Clerks 2: Damn you, Pillow Pants

While Zack and Miri Make a Porno saw Kevin Smith return to the gross-out humour of Jay and Silent Bob strike Back, while keeping hold of the very human comedy and drama of Chasing Amy, Clerks 2 seems to have been somewhat forgotten. While it differed in many ways from the classic original, it is still a fantastic, funny, moving and rude film that holds a special place in the hearts of many fans.

I personally love the Clerks 2 movie`, and in the characters of Dante and Randall is see big chunks of my life being played out in front of my very eyes. The situations may be ridiculous, but then, so is life.

Beck, played by the delightful Rosario Dawson (Seven Pounds, Sin City, and, erm, Josie and the Pussycats) is one of Kevin Smith's most delightful creations- a woman with her own problems, a real sense of humour and a very believable emotional connection to Dante (Brian O'Halloran). Dante and Randall are still very much the same characters they were in the original Clerks, just a little more jaded, a little more sad with their lot in life.

The dilemmas they face throughout Clerks 2 movie as they hurtle on deeper into their thirties are something that resonate deeply with Kevin Smith's last few films, which tells us something about the filmmaker himself. Yes, his earlier films were juvenile and puerile, but he's growing up at last, and wants to make something a little deeper.

Sure, I can’t really argue that a film with a Donkey Show in it is anything remotely deep, but the pop culture obsessed main characters are drawn as pretty real people. Hell, even Jay and Silent Bob seem to have matured a bit in Clerks 2. The film works as a sequel to the first Clerks very well, but it also works as a denouement of that period in Kevin Smith's career- the Jersey series, the Jay and Silent Bob stuff, and one of the most beloved pieces of Geek culture there has ever been.

It holds up very well on repeated viewings, and even though a couple of things are now rather dated (the announcement of a live action Transformers movie, for example), the story is moving and funny, which is pretty much we want from a Kevin Smith film.

Mind you... That poor Donkey...