Why you should watch Clerks
Monday, February 8th, 2010 |
Why you should watch Clerks.
Movie Title: Clerks Clerks is available for streaming or downloading. |
I’m not going to tell the plot of Clerks, since tons of other reviewers have already done that, but instead I’m going to focus of the DVD, because I don’t feel enough people write about that.
First off here’s the special features:
Audio Commentary: This commentary features a nearly countless amount of people, but mostly Kevin Smith with the occasional tid bit from actor Brian O’ Halloran (also known as Brian Christopher O’ Halloran) or producer Scott Mosier. Funnily, Jason Mewes showed up drunk for the recording of this and lies on the floor past out most of the time, sometimes waking up to swear or scream “Snootchie Bootchies.” Obviously only one mike was used for this, but that never bothered me much, because the commentary is a load of fun, with tons of interesting things and laughs. I like this much better than the overrated Mallrats commentary.
Deleted Scenes With Introductions by Kevin Smith: There are about 6 deleted scenes, almost all of them extended bits, but all of them interesting. Ones I particularly liked were the longer Gum Guy’s speech, the longer conversation with Dane and Veronica, and the longer talking between Veronica and Randal. The only completely additional scene is in #3 where Randal tries to pursuade a customer to rent Smokey and the Bandit 3. Not very funny, but interesting. The introductions to the scenes by Kevin Smith are very good, short and to the point, where as in all the other DVDs he rambles on for about two minutes about why you should visit Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash or mumbles or wastes time going “Um,” you get my point. In these intros he simly states what you’ll find new in the scene and then you view, I think the longest intro is about thirty seconds. Excellent.
Original Ending: The shocking original ending is included for your enjoyment, and it is obvious why it was cut, although I personally love the scene and think it’d be a great ending to the film. Why? Because it ends on a downer, just like Dante and Randal talk about early in the film, and is more realistic (OK, maybe not, but I like it). Sit through the short set of credits for a breif cameo by director Smith. The ending features an introduction where Smith states how happy he is that the scene was cut. Interesting.
Music Video: The funny music video for Soul Asylum’s “Can’t Even Tell”, featuring a recreation of the hockey scene, in color no less! It’s an interesting look at what if would be like if the movie was in color, but it’s also a pretty good song, and the video is entertaining, measuring around four and a half minutes. Introduction by Smith is included, which is pretty interesting.
Theatrical Trailer: The film’s original trailer is included with introduction by Smith, where he states how crazy he is for it and that it’s one of his favorite trailers ever. It’s a nice trailer and all, but really, it is just a trailer, and I think he sees into it more than most people will (though I read a review that called the trailer “a piece of film itself”).
Anyway, those are the extras. It doesn’t look like much, but quality overwhelms quantity, and all these extras are very cool, and worth your time.
The sound and picture on the film is fine, at least when you think about it. Remember Clerks cost less than a car to make, and the picture is consistently grainy throughout, as well as black and white (oh boo hoo to all you people who can’t watch a black and white movie), but I could always tell what was going on, and after about two minutes, I got used to the grain (you will, too). The sound is a 2.0 surround sound that is always clear and never bothersome. There’s minor hiss, but barely irritating (or noticeable).
Anyway, I like CLerks a lot, although most people won’t watch it because of the black and white picture and a lot of people find it boring, but I just don’t understand how anyone could find a movie with such great acting and dialouge boring. Well, if you need an explosion or a bunch of action every ten minutes…..
Hope you liked my review (kind of long, sorry), and please vote if it was helpful. Thank you for reading.
One of my favorite films of all time… and they’ve given it the deluxe treatment with this 3-disc set. Here are the details from Kevin Smith’s View Askew website about this new edition:
Buy,Download, Or Stream Clerks! Click Here
The 93 minute “Clerks” Theatrical cut- All new HiDef transfer from 16mm IP supervised by Dave Klein with all-new 5.1 Skywalker Sound remix supervised by Scott Mosier, includes original commentary track from laser disc/initial DVD release
The 103 minute “Clerks” IFFM First Cut, includes all-new audio/video commentary track with Kevin, Scott, Jeff Anderson, Brian O’Halloran and Jason Mewes.
Buy,Download, Or Stream Clerks! Click Here
The 95 minute “The Snowball Effect: The Story of Clerks” Brand Spanking New Documentary that inteviews almost everybody who ever had something to do with “Clerks”
The MTV Jay and Silent Bob shorts that everyone’s been crying for us to put on a DVD for years now
The Arclight 10th Anniversary Q&A with Brian, Jeff, Marilyn, Scott, Dave, Mewes, and Kevin
Lots of new video intros.
“The Flying Car” short from the Tonight Show (re-telecined in HiDef).
The Original theatrical trailer
“Can’t Even Tell” Music Video
The original Jeff, Brian, and Marilyn and Ernie O’Donnell audition tapes
The brand new, seven minute animated “Lost Scene” short
Expansive Still Photo Gallery
‘Clerks’ Trivia track
Original 168-page original first draft screenplay
Kevin’s ‘Clerks’ Journal
Kevin’s ‘Sundance’ Journal
Peter Broderick’s 1992 article “The ABC’s of No-Budget Filmmaking” that inspired the budget for ‘Clerks’
Peter Broderick’s followup article “Learning from Low-Budgets” a year later that does the same treatment on ‘Clerks’
Amy Taubin’s Village Voice article on the 1991 IFFM and ‘Slacker’ that inspired Kevin to take ‘Clerks’ to the IFFM
Amy Taubin’s Village Voice article on the 1993 IFFM about ‘Clerks’ being the gem of the festival.
Janet Maslin’s 1994 New York Times review of ‘Clerks’ entitled “At a Convenience Store, Coolness To Go”
The entire John Pierson ‘The Odd Couple: Sundance 1994″ Chapter from ‘Spike Mike Reloaded’ book
The original Kevin-penned IFFM program note
The original Bob Hawk-penned 1994 Sundance Film Festival program note.
“Mae Day” – Kevin and Scott’s Vancouver Film School documentary short.