and everything. Yeah, yeah. Could you imagine making this with someone else? I mean he seems to sell this film, him and Elizabeth both. Yeah, but him even more so than Elizabeth, because it was written expressly for him. At one point the Weinstein Company was just like, “What if he says no, who’s your backup?” I was like, “I have no backup. This is the only guy who can play this role. Let’s not let any negative thinking into this process. Let’s just all hope that he’s going to say yes, and do the right thing,” because he was the guy. I had been working on this idea about a movie set on the outskirts of the porn industry since ‘96, since we wrapped Chasing Amy. It’s gone through various permutations, but it wasn’t until I saw him in 40 Year Old Virgin that I was just like, “I’ve got to work with that guy. That guy is amazing! He sounds like one of my characters, ” and suddenly I was like, “Oh, my God! He’s the guy!” Then I built it around the notion of having him in the movie. So without him there is no Zach & Miri Make a Porno. Me, him and that flick are very tied together. I think if he’s said no I probably wouldn’t have made it, I’d have just made Red State instead. He said he brought in Elizabeth Banks, he suggested Justin Long, but you and Justin had been in Live Free Or Die Hard together. We did Die Hard together. Did that kind of happen because of Seth’s suggestion, or did you guys kind of know each other after working on it? I knew Justin after working with him, because we spent a week together on that flick, but never…the dude didn’t cross my mind for some reason when we were figuring out who to play Brandon. And Seth was just like, “What about Justin Long?” And I was like, “Oh, my god, yes. Justin Long.” I had a lot of moments like that. He brought in Craig Robinson, who played Delaney. Oh, yeah, he was great in this. Because I had written it for this dude Earthquake, who was in Clerks 2. And Seth was like, “That guy’s very funny, but I just worked with Craig Robinson on Pineapple Express and he was fantastic.” He’s just like, “Let him come in and read. If he sucks, don’t worry about it.” And he came in and he just kind of knocked it out of the park, so boom, he was there. Banks was––it was written originally for Rosario Dawson. I wanted Rosario to play Miri. But she wound up taking this role in Eagle Eye and the dates didn’t work any more, so she was committed to that. I couldn’t blame her, it’s a fucking Spielberg movie with Shia LaBeouf and whatnot, so why not? But we were going to be shooting in the fall and she could have done it, but then when we moved into January and March, she was committed to that, so it was all over. We were at ground zero and we started looking at actors’ availabilities of all the agencies to see who was going to be free from January to March. We narrowed it down to six possible names of chicks who might be interested in doing this movie. Because the material’s not for everybody. I’m sure we would get a lot of “no’s” is we went out into the world with it. So Banks alphabetically was at the top of the list. Seth comes over and we’re talking about a bunch of other stuff, and I was like, “Let’s talk about possible Miris. I’ve got a list here.” And he was like, “Elisabeth Banks is your first choice. She would be my first choice too. She’s amazing.” And I didn’t have the heart to tell him that alphabetically she was first. [laughs] But he was just like, “Oh my god, she was so good in 40 Year Old Virgin, and she made it so far in the Knocked Up auditions.” She was almost the chick in Knocked Up. So he was going, “I vote for Banks.” And I like her in Invincible, I like her in everything I’d seen her in. So I said, “Let me just see her whenever.” She came over to the house, read the script, and then we sat talking for like two hours, and I was like, “You are so it. The movie’s yours if you want to do it.” And thank god, because she’s hands down the best actress I’ve ever worked with. She really…I mean Miri kind of is the emotional sign and grounds the movie and makes it very real, makes it plausible for some reason. And she pulls it off is all. Because Banks is that good of an actress and that good of good of a comedienne on top of it. The whole process with the MPAA, with submitting it multiple times for approval, going through the approval process, did you guys originally submit like a really nasty cut thinking, “All right, we can cut it down based on   we’ll put more in and they’ll ask for certain cuts…” Ow! You all right, man? Ow, ow, ow. Crap. My calf. Those are no fun. Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow. Think happy thoughts. Charlie horse. Oh, those are not fun. No. Bad one, bad one, bad one. Ow! Ow, ow, ow. OK, it’s going now. Holy shit, that hurts. Oh, shit. Ow, ow, ow, ow. OK. Ow. I’m glad it’s not a seizure. That’d be weird. It’s like, “I’m going to have to shove something in Kevin Smith’s mouth, or he’ll just bite his own tongue off.” Hold on, just let it work itself out. Oh, shit. No, take your time. That’s one of those things where you really feel your age. Yeah. Oh, shit. Come on. Come on. I would just like to see what it looks like inside. I don’t even know what causes that. It’s like blood gets starved to one area or something? It literally feels like the muscle gets inverted around the bone. Like it feels like it shifts into a place it shouldn’t be. It’s some kind of weird muscle spasm, I guess. It usually happens to me in my sleep. I wake up in fucking agony. In pain like that? Oh, yeah. I think it’s about gone now. I’m sorry, what were we talking about? The whole MPAA thing. Did you guys submit harder cuts? What we did was we didn’t submit something where I was like, “Let’s give them the worst and see what happens.” We had an hour and forty five minute cut of the movie and we had just test screened it in Kansas City. We had a great test screening and scored really well. So I said, there’s stuff in the movie with now having seen it with 300 people at once, I hear is just not as good as the other stuff. Ow. Oh, shit, dude. Ow. It’s a bad day for the Smith calves. Hold on. Yeah, man, just the one. Let me just stretch it. Oh, shit. So I submitted the hour and forty five cut that we had test screened, knowing that I was going to take out at least 10 minutes, probably 12. So I said listen to this, that way if there is any problem, chances are I’m going to be addressing with the cuts I make anyway. At the very least I’ll be able to turn in another cut in three days, and they’ll think I did a massive amount of work on it. So we submitted the 1:45, and they immediately said it was a NC 17. So we waited a few days and submitted the shorter cut, which I think was 12 minutes shorter. And they said, “Wow, you’ve done a lot of great work, but there’s still the two scenes that you need to focus on. One is the first porno sequence with Lester and Stacey. And the other is the shit shot. The shit shot is never going to play in a R rated movie. It’s not going to work in an R rated movie.” And I was like, “Well, I’ve seen it play with an audience and I’m really hesitant to lose it. I just can’t. I’m married to the shot. It works like crazy.” And I’ve seen shit in other movies, so it’s not like it’s without precedent. And they were like, “Maybe you can work with some of the other elements involved. Like maybe if you bring the sound down on it. Maybe the sound is the problem.” And I’m like, “Really? It’s the egregious visual of shit hitting somebody’s face? Fake movie shit?” But I felt like I was on good ground, because it’s not even a second long. It’s 14 frames. And I felt like I think I can win this fight. So I did what they suggested, I submitted a version with the sound turned down and they were like, “No, no. It’s still not working.” And at that point I was like, “Look. Let’s just go to the appeals part of the process.” And they were totally content to do it. I put everything into the movie. I submitted like the perfect version of the movie for me. Like, this is everything I want. Because I’m like, if we’re going to get this second bite of the apple, let’s do it. If we win, let’s make sure it’s the movie that we really want out there. So they did the appeals process and they flipped it without us having to make any cuts. So it was kind of delightful, but still like a process that you didn’t really want to go through in the first place. No. Not that many times at least. No. And it’s not even the frequency or how many times we had to do it, it’s just like it’s kind of embarrassing. You don’t want to go out there in the world and be like, you know, they have a problem with the movie. You just don’t want to send anything out there in the world. It’s tough enough to open up a movie. It’s tough enough to make sure you’ve got good buzz and not bad buzz. And then deal with the reviews when they come out and shit like that. All that stuff’s difficult. Making a movie, all that stuff. But it’s a necessary part of the process. This part of the process, not really. Not everyone goes through it. In fact, after we won I said to Joan Graves, the woman that heads up the MPAA––who’s really lovely and I was very friendly with. I said, “Do you have another one of these today?” And she’s like, “We do maybe––maybe––10 of these a year.” 10 appeals? Yeah. And I’m like, “Really? It doesn’t happen that much?” And she’s like, “No, most people just do the cuts.” Wow. But I don’t know why anyone wouldn’t go for it. It’s worth it. At the very least, what are they going to do? Uphold the rating you already have? And the very most you could flip it, without having to cut anything. I was always shocked though, they focused on two things and I was just like, “Really? That?” The sex scene to me––and I argued it when I was doing the appeal thing––it’s just so cartoonish. It’s like a caricature of sex. It’s a caricature of a caricature of sex, because it’s porno sex. Porno sex is over the top to begin with. I don’t know anybody that does 26 positions in 10 minutes. But in order to make fun of it or lampoon it, you have to be bigger. But still, it was very much a cartoon and not meant to titillate. Clearly it was meant to draw laughs out of people. And the shit shot to me was so brief and clearly it’s movie shit and not real shit. To me it’s like, “Yeah it’s a gross out gag and maybe it might not be everyone’s cup of tea. But it’s not egregious, it’s not like this thing you have to protect children from.” The things that I thought they would hit us with, were there’s a shot in the strip club where one of the strippers, you flat out see the labia, man. Yeah, I did notice that. And if you look really closely, and I have because I have it on the Avid and I got frame by frame, you see a little bit of brown eye in there. That’s what Seth said. And I’m like, yeah, it’s definitely there. And I felt like that would be the thing that they would harp on. And because of that, when we were shooting it, we shot I think five takes of completely nude, and before that Scott Mosier was like, “I don’t know if we’re going to get this through. There are flat out pussy lips all over the shot.” And I was like, “All right. Let’s grab one of here in a G string. So we had that in our back pocket in case the MPAA came down on it. The other shot I thought that they could have tagged was Jason’s cock shot. Not because it’s just a shot of a dick, but that dick is so close to being fucking erect, it could very well be considered hard… What about the scrotum shot? That too. Are those really his balls? Those are his balls. Wow. But it’s backlit so you can’t see anything else. You don’t see a ring piece or anything. But I felt like that was the moment we could have gotten in trouble for. Because the rule is any erect penis will get you an NC 17. And I look at his cock in that shot, and I’m like I have had sex with a dick that engorged. Not all the way hard but almost there. [laughs] Right. If you’re going for a second or third round or something like that and you’re like, “I ain’t got much left, but I’ll try to work with this.” So to me, that’s classified as an erection, but they didn’t see it that way. I’m not saying the should rethink it by any stretch of the imagination, but if I was a member of the MPAA, those are the two things I would have went after. And I think if I was a member of the MPAA, I would have won the shit shot argument. Because when I stood up to defend the shit shot, I referenced other movies that had shit moments, like Trainspotting, where they ripped the sheet. Or American Pie 3, where Stiffler eats dogshit. And then I referenced Jackass with the fart helmet, where… Oh, yeah, that’s real shit. It’s real shit in that funnel! You can see it. And I said, “If they have real shit and the get an R, how come fake shit gets an NC 17?” But if I was Joan Graves I would have turned around and been like, “None of those shots you mentioned is in the midst of a sex act.” And that’s kind of what like sets our shot apart, but they just didn’t, for some reason, zero in on why it was questionable. Because it’s not just that it’s a simple shit shot. It’s coming from somewhere and it’s a sex act. So I think I could have won that one if I was on their side. We talked to Peter Sollett, who directed Nick and Norah in Toronto, and there’s a scene in his movie…   have you seen his movie? Not yet. This actress is drunk, she drops her gum in the toilet. I heard about it. He said that was a pain in the ass dealing with the MPAA on that. Really, they brought that up? Yeah. They wanted to scale back and not see it, and just see her hand go out of frame. He said that whole process was a pain. They don’t tell you what to do, but they will make suggestions to work around things. That’s interesting. And on the shit shot they were like, “Look, just cut the shot, and be on somebody’s face and hear the sound. And then when you’re outside and you see him caked I shit, the audience will know what happened.” But I’m like, “It’s 14 frames, man.” 14 frames and it works like crazy. I don’t want to lose it. I know you’ve been busy with this movie, but have you had any time to see any of the summer films this summer, or see anything? I’m sure you saw Dark Knight. Yeah. I’ve seen mostly all the summer films. There are only two that I want to see that I didn’t get to see yet, and that was Wanted and Hancock. But I saw pretty much everything else. It was a good summer, man. It was bookended by wonderful comic book movies. Iron Man was great and then Dark Knight was great. Although it was weird, did you see that quote from Robert Downey, Jr. when he was talking about Dark Knight? Yeah. I mean, I’m certainly nobody’s career counselor, but I couldn’t believe that that dude said that. Because it’s like he came back in a big way with Iron Man, and everyone remembered how much they love Robert Downey, Jr. He knocked that role out of the park. He was sublime. Dark Knight comes out a couple of months later and it is universally beloved. Everyone takes it very personally, everyone defends that movie, everybody loves it, it did killer business, it may be one of the perfect Hollywood movies. One of the most perfect Hollywood movies ever made. It appeals to a bunch of different people on a bunch of different levels without being saccharine or sophomoric. It’s dark; it’s a bleak fucking picture. I never in a million years, even if I hated Dark Knight, I would not be the guy going online being like––or in any interview setting––being like, “I don’t like Dark Knight. Fuck Dark Knight.” Because, man, they would all turn on me so fucking quickly. So when I saw him make that quote I was just like, oh my god, dude. You’ve got to be very, very ballsy to say that. He was. It’s was a weird thing for him to say, but it doesn’t seem to have affected him. You mentioned Red State would have been your next film if this had not been. Are you on to that already now, or is that going to be next? We’re trying. The script’s done, and it’s been done for a year or more. Finding money for it has been fucking difficult. Bob and Harvey didn’t want to do it, so that kind of opened us to go out and raise financing. But it’s been tough. I get it. It’s not a very commercial film. It’s very bleak. It makes Dark Knight look like Strawberry Shortcake. There’s nobody to root for. Everyone dies. It just a series of bad choices made based on questionable morality throughout the film. No character for an audience member to latch onto. Right. So I get it. If it does any business at all it would be because it played well at festivals. It’s a total festival film. But if it had a little water cooler buzz coming out of the festival, maybe it does. I get why people aren’t racing to flip open their checkbooks. And I figure sooner or later the money will come. For some reason, the lack of confidence… financial confidence from anybody has just served to make me feel like I’m on the right track. Because these are cats that are like, hey, if I wanted to make a comedy, everyone would pony up but I get it. I’m working outside my comfort zone. I’m working in a genre that I’m certainly not proven in by any stretch of the imagination. With material that doesn’t lend itself to a Saw type opening or anything like that. So I can completely understand why people would be hesitant to cough up   and for some reason it only makes me more confident that it’s the right thing to do next. It must make you want to do it more, to be out of the comfort zone. You’re pretty safe with the films you’ve been doing, then you try something totally different to stretch your legs. Most days I’ve never felt like a filmmaker. I just feel like a guy who writes movies and happens to direct what he writes. If I could make that movie and pull it off, like I would feel like maybe I am a filmmaker. But if it doesn’t work I’m just as content to go, “OK, I’m the dick and fart joke guy, and I’ll go back to doing that. But it’s worth a shot, you know? Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Sun, 21 Sep 2008 19:01:06 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com9/21/2008 3:01:06 PM Kevin Smith has directed his most emotional film with a decidedly non-emotional title with Zack & Miri Make A Porno. Rife with penis and poop jokes, it’s not really a departure from his entire Askew-niverse, but the film does hit some emotional chords that Smith had only really hit before in Chasing Amy. Granted, I wasn’t a big fan of Clerks 2 (although I loved the original), but I found myself really liking Zack & Miri. In our in-depth interview, Kevin Smith talks about Jason Mewes’ penis and Ben Affleck’s reaction to it, dealing with the MPAA’s obsession with poop, and how this movie came together. He also talks a bit about his next project, Red State. Don your flak vests and kevlar helmets, because there’s quite a few f-bombs in here, as well as a slew of spoilers from Zack & Miri. How’s it going? It’s going well, sir, it’s going well. Did you come straight here from Toronto, or did you get to go home for awhile? No. After Toronto I went to Jersey, and we were based out of Jersey for about a week. I had things to do at the latest screening in Westchester for Janet Maslin and her theater group, and then I went to the IFP, Independent Film Week for the 15th anniversary for Clerks and a keynote. Then I did a Q&A, a college gig at South Carolina last night, and I got on a plane and came here. So, tomorrow I get to go home for the first time in two weeks. I’m really looking forward to it. So, did you get to see the movie yet? I did, I saw it yesterday in a press screening. Right on, thank you. How did it play with the small group? It was really small, like ten people. Harry Knowles seemed to love it. Did he? Right on! I mean when you see him laughing you’re like, “Oh, you know that’s going to be five more exclamation points in the header.” [laughs] It’s always frightening when you have a screening of a comedy for a very small group, because laughter is kind of infectious. When you’ve got 300 people laughing, people who were maybe on the fence who don’t like it will be more kind to it. They’re inclined to be more kind, because “Obviously, I’m missing something.” But if you get a small group and nobody is laughing, your all unified frontward, just like, “This sucks!” I’ve never sat through it with a full audience. I mean I guess I did at the test screenings, but I didn’t sit; I just kind of skulked in the back. At Toronto I just popped in for the key sequences. I’m like if the reunion sequence works, then the rest of the movie is going to work. If I ever get nervous I pop in on the first porno, and if that works I feel good. And then I’m like, “I got to see how the love story plays,” so I go back for their love-making scene, and then I check out until the end. This is probably your most emotional film. I mean it’s close to Chasing Amy, because that had some emotional moments, but this one was like this had like naked, open emotion in it. Was that the hardest part of it for you, or the porno part the hardest part? The porno part was definitely the hardest. The naked emotion stuff, I feel like we had in Chasing Amy, I feel like even in the last movie Clerks 2 they’re sitting between Dante and Randal in the jail scene, which is just emotionally devastating. You watch one dude who’s always confident, always a wise ass, like laid bare. That to me is like devastating, because that’s a dude completely unguarded. So doing a version, not a version of that, but doing a girl-boy type emotion that lay bare, that was easy. Shooting fake sex––that was definitely something I wasn’t ready for. Mercifully, the first scene we shot was Lester and Stacy, was Mewes and Katie Morgan. You couldn’t ask for two better people in the scene, your first sex scene to kick it off with. Because you have one person who sprang forth from the womb pretending to fuck everything in the room anyway, and you have someone else who’s day job is the adult film industry, and nothing you ask her to do in your movie will ever compare to like the lightest day in her day job so to speak. So I felt like I was in good hands. So I cleared the set, and just talked to those two for about 15 minutes, and we kind of mapped out everything. I was always like, “Is everyone comfortable with this?” They’re looking at me like, “What, are you insane? Of course we’re comfortable with this.” So once we got into it, it was fun and weird. You felt like you were really directing porn, because from the vantage point of the monitor he could have been in her for all we knew. I knew he wasn’t, but it just looked convincing. Yeah. Everyone was just kind of standing around and not like, “This is fucked up, isn’t it?” and like everyone is just kind of concentrating on their jobs. It just seemed like a porno set for some reason. So it kind of worked out, but that was the one I was most nervous about going into. Well, Jay in Clerks 2, he’s got that Silence of the Lambs scene. He looks pretty heroin thin and everything, and now he looks all buff. [laughs] Yeah. Did he buff up for this movie, or is that just what he looks like? I think that’s kind of what he looks like. What, you don’t see him naked all the time? I’ve seen that dude’s dick, more than I’ve seen my own to be honest with you. And in this movie, that’s the biggest I’ve ever seen his dick. Because in real life, it’s an average dick. When we were shooting that sequence and he comes out that door, like he was hanging low! I was just like, “Did Mewes sneak a prosthetic onto the set, because that doesn’t look like Mewes…” Maybe he got fluffed backstage or something. He was fluffing himself, sir. He was fucking tugging furiously. Although he’s fond of saying, “That wasn’t on its way up; I was on its way down,” and I was like, “I don’t want to know about that.” I had it confirmed too by Affleck. Affleck came over the house to watch the movie. He hadn’t read the script or anything, so he kind of went in fresh. The third thing he said about it after it was done, he was like “You realize Mewes was one pump away from being totally hard.” I was like, “Right!” He said, “Because his dick has never been that big.” I said, “I realize that.” I don’t know if it’s frightening that you guys know that much about Jason’s dick. It’s a sad commentary really, because either it means that he is way too comfortable in exposing himself, or that my gut is so big I haven’t seen my dick in years. So I’m just more familiar with his dick than my own by this point. Did he have to work on his porn faces? He nailed those. Dude, he has been that guy forever. In many ways even more so than Jay, in Jay and Silent Bob, he was born to play this role. It caters to all of his shrines: cluelessness, sweetness, utter filth and raunchy, pretend fucking. It was just so right up his alley. Yeah, it seems like he could pick up the porn and the business tomorrow if he needed to. Totally. So, you put Jeff Anderson in this film. How did that happen? Was that sort of natural? Did you always want to put him in, or did you just think “Hey, let’s stick Jeff in this role”? When I was writing it I was like, “I’m going to write this role, the Deacon role for Jeff,” just because I love working with Jeff. I thought he did a bang up on job on Clerks 2, but I just wanted to have him for the next flick as well. I was worried when I gave him the script that he would be like, “I don’t know, it’s kind of a small part comparatively,” but he was so elated to like not have to carry the movie. He was just like, “It’s going to be fun to just kick back and watch somebody else carry the movie, and just come in when I need to come in.” So, it kind of worked out. Yeah, he was good in that. I was reading in the notes how you were kind of really jazzed when Seth Rogen wanted to do this, and you hand delivered the script to his house, which you’d never done before. Then by a weird chain of events he had turned out to be a huge fan of yours, having grown up quoting Clerks and everything. Yeah, yeah. Could you imagine making this with someone else? I mean he seems to sell this film, him and Elizabeth both. Yeah, but him even more so than Elizabeth, because it was written expressly for him. At one point the Weinstein Company was just like, “What if he says no, who’s your backup?” I was like, “I have no backup. This is the only guy who can play this role. Let’s not let any negative thinking into this process. Let’s just all hope that he’s going to say yes, and do the right thing,” because he was the guy. I had been working on this idea about a movie set on the outskirts of the porn industry since ‘96, since we wrapped Chasing Amy. It’s gone through various permutations, but it wasn’t until I saw him in 40 Year Old Virgin that I was just like, “I’ve got to work with that guy. That guy is amazing! He sounds like one of my characters, ” and suddenly I was like, “Oh, my God! He’s the guy!” Then I built it around the notion of having him in the movie. So without him there is no Zach & Miri Make a Porno. Me, him and that flick are very tied together. I think if he’s said no I probably wouldn’t have made it, I’d have just made Red State instead. He said he brought in Elizabeth Banks, he suggested Justin Long, but you and Justin had been in Live Free Or Die Hard together. We did Die Hard together. Did that kind of happen because of Seth’s suggestion, or did you guys kind of know each other after working on it? I knew Justin after working with him, because we spent a week together on that flick, but never…the dude didn’t cross my mind for some reason when we were figuring out who to play Brandon. And Seth was just like, “What about Justin Long?” And I was like, “Oh, my god, yes. Justin Long.” I had a lot of moments like that. He brought in Craig Robinson, who played Delaney. Oh, yeah, he was great in this. Because I had written it for this dude Earthquake, who was in Clerks 2. And Seth was like, “That guy’s very funny, but I just worked with Craig Robinson on Pineapple Express and he was fantastic.” He’s just like, “Let him come in and read. If he sucks, don’t worry about it.” And he came in and he just kind of knocked it out of the park, so boom, he was there. Banks was––it was written originally for Rosario Dawson. I wanted Rosario to play Miri. But she wound up taking this role in Eagle Eye and the dates didn’t work any more, so she was committed to that. I couldn’t blame her, it’s a fucking Spielberg movie with Shia LaBeouf and whatnot, so why not? But we were going to be shooting in the fall and she could have done it, but then when we moved into January and March, she was committed to that, so it was all over. We were at ground zero and we started looking at actors’ availabilities of all the agencies to see who was going to be free from January to March. We narrowed it down to six possible names of chicks who might be interested in doing this movie. Because the material’s not for everybody. I’m sure we would get a lot of “no’s” is we went out into the world with it. So Banks alphabetically was at the top of the list. Seth comes over and we’re talking about a bunch of other stuff, and I was like, “Let’s talk about possible Miris. I’ve got a list here.” And he was like, “Elisabeth Banks is your first choice. She would be my first choice too. She’s amazing.” And I didn’t have the heart to tell him that alphabetically she was first. [laughs] But he was just like, “Oh my god, she was so good in 40 Year Old Virgin, and she made it so far in the Knocked Up auditions.” She was almost the chick in Knocked Up. So he was going, “I vote for Banks.” And I like her in Invincible, I like her in everything I’d seen her in. So I said, “Let me just see her whenever.” She came over to the house, read the script, and then we sat talking for like two hours, and I was like, “You are so it. The movie’s yours if you want to do it.” And thank god, because she’s hands down the best actress I’ve ever worked with. She really…I mean Miri kind of is the emotional sign and grounds the movie and makes it very real, makes it plausible for some reason. And she pulls it off is all. Because Banks is that good of an actress and that good of good of a comedienne on top of it. The whole process with the MPAA, with submitting it multiple times for approval, going through the approval process, did you guys originally submit like a really nasty cut thinking, “All right, we can cut it down based on   we’ll put more in and they’ll ask for certain cuts…” Ow! You all right, man? Ow, ow, ow. Crap. My calf. Those are no fun. Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow. Think happy thoughts. Charlie horse. Oh, those are not fun. No. Bad one, bad one, bad one. Ow! Ow, ow, ow. OK, it’s going now. Holy shit, that hurts. Oh, shit. Ow, ow, ow, ow. OK. Ow. I’m glad it’s not a seizure. That’d be weird. It’s like, “I’m going to have to shove something in Kevin Smith’s mouth, or he’ll just bite his own tongue off.” Hold on, just let it work itself out. Oh, shit. No, take your time. That’s one of those things where you really feel your age. Yeah. Oh, shit. Come on. Come on. I would just like to see what it looks like inside. I don’t even know what causes that. It’s like blood gets starved to one area or something? It literally feels like the muscle gets inverted around the bone. Like it feels like it shifts into a place it shouldn’t be. It’s some kind of weird muscle spasm, I guess. It usually happens to me in my sleep. I wake up in fucking agony. In pain like that? Oh, yeah. I think it’s about gone now. I’m sorry, what were we talking about? The whole MPAA thing. Did you guys submit harder cuts? What we did was we didn’t submit something where I was like, “Let’s give them the worst and see what happens.” We had an hour and forty five minute cut of the movie and we had just test screened it in Kansas City. We had a great test screening and scored really well. So I said, there’s stuff in the movie with now having seen it with 300 people at once, I hear is just not as good as the other stuff. Ow. Oh, shit, dude. Ow. It’s a bad day for the Smith calves. Hold on. Yeah, man, just the one. Let me just stretch it. Oh, shit. So I submitted the hour and forty five cut that we had test screened, knowing that I was going to take out at least 10 minutes, probably 12. So I said listen to this, that way if there is any problem, chances are I’m going to be addressing with the cuts I make anyway. At the very least I’ll be able to turn in another cut in three days, and they’ll think I did a massive amount of work on it. So we submitted the 1:45, and they immediately said it was a NC 17. So we waited a few days and submitted the shorter cut, which I think was 12 minutes shorter. And they said, “Wow, you’ve done a lot of great work, but there’s still the two scenes that you need to focus on. One is the first porno sequence with Lester and Stacey. And the other is the shit shot. The shit shot is never going to play in a R rated movie. It’s not going to work in an R rated movie.” And I was like, “Well, I’ve seen it play with an audience and I’m really hesitant to lose it. I just can’t. I’m married to the shot. It works like crazy.” And I’ve seen shit in other movies, so it’s not like it’s without precedent. And they were like, “Maybe you can work with some of the other elements involved. Like maybe if you bring the sound down on it. Maybe the sound is the problem.” And I’m like, “Really? It’s the egregious visual of shit hitting somebody’s face? Fake movie shit?” But I felt like I was on good ground, because it’s not even a second long. It’s 14 frames. And I felt like I think I can win this fight. So I did what they suggested, I submitted a version with the sound turned down and they were like, “No, no. It’s still not working.” And at that point I was like, “Look. Let’s just go to the appeals part of the process.” And they were totally content to do it. I put everything into the movie. I submitted like the perfect version of the movie for me. Like, this is everything I want. Because I’m like, if we’re going to get this second bite of the apple, let’s do it. If we win, let’s make sure it’s the movie that we really want out there. So they did the appeals process and they flipped it without us having to make any cuts. So it was kind of delightful, but still like a process that you didn’t really want to go through in the first place. No. Not that many times at least. No. And it’s not even the frequency or how many times we had to do it, it’s just like it’s kind of embarrassing. You don’t want to go out there in the world and be like, you know, they have a problem with the movie. You just don’t want to send anything out there in the world. It’s tough enough to open up a movie. It’s tough enough to make sure you’ve got good buzz and not bad buzz. And then deal with the reviews when they come out and shit like that. All that stuff’s difficult. Making a movie, all that stuff. But it’s a necessary part of the process. This part of the process, not really. Not everyone goes through it. In fact, after we won I said to Joan Graves, the woman that heads up the MPAA––who’s really lovely and I was very friendly with. I said, “Do you have another one of these today?” And she’s like, “We do maybe––maybe––10 of these a year.” 10 appeals? Yeah. And I’m like, “Really? It doesn’t happen that much?” And she’s like, “No, most people just do the cuts.” Wow. But I don’t know why anyone wouldn’t go for it. It’s worth it. At the very least, what are they going to do? Uphold the rating you already have? And the very most you could flip it, without having to cut anything. I was always shocked though, they focused on two things and I was just like, “Really? That?” The sex scene to me––and I argued it when I was doing the appeal thing––it’s just so cartoonish. It’s like a caricature of sex. It’s a caricature of a caricature of sex, because it’s porno sex. Porno sex is over the top to begin with. I don’t know anybody that does 26 positions in 10 minutes. But in order to make fun of it or lampoon it, you have to be bigger. But still, it was very much a cartoon and not meant to titillate. Clearly it was meant to draw laughs out of people. And the shit shot to me was so brief and clearly it’s movie shit and not real shit. To me it’s like, “Yeah it’s a gross out gag and maybe it might not be everyone’s cup of tea. But it’s not egregious, it’s not like this thing you have to protect children from.” The things that I thought they would hit us with, were there’s a shot in the strip club where one of the strippers, you flat out see the labia, man. Yeah, I did notice that. And if you look really closely, and I have because I have it on the Avid and I got frame by frame, you see a little bit of brown eye in there. That’s what Seth said. And I’m like, yeah, it’s definitely there. And I felt like that would be the thing that they would harp on. And because of that, when we were shooting it, we shot I think five takes of completely nude, and before that Scott Mosier was like, “I don’t know if we’re going to get this through. There are flat out pussy lips all over the shot.” And I was like, “All right. Let’s grab one of here in a G string. So we had that in our back pocket in case the MPAA came down on it. The other shot I thought that they could have tagged was Jason’s cock shot. Not because it’s just a shot of a dick, but that dick is so close to being fucking erect, it could very well be considered hard… What about the scrotum shot? That too. Are those really his balls? Those are his balls. Wow. But it’s backlit so you can’t see anything else. You don’t see a ring piece or anything. But I felt like that was the moment we could have gotten in trouble for. Because the rule is any erect penis will get you an NC 17. And I look at his cock in that shot, and I’m like I have had sex with a dick that engorged. Not all the way hard but almost there. [laughs] Right. If you’re going for a second or third round or something like that and you’re like, “I ain’t got much left, but I’ll try to work with this.” So to me, that’s classified as an erection, but they didn’t see it that way. I’m not saying the should rethink it by any stretch of the imagination, but if I was a member of the MPAA, those are the two things I would have went after. And I think if I was a member of the MPAA, I would have won the shit shot argument. Because when I stood up to defend the shit shot, I referenced other movies that had shit moments, like Trainspotting, where they ripped the sheet. Or American Pie 3, where Stiffler eats dogshit. And then I referenced Jackass with the fart helmet, where… Oh, yeah, that’s real shit. It’s real shit in that funnel! You can see it. And I said, “If they have real shit and the get an R, how come fake shit gets an NC 17?” But if I was Joan Graves I would have turned around and been like, “None of those shots you mentioned is in the midst of a sex act.” And that’s kind of what like sets our shot apart, but they just didn’t, for some reason, zero in on why it was questionable. Because it’s not just that it’s a simple shit shot. It’s coming from somewhere and it’s a sex act. So I think I could have won that one if I was on their side. We talked to Peter Sollett, who directed Nick and Norah in Toronto, and there’s a scene in his movie…   have you seen his movie? Not yet. This actress is drunk, she drops her gum in the toilet. I heard about it. He said that was a pain in the ass dealing with the MPAA on that. Really, they brought that up? Yeah. They wanted to scale back and not see it, and just see her hand go out of frame. He said that whole process was a pain. They don’t tell you what to do, but they will make suggestions to work around things. That’s interesting. And on the shit shot they were like, “Look, just cut the shot, and be on somebody’s face and hear the sound. And then when you’re outside and you see him caked I shit, the audience will know what happened.” But I’m like, “It’s 14 frames, man.” 14 frames and it works like crazy. I don’t want to lose it. I know you’ve been busy with this movie, but have you had any time to see any of the summer films this summer, or see anything? I’m sure you saw Dark Knight. Yeah. I’ve seen mostly all the summer films. There are only two that I want to see that I didn’t get to see yet, and that was Wanted and Hancock. But I saw pretty much everything else. It was a good summer, man. It was bookended by wonderful comic book movies. Iron Man was great and then Dark Knight was great. Although it was weird, did you see that quote from Robert Downey, Jr. when he was talking about Dark Knight? Yeah. I mean, I’m certainly nobody’s career counselor, but I couldn’t believe that that dude said that. Because it’s like he came back in a big way with Iron Man, and everyone remembered how much they love Robert Downey, Jr. He knocked that role out of the park. He was sublime. Dark Knight comes out a couple of months later and it is universally beloved. Everyone takes it very personally, everyone defends that movie, everybody loves it, it did killer business, it may be one of the perfect Hollywood movies. One of the most perfect Hollywood movies ever made. It appeals to a bunch of different people on a bunch of different levels without being saccharine or sophomoric. It’s dark; it’s a bleak fucking picture. I never in a million years, even if I hated Dark Knight, I would not be the guy going online being like––or in any interview setting––being like, “I don’t like Dark Knight. Fuck Dark Knight.” Because, man, they would all turn on me so fucking quickly. So when I saw him make that quote I was just like, oh my god, dude. You’ve got to be very, very ballsy to say that. He was. It’s was a weird thing for him to say, but it doesn’t seem to have affected him. You mentioned Red State would have been your next film if this had not been. Are you on to that already now, or is that going to be next? We’re trying. The script’s done, and it’s been done for a year or more. Finding money for it has been fucking difficult. Bob and Harvey didn’t want to do it, so that kind of opened us to go out and raise financing. But it’s been tough. I get it. It’s not a very commercial film. It’s very bleak. It makes Dark Knight look like Strawberry Shortcake. There’s nobody to root for. Everyone dies. It just a series of bad choices made based on questionable morality throughout the film. No character for an audience member to latch onto. Right. So I get it. If it does any business at all it would be because it played well at festivals. It’s a total festival film. But if it had a little water cooler buzz coming out of the festival, maybe it does. I get why people aren’t racing to flip open their checkbooks. And I figure sooner or later the money will come. For some reason, the lack of confidence… financial confidence from anybody has just served to make me feel like I’m on the right track. Because these are cats that are like, hey, if I wanted to make a comedy, everyone would pony up but I get it. I’m working outside my comfort zone. I’m working in a genre that I’m certainly not proven in by any stretch of the imagination. With material that doesn’t lend itself to a Saw type opening or anything like that. So I can completely understand why people would be hesitant to cough up   and for some reason it only makes me more confident that it’s the right thing to do next. It must make you want to do it more, to be out of the comfort zone. You’re pretty safe with the films you’ve been doing, then you try something totally different to stretch your legs. Most days I’ve never felt like a filmmaker. I just feel like a guy who writes movies and happens to direct what he writes. If I could make that movie and pull it off, like I would feel like maybe I am a filmmaker. But if it doesn’t work I’m just as content to go, “OK, I’m the dick and fart joke guy, and I’ll go back to doing that. But it’s worth a shot, you know? Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/blogs/karina/archive/2008/9/19/35314.aspx Post By: Karina
Post To: Karina on SpoutBlog
Post Date: 9/19/2008 2:00:53 PM
Body: Believe the hype––at least, to a certain extent. Zach and Miri Make a Porno is Kevin Smith’s all-around high score for the current decade, and as a date movie for the demographic looking for a formula of 5% genuine romance underneath 95% poop and dick jokes, it’s way more fun than the film that made Seth Rogen a plausible leading man, Knocked Up. But what’s really exciting about it is its seemingly autobiographical subtext referencing Smith’s own career –– which, unfortunately, is thrown in the flaming trash can of traditional romantic comedy in the film’s final twenty minutes, but which nonetheless makes Zach and Miri seem more heartfelt than any View Askew production since Chasing Amy. In a working class suburb of Pittsburgh, in the midst of a realistically icy, muddy, shitty winter, lifelong best friends and roommates Zach (Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth Banks, finally proving to me that she’s a different person than Rachel McAdams) work menial jobs and are nowhere near being able to pay their bills. It’s the night before Thanksgiving, and all through the town, everyone’s bitter and desperate to get laid. (Side note: it’s interesting that Smith, currently at his most bloated in memory––before the film, he thrilled the crowd with a story of being so fat that he broke a toilet––has made his most convincing film about the frustrations of being skint.) At their exceptionally depressing high school reunion set to the pop hits of 1998 (Marcy Playground and MACE, finally playlist bedmates once again), Zach and Miri discover from a former classmate’s porn star significant other that they (and Miri’s pair of oversized granny panties) have become accidental YouTube stars. Zach has an epiphany: if people are already looking at their asses on the internet for free, why not get paid for it? By this point, Zach and Miri have had their heat, water and power shut off, so they discuss the moral finer points whilst huddled around a trashcan hobo fire in their living room. If being a DIY porn star is such a simple route to quick cash, Miri wonders, “Why doesn’t everyone do it?” In fact, Zach and Miri would appear to be uniquely qualified for the job: they’re poor, but unlike most poor people, they’re media savvy, free of the moral constraints of any particular religious or ideological affiliation, and, essentially, alone in the universe, with no family or significant other to impress or disappoint aside from each other. These are, of course, some of the same factors that will lead Zach and Miri to inevitably fall in love. For a film in which the two leads discover their mutual true love via sex work, the convolutions of Zach and Miri’s romantic narrative are sadly old hat. What’s really exciting about the film is the glimpses it offers into the mind and soul of a garden variety suburban loser who finds his true talent behind the camera. In some ways a Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland “let’s put on a show!” movie with lightsaber dildos instead of a barn, Zach and Miri feels like a semi-autobiographical portrait of a nerd who figures out how to be somebody by turning on other nerds for a living. There are even patches of dialogue that seem like they could have been lifted from Smith’s days preparing Clerks. “You want to shoot a dirty movie here? Where we work?” asks Zach’s incredulous fellow barista. “You don’t know how may stories I have just from working here,” Zack responds. Later, when his own spirit needs lifting, the same co-worker reminds Zach that their pornographic exploits opened them up to “a world of possibilities, where plain old people like us could do something special.” Could there be a plainer reference to Smith’s own charmed career path from suburban comic nerd to God of Suburban Comic Nerds? But though Rogen and Banks have surprisingly convincing sexual tension and their relationship itself is one of the film’s selling points, its Smith’s handling of the romance in relation to the porno that ultimately steers the film into disappointing territory. In unnecessarily tearing the couple apart at the exact moment when they should be deciding to be together, Smith accomplishes two things: he makes his film twenty minutes longer than it needs to be, and he completely abandons the idea that making porn movies (or, metaphorically speaking, any kind of movie) is not only a valid occupation, but the outlet through which Zach finds himself as a creative person and as a man. In the end, Zach and Miri’s romance reaches its predictable (and satisfying) resolution, but their porno remains in limbo, and with it languishes the idea that art––however depraved––can save a loser’s life. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog » Karina Longworth
]]>Fri, 19 Sep 2008 18:00:53 GMTKarinaKarina on SpoutBlog9/19/2008 2:00:53 PMBelieve the hype––at least, to a certain extent. Zach and Miri Make a Porno is Kevin Smith’s all-around high score for the current decade, and as a date movie for the demographic looking for a formula of 5% genuine romance underneath 95% poop and dick jokes, it’s way more fun than the film that made Seth Rogen a plausible leading man, Knocked Up. But what’s really exciting about it is its seemingly autobiographical subtext referencing Smith’s own career –– which, unfortunately, is thrown in the flaming trash can of traditional romantic comedy in the film’s final twenty minutes, but which nonetheless makes Zach and Miri seem more heartfelt than any View Askew production since Chasing Amy. In a working class suburb of Pittsburgh, in the midst of a realistically icy, muddy, shitty winter, lifelong best friends and roommates Zach (Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth Banks, finally proving to me that she’s a different person than Rachel McAdams) work menial jobs and are nowhere near being able to pay their bills. It’s the night before Thanksgiving, and all through the town, everyone’s bitter and desperate to get laid. (Side note: it’s interesting that Smith, currently at his most bloated in memory––before the film, he thrilled the crowd with a story of being so fat that he broke a toilet––has made his most convincing film about the frustrations of being skint.) At their exceptionally depressing high school reunion set to the pop hits of 1998 (Marcy Playground and MACE, finally playlist bedmates once again), Zach and Miri discover from a former classmate’s porn star significant other that they (and Miri’s pair of oversized granny panties) have become accidental YouTube stars. Zach has an epiphany: if people are already looking at their asses on the internet for free, why not get paid for it? By this point, Zach and Miri have had their heat, water and power shut off, so they discuss the moral finer points whilst huddled around a trashcan hobo fire in their living room. If being a DIY porn star is such a simple route to quick cash, Miri wonders, “Why doesn’t everyone do it?” In fact, Zach and Miri would appear to be uniquely qualified for the job: they’re poor, but unlike most poor people, they’re media savvy, free of the moral constraints of any particular religious or ideological affiliation, and, essentially, alone in the universe, with no family or significant other to impress or disappoint aside from each other. These are, of course, some of the same factors that will lead Zach and Miri to inevitably fall in love. For a film in which the two leads discover their mutual true love via sex work, the convolutions of Zach and Miri’s romantic narrative are sadly old hat. What’s really exciting about the film is the glimpses it offers into the mind and soul of a garden variety suburban loser who finds his true talent behind the camera. In some ways a Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland “let’s put on a show!” movie with lightsaber dildos instead of a barn, Zach and Miri feels like a semi-autobiographical portrait of a nerd who figures out how to be somebody by turning on other nerds for a living. There are even patches of dialogue that seem like they could have been lifted from Smith’s days preparing Clerks. “You want to shoot a dirty movie here? Where we work?” asks Zach’s incredulous fellow barista. “You don’t know how may stories I have just from working here,” Zack responds. Later, when his own spirit needs lifting, the same co-worker reminds Zach that their pornographic exploits opened them up to “a world of possibilities, where plain old people like us could do something special.” Could there be a plainer reference to Smith’s own charmed career path from suburban comic nerd to God of Suburban Comic Nerds? But though Rogen and Banks have surprisingly convincing sexual tension and their relationship itself is one of the film’s selling points, its Smith’s handling of the romance in relation to the porno that ultimately steers the film into disappointing territory. In unnecessarily tearing the couple apart at the exact moment when they should be deciding to be together, Smith accomplishes two things: he makes his film twenty minutes longer than it needs to be, and he completely abandons the idea that making porn movies (or, metaphorically speaking, any kind of movie) is not only a valid occupation, but the outlet through which Zach finds himself as a creative person and as a man. In the end, Zach and Miri’s romance reaches its predictable (and satisfying) resolution, but their porno remains in limbo, and with it languishes the idea that art––however depraved––can save a loser’s life. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog » Karina Longworth http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2008/9/19/35313.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 9/19/2008 2:00:41 PM
Body: Believe the hype––at least, to a certain extent. Zach and Miri Make a Porno is Kevin Smith’s all-around high score for the current decade, and as a date movie for the demographic looking for a formula of 5% genuine romance underneath 95% poop and dick jokes, it’s way more fun than the film that made Seth Rogen a plausible leading man, Knocked Up. But what’s really exciting about it is its seemingly autobiographical subtext referencing Smith’s own career –– which, unfortunately, is thrown in the flaming trash can of traditional romantic comedy in the film’s final twenty minutes, but which nonetheless makes Zach and Miri seem more heartfelt than any View Askew production since Chasing Amy. In a working class suburb of Pittsburgh, in the midst of a realistically icy, muddy, shitty winter, lifelong best friends and roommates Zach (Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth Banks, finally proving to me that she’s a different person than Rachel McAdams) work menial jobs and are nowhere near being able to pay their bills. It’s the night before Thanksgiving, and all through the town, everyone’s bitter and desperate to get laid. (Side note: it’s interesting that Smith, currently at his most bloated in memory––before the film, he thrilled the crowd with a story of being so fat that he broke a toilet––has made his most convincing film about the frustrations of being skint.) At their exceptionally depressing high school reunion set to the pop hits of 1998 (Marcy Playground and MACE, finally playlist bedmates once again), Zach and Miri discover from a former classmate’s porn star significant other that they (and Miri’s pair of oversized granny panties) have become accidental YouTube stars. Zach has an epiphany: if people are already looking at their asses on the internet for free, why not get paid for it? By this point, Zach and Miri have had their heat, water and power shut off, so they discuss the moral finer points whilst huddled around a trashcan hobo fire in their living room. If being a DIY porn star is such a simple route to quick cash, Miri wonders, “Why doesn’t everyone do it?” In fact, Zach and Miri would appear to be uniquely qualified for the job: they’re poor, but unlike most poor people, they’re media savvy, free of the moral constraints of any particular religious or ideological affiliation, and, essentially, alone in the universe, with no family or significant other to impress or disappoint aside from each other. These are, of course, some of the same factors that will lead Zach and Miri to inevitably fall in love. For a film in which the two leads discover their mutual true love via sex work, the convolutions of Zach and Miri’s romantic narrative are sadly old hat. What’s really exciting about the film is the glimpses it offers into the mind and soul of a garden variety suburban loser who finds his true talent behind the camera. In some ways a Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland “let’s put on a show!” movie with lightsaber dildos instead of a barn, Zach and Miri feels like a semi-autobiographical portrait of a nerd who figures out how to be somebody by turning on other nerds for a living. There are even patches of dialogue that seem like they could have been lifted from Smith’s days preparing Clerks. “You want to shoot a dirty movie here? Where we work?” asks Zach’s incredulous fellow barista. “You don’t know how may stories I have just from working here,” Zack responds. Later, when his own spirit needs lifting, the same co-worker reminds Zach that their pornographic exploits opened them up to “a world of possibilities, where plain old people like us could do something special.” Could there be a plainer reference to Smith’s own charmed career path from suburban comic nerd to God of Suburban Comic Nerds? But though Rogen and Banks have surprisingly convincing sexual tension and their relationship itself is one of the film’s selling points, its Smith’s handling of the romance in relation to the porno that ultimately steers the film into disappointing territory. In unnecessarily tearing the couple apart at the exact moment when they should be deciding to be together, Smith accomplishes two things: he makes his film twenty minutes longer than it needs to be, and he completely abandons the idea that making porn movies (or, metaphorically speaking, any kind of movie) is not only a valid occupation, but the outlet through which Zach finds himself as a creative person and as a man. In the end, Zach and Miri’s romance reaches its predictable (and satisfying) resolution, but their porno remains in limbo, and with it languishes the idea that art––however depraved––can save a loser’s life. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Fri, 19 Sep 2008 18:00:41 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com9/19/2008 2:00:41 PMBelieve the hype––at least, to a certain extent. Zach and Miri Make a Porno is Kevin Smith’s all-around high score for the current decade, and as a date movie for the demographic looking for a formula of 5% genuine romance underneath 95% poop and dick jokes, it’s way more fun than the film that made Seth Rogen a plausible leading man, Knocked Up. But what’s really exciting about it is its seemingly autobiographical subtext referencing Smith’s own career –– which, unfortunately, is thrown in the flaming trash can of traditional romantic comedy in the film’s final twenty minutes, but which nonetheless makes Zach and Miri seem more heartfelt than any View Askew production since Chasing Amy. In a working class suburb of Pittsburgh, in the midst of a realistically icy, muddy, shitty winter, lifelong best friends and roommates Zach (Rogen) and Miri (Elizabeth Banks, finally proving to me that she’s a different person than Rachel McAdams) work menial jobs and are nowhere near being able to pay their bills. It’s the night before Thanksgiving, and all through the town, everyone’s bitter and desperate to get laid. (Side note: it’s interesting that Smith, currently at his most bloated in memory––before the film, he thrilled the crowd with a story of being so fat that he broke a toilet––has made his most convincing film about the frustrations of being skint.) At their exceptionally depressing high school reunion set to the pop hits of 1998 (Marcy Playground and MACE, finally playlist bedmates once again), Zach and Miri discover from a former classmate’s porn star significant other that they (and Miri’s pair of oversized granny panties) have become accidental YouTube stars. Zach has an epiphany: if people are already looking at their asses on the internet for free, why not get paid for it? By this point, Zach and Miri have had their heat, water and power shut off, so they discuss the moral finer points whilst huddled around a trashcan hobo fire in their living room. If being a DIY porn star is such a simple route to quick cash, Miri wonders, “Why doesn’t everyone do it?” In fact, Zach and Miri would appear to be uniquely qualified for the job: they’re poor, but unlike most poor people, they’re media savvy, free of the moral constraints of any particular religious or ideological affiliation, and, essentially, alone in the universe, with no family or significant other to impress or disappoint aside from each other. These are, of course, some of the same factors that will lead Zach and Miri to inevitably fall in love. For a film in which the two leads discover their mutual true love via sex work, the convolutions of Zach and Miri’s romantic narrative are sadly old hat. What’s really exciting about the film is the glimpses it offers into the mind and soul of a garden variety suburban loser who finds his true talent behind the camera. In some ways a Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland “let’s put on a show!” movie with lightsaber dildos instead of a barn, Zach and Miri feels like a semi-autobiographical portrait of a nerd who figures out how to be somebody by turning on other nerds for a living. There are even patches of dialogue that seem like they could have been lifted from Smith’s days preparing Clerks. “You want to shoot a dirty movie here? Where we work?” asks Zach’s incredulous fellow barista. “You don’t know how may stories I have just from working here,” Zack responds. Later, when his own spirit needs lifting, the same co-worker reminds Zach that their pornographic exploits opened them up to “a world of possibilities, where plain old people like us could do something special.” Could there be a plainer reference to Smith’s own charmed career path from suburban comic nerd to God of Suburban Comic Nerds? But though Rogen and Banks have surprisingly convincing sexual tension and their relationship itself is one of the film’s selling points, its Smith’s handling of the romance in relation to the porno that ultimately steers the film into disappointing territory. In unnecessarily tearing the couple apart at the exact moment when they should be deciding to be together, Smith accomplishes two things: he makes his film twenty minutes longer than it needs to be, and he completely abandons the idea that making porn movies (or, metaphorically speaking, any kind of movie) is not only a valid occupation, but the outlet through which Zach finds himself as a creative person and as a man. In the end, Zach and Miri’s romance reaches its predictable (and satisfying) resolution, but their porno remains in limbo, and with it languishes the idea that art––however depraved––can save a loser’s life. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2008/8/13/33965.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 8/13/2008 3:01:08 PM
Body: From what I hear, Star Wars: The Clone Wars is really bad. Bad enough for the king of the fanboys, Harry Knowles, to reportedly write, “I hated the film. HATED IT. REALLY HATED IT.” Bad enough that Warner Bros. had the review removed from Aint it Cool News due to a review embargo — though probably it had more to do with it being so damaging to the studio’s marketing of the film (apparently Warners had no issue with Variety publishing its so-so review on the same day). I’m not in the least bit surprised. Most people I know who used to be big Star Wars fans won’t be bothering to see the film. But if it bombs at the box office this weekend, what will that mean for Lucasfilm’s upcoming Clone Wars animated series, which is set to spin off from the movie? The show will probably do OK, thanks to the few geeks who still worship the franchise, but it’s not likely to make my list of best animated series spun off from movies: Muppet Babies - The cute infant versions of Kermit, Miss Piggy, Fozzie and (most of) the others officially debuted in The Muppets Take Manhattan, so this cartoon series counts. Even though my brother disagrees (”the Muppets are a whole entity outside of the movies”). And it’s so good that I’d almost say it’s the best Muppet project ever. It’s at least better than the movie it spun off from. Plus, it was especially entertaining for movie fans. Long before Family Guy did it, the Muppet Babies had their own brilliant animated take on the Star Wars films. Star Wars: Droids - When I was a kid, I definitely preferred the cuter, longer-running Star Wars: Ewoks (both cartoons were later united as Ewoks & Droids Adventure Hour), but looking back, Droids was the cooler series because it retained Anthony Daniels as the voice of C-3PO (R2-D2 was humorously credited as himself) and featured characters like Boba Fett and IG-88. As a bonus, it also featured an awesome theme song co-written and performed by Stewart Copeland. The only theme that might top it is the Fat Boys’ rap for Police Academy: The Series. Back to the Future - I’m a sucker for cartoon spin-offs that feature voices from the original movies, and this one had both Mary Steenburgen (Clara Brown) and Thomas F. Wilson (Biff Tannen) reprising their roles. Strangely enough, the animated Doc Brown was voiced by Dan Castellaneta (also the voice of Homer Simpson), while the live-action Doc Brown, who introduced and closed each episode, was actually played by the movies’ Christopher Lloyd. Someone please put this show on DVD already. Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventures - Even better than BTTF, this cartoon initially featured the voices of the three original stars of Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Keanu Reeves, Alex Winter and George Carlin. Unfortunately, the bogus second season of the series screwed everything up with a different production company (DiC instead of Hanna-Barbera), new actors (Evan Richards and Christopher Kennedy, stars of the live-action Bill & Ted series) and a broader premise (the dudes could now travel into literature, TV shows and the human body). At least for awhile, the series was most triumphant. Beetlejuice - Talk about changing the premise. I don’t know what the creators were thinking when they decided to suddenly make Beetlejuice and Lydia best friends, but somehow it works. And, as much as I’d have loved for Winona Ryder to reprise her role, I’m glad Lydia was voiced by one of my favorites, Alyson Court (Jubilee in X-Men: The Animated Series and Veronica in The New Archies). I don’t understand how it really fits with the plot of Tim Burton’s movie anymore than I get why Daniel and Mr Miyagi were suddenly adventurers in the Karate Kid cartoon, but I was at least a big fan of the imaginative Netherworld setting of the Beetlejuice series. The Real Ghostbusters - Like Beetlejuice, this animated version of Ghostbusters turned enemies into friends by making Slimer a cute mascot. In fact, the series was eventually retitled Slimer! and the Real Ghostbusters because of how kids responded to the green guy, with Slimer receiving his own half-hour storylines. This despite the initial attraction of the series having a darker tone than most Saturday morning cartoons. TaleSpin - Forget all the later Disney cartoon series based on animated features, this was the best and most inspired. Maybe because it’s another example in which the premise of the series is completely different than the premise of the films. Aside from starring the characters Baloo, Louie and Shere Khan, it has nothing at all to do with The Jungle Book. And except for the lack of songs performed by Louis Prima, the series is much cooler than the movie. She-Ra: Princess of Power - I’m counting this even though the movie it’s spun off from, The Secret of the Sword, is also the first four episodes of the series. It was released theatrically, though. Besides, including it on the list means I don’t have to choose a best of the three lame Jim Carrey movie spin offs (The Mask; Dumb and Dumber; Ace Ventura), nor do I have to familiarize myself with The Animatrix, which I’m sure has it’s fans, or attempt to justify the cool in theory but terrible in reality Teen Wolf cartoon. Toxic Crusaders - Among all the R-rated movies that were turned into cartoons for kids — including First Blood (Rambo), Highlander, RoboCop and Police Academy – the decision to make an animated series out of The Toxic Avenger is the most questionable and therefore the most ingenious. I doubt something like this could be created today; we kids of the ’80s were just more exposed to inappropriate material and also had room for more sanitized versions. I saw the original, extremely violent movie when I was 8 years old and would have also loved this cartoon back then, despite it’s lack of head-crushings and nudity. Unfortunately, it didn’t debut until I was in my teens, when I was typically sleeping in on Saturday mornings and napping on weekday afternoons. Clerks - I’ve honestly never seen this cartoon, but I have a good reason to include it. While taking a film studies course titled American Film Comedy in college, I had a classmate who literally finished each session — having just watched The Circus, The General, Sherlock Jr., Duck Soup, The Palm Beach Story, It, Trouble in Paradise, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, His Girl Friday, It Should Happen to You, Tootsie or some other classic — by saying, in all seriousness, “I guess I don’t have the right sense of humor for these movies. I prefer smart comedies like Chasing Amy.” A devout Kevin Smith fan, he also continuously would reference the animated Clerks series, despite the fact that nobody else seemed to have any familiarity with it. For a cartoon spin-off to so completely appease the biggest fan of the movie, it has to be considered a success. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Wed, 13 Aug 2008 19:01:08 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com8/13/2008 3:01:08 PM From what I hear, Star Wars: The Clone Wars is really bad. Bad enough for the king of the fanboys, Harry Knowles, to reportedly write, “I hated the film. HATED IT. REALLY HATED IT.” Bad enough that Warner Bros. had the review removed from Aint it Cool News due to a review embargo — though probably it had more to do with it being so damaging to the studio’s marketing of the film (apparently Warners had no issue with Variety publishing its so-so review on the same day). I’m not in the least bit surprised. Most people I know who used to be big Star Wars fans won’t be bothering to see the film. But if it bombs at the box office this weekend, what will that mean for Lucasfilm’s upcoming Clone Wars animated series, which is set to spin off from the movie? The show will probably do OK, thanks to the few geeks who still worship the franchise, but it’s not likely to make my list of best animated series spun off from movies: Muppet Babies - The cute infant versions of Kermit, Miss Piggy, Fozzie and (most of) the others officially debuted in The Muppets Take Manhattan, so this cartoon series counts. Even though my brother disagrees (”the Muppets are a whole entity outside of the movies”). And it’s so good that I’d almost say it’s the best Muppet project ever. It’s at least better than the movie it spun off from. Plus, it was especially entertaining for movie fans. Long before Family Guy did it, the Muppet Babies had their own brilliant animated take on the Star Wars films. Star Wars: Droids - When I was a kid, I definitely preferred the cuter, longer-running Star Wars: Ewoks (both cartoons were later united as Ewoks & Droids Adventure Hour), but looking back, Droids was the cooler series because it retained Anthony Daniels as the voice of C-3PO (R2-D2 was humorously credited as himself) and featured characters like Boba Fett and IG-88. As a bonus, it also featured an awesome theme song co-written and performed by Stewart Copeland. The only theme that might top it is the Fat Boys’ rap for Police Academy: The Series. Back to the Future - I’m a sucker for cartoon spin-offs that feature voices from the original movies, and this one had both Mary Steenburgen (Clara Brown) and Thomas F. Wilson (Biff Tannen) reprising their roles. Strangely enough, the animated Doc Brown was voiced by Dan Castellaneta (also the voice of Homer Simpson), while the live-action Doc Brown, who introduced and closed each episode, was actually played by the movies’ Christopher Lloyd. Someone please put this show on DVD already. Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventures - Even better than BTTF, this cartoon initially featured the voices of the three original stars of Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Keanu Reeves, Alex Winter and George Carlin. Unfortunately, the bogus second season of the series screwed everything up with a different production company (DiC instead of Hanna-Barbera), new actors (Evan Richards and Christopher Kennedy, stars of the live-action Bill & Ted series) and a broader premise (the dudes could now travel into literature, TV shows and the human body). At least for awhile, the series was most triumphant. Beetlejuice - Talk about changing the premise. I don’t know what the creators were thinking when they decided to suddenly make Beetlejuice and Lydia best friends, but somehow it works. And, as much as I’d have loved for Winona Ryder to reprise her role, I’m glad Lydia was voiced by one of my favorites, Alyson Court (Jubilee in X-Men: The Animated Series and Veronica in The New Archies). I don’t understand how it really fits with the plot of Tim Burton’s movie anymore than I get why Daniel and Mr Miyagi were suddenly adventurers in the Karate Kid cartoon, but I was at least a big fan of the imaginative Netherworld setting of the Beetlejuice series. The Real Ghostbusters - Like Beetlejuice, this animated version of Ghostbusters turned enemies into friends by making Slimer a cute mascot. In fact, the series was eventually retitled Slimer! and the Real Ghostbusters because of how kids responded to the green guy, with Slimer receiving his own half-hour storylines. This despite the initial attraction of the series having a darker tone than most Saturday morning cartoons. TaleSpin - Forget all the later Disney cartoon series based on animated features, this was the best and most inspired. Maybe because it’s another example in which the premise of the series is completely different than the premise of the films. Aside from starring the characters Baloo, Louie and Shere Khan, it has nothing at all to do with The Jungle Book. And except for the lack of songs performed by Louis Prima, the series is much cooler than the movie. She-Ra: Princess of Power - I’m counting this even though the movie it’s spun off from, The Secret of the Sword, is also the first four episodes of the series. It was released theatrically, though. Besides, including it on the list means I don’t have to choose a best of the three lame Jim Carrey movie spin offs (The Mask; Dumb and Dumber; Ace Ventura), nor do I have to familiarize myself with The Animatrix, which I’m sure has it’s fans, or attempt to justify the cool in theory but terrible in reality Teen Wolf cartoon. Toxic Crusaders - Among all the R-rated movies that were turned into cartoons for kids — including First Blood (Rambo), Highlander, RoboCop and Police Academy – the decision to make an animated series out of The Toxic Avenger is the most questionable and therefore the most ingenious. I doubt something like this could be created today; we kids of the ’80s were just more exposed to inappropriate material and also had room for more sanitized versions. I saw the original, extremely violent movie when I was 8 years old and would have also loved this cartoon back then, despite it’s lack of head-crushings and nudity. Unfortunately, it didn’t debut until I was in my teens, when I was typically sleeping in on Saturday mornings and napping on weekday afternoons. Clerks - I’ve honestly never seen this cartoon, but I have a good reason to include it. While taking a film studies course titled American Film Comedy in college, I had a classmate who literally finished each session — having just watched The Circus, The General, Sherlock Jr., Duck Soup, The Palm Beach Story, It, Trouble in Paradise, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, His Girl Friday, It Should Happen to You, Tootsie or some other classic — by saying, in all seriousness, “I guess I don’t have the right sense of humor for these movies. I prefer smart comedies like Chasing Amy.” A devout Kevin Smith fan, he also continuously would reference the animated Clerks series, despite the fact that nobody else seemed to have any familiarity with it. For a cartoon spin-off to so completely appease the biggest fan of the movie, it has to be considered a success. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/love/MemberTagFilms.aspxlove
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