Posted by Neil at term4-216-231-033-160.speakeasy.net on August 19, 2001 at 03:43:36:
I'll try to stay relatively spoiler free, but I don't make a serious promise to not make any specific comments, so if you don't want to hear too much don't proceed past the next paragraph.
Ok, I may partly be on post-movie high, but I think this movie is now my #2 Kevin Smith movie after CHASING AMY. In fact, I think CHASING AMY is on a certain level a perfection of what CLERKS was attempting and JAY & SILENT BOB STRIKES BACK is similarly a perfection of what MALLRATS was attempting. Very, very funny stuff. Hopefully it will get the success it deserves and will lead to Mewes getting some further work.
Ok, minor spoilers may happen from this point on -
I'm not quite feeling like giving a full, intelligent review, but I will give some random thoughts.
First of all, based on my viewing, I thought GLAAD was pretty far off base, but that Harry Knowles wasn't far off. Take that however you like.
Jay just continues to get better. I hope this can succeed, if for no other reason than to help bring more work his way. He really has become a strong performer.
Affleck and Lee both do fantastic jobs of playing two characters who are clearly distinct, and the "Ben Affleck" character was hysterical.
The use of Internet fan sites was brilliant. My roommate and I talked about that afterwards for quite some time. I compared it on a number of levels to the William Shatner "Get a life!" sketch. It's quite smart and on-the-nose. As an aside, did the people whose board nicknames were used give permission for that? I totally loved that they were real board names.
The acting was the strongest of any Kevin Smith movie, with the possible exception of CHASING AMY. No one seemed awkward in their performance. O'Halloran gives his strongest performance to date.
The ape sequence was, obviously, straight out of the comic and suffered for me because of that, although I certainly enjoyed Marshal Wilenholly (great reference) and the reinactment of the apes taking over and watching Jay do the "You maniacs..." speech. Overall, though, I wasn't terribly fond of those bits in the comic and not much about seeing them on film improved them.
I also can't say I disagree with Ebert on the Rock bit. It just didn't really have anything to say and never came across that funny for me. If his review turns out to be positive overall, than he and I aren't far off.
I did enjoy Shannon Elizabeth, Seann William Scott, Carlin, Eliza Dushku, Biggs & Van Der Beek, Doherty, Van Sant and Craven a lot. I also found it nice to see the roundup of characters from throughout the series, that was nice to see and he got some funny moments out of them. Also a big shout-out to Vincent for his nice moment at the Quick Stop. Rock on!
I'm very much interested to see how Kevin's career will progress from now that the book has been closed on the View Askew-niverse.
Good luck to all, and thanks for the wonderful movies.