Posted by Weiss at r96aag012943.sbo-smr.ma.cable.rcn.com on February 10, 2000 at 01:58:26:
Kevin,
It seems like you and other directors of your generation (Quentin Tarantino, Paul Thomas Anderson, David Fincher and some of the other "Next Scorseses" from that Esquire article) have recently spent a lot of time talking smack on each others movies and styles in general. Maybe it's all friendly rivalry and maybe it's not. The way I see you're all basically the Tim Duncans, The Kevin Garnetts, and the Vince Carters of filmmaking. But at least when those guys talk shit on each other they eventually get to set it straight head to head on the court. I understand that there's really no analogue for that in movies, but maybe you could all agree to release your next film on the same day (as if the distributors would actually let that happen) and everyone agrees not to talk shit on the movies that does best at the box office or whoever gets the best reviews or something. It could be a good marketing ploy. Anderson vs. Smith. Hey, Don King could promote it. Essentially, what I'm saying is you should all join forces and together you can rule the universe. Sorry, I could resist a Star Wars reference in communication with the Holy Trilogy referencing master.
As for the Mallrat 2 idea, I think I'd rather see Clerks 2: More Clerkin'.
What about the Rick Derris story? I always kinda wondered what happened to him. Did he get obsessed with weightlifting and get hooked on sterioids? Did all his playing around with Dante and Holden's women come back to haunt him? It could be a Kevin Smith does Raging Bull. Maybe you are the next Scorsese.
-Jonathan Weiss