Jay
and Silent Bob Strike Back
(2001)
Rated: R
Runtime: 1 Hour and 44 Minutes
Reviewer: Dale
Grade: D-If you meet anyone, say, at a party, and they happen to mention that they actually enjoyed "Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back". If they happen to say, in fact, that it was the funniest film of the year, or some nonsense along those lines, I want you to do something for me. Would you please knee them directly in the crotch? Don't think about it, just do it. Trust me, they deserve it. The same applies to seeing Kevin Smith somewhere, say, on the street (hopefully bearing a sign saying that he will give head for food). Knee his crotch, and knee it hard.
Because this film is not just your average bad movie. No, no, my friends. This is far and away beyond a simple bad movie. This film is the most inane, moronic, insipid, bloated, smug, tasteless, humorless and flat-out awful cinematic enterprise since I had to sit through the "Grinch". No, it isn't as ghastly as the "Grinch", but it was damn close.
This film pissed me off. Not an easy thing to do. I am an easygoing man. I say live and let live, generally. But this film irked my ire and got my bile flowing as few films have. This film inspired genuine feelings of hatred within me. I was in a rage as I left the theater. I entertained visions of finding Kevin Smith and beating him blue. Such feelings have dissipated, yes, but I still hate this movie with every fiber of my being.
This film has no plot. It doesn't even have the semblance of a plot. But what might be somehow construed as the plot involves Jay (Jason Mewes, who can die soon) and Silent Bob (Kevin Smith, who can live a little longer than Mewes, provided that his next movie is closer to "Dogma" than it is to this sorry mess), two stoners anyone who has seen a Kevin Smith film is familiar with, going to Hollywood because some moron is making a movie about them and the Internet is filled with people saying that they suck (they're just telling the truth).
Yes, folks, it's just as stupid as it looks in print.
I can understand that Smith has a couple axes to grind about the people who don't like his movies, but watching this film is like watching some horrible home movie that the maker thinks is clever. Smith and his friends and family might have gotten a good laugh out of this, but I don't see why any of the rest of us should give a shit. Yet, somehow, he has lured a group of talented people to be in this film not unlike a child molester luring kids to his rusted-out Buick with the promise of candy. And with just as dire consequences.
Here is a short list of people who embarrass themselves in this shitty film: Shannon Elizabeth, George Carlin, Jason Lee, Eliza Dushku, Ali Larter (particularly awful), Carrie Fisher, Stiffler, the guys from "Clerks", Ben Affleck, Diedrich Bader, Mark Hamill, Jason Biggs, James van Der Beek, Will Farrell, Judd Nelson, and especially Chris Rock. Chris Rock is utterly terrible here. He spouts black rage epithets and hates white people, and he doesn't even do it in a fresh or funny manner. You smile at first when you see him onscreen, because Chris can usually be depended upon for some quality support. Then you frown as the scene continues, dragging its one note longer and longer and longer. Each of the celebrity cameos (each scene of the movie, for that matter) is the same way. Things that could be funny as sucked completely dry. There is a ghastly sub-plot involving four hot jewel thieves. Each of them is so awful that the fact they are extremely hot barely even registers. There are awful film parodies of "Planet of the Apes", "The Fugitive", "Star Wars", "E.T." and "Scooby Doo" and none of them is the least bit clever. None of them has a spark of inspiration or wit to them.
Each of them is infested with awful fart jokes and terrible one-liners. The entire movie is a patchwork quilt of unfunny gags.
Many of them are gay jokes. Now, I have no problem with gay jokes, long as they are funny.
These are on the polar opposite of the spectrum from funny. These jokes and funny have never made one another's acquaintance. And if they did meet one another at a dinner party, they would likely just exchange an awkward silence and go about their separate ways. No wonder the GLAD people blasted this film. They have every right to. I'm not gay and even I thought this was totally horrible. If they had been funny, or contained some element of truthfulness (as in Smith's vastly superior "Chasing Amy") this would be a moot point. But they aren't, so the immense bitterness of them just looms that much larger.
There are one or two funny moments in these proceedings, but there is an awful lot of stuff that doesn't work at all here. Remember the "Airplane" movies? Where there were so many jokes that some of them didn't work, but there were so many jokes that the odds were stacked in favor of the ones that did? This is the other way around. There are so many jokes in this film that one or two of them can't help but be funny. The majority of them, however, are just atrocious.
Then again, the film stars the two characters that any other Smith film would have been improved by losing. To make them the main focus of the film is a gross mistake. Jay is not funny, he is just annoying. Hell, he's annoying in small doses. Stretch that to two hours and you get a sense of the Hitler-like cruelty at work in this picture. And Silent Bob compensates by remaining absolutely quiet and only speaking up when he has something of importance to say. Meanwhile, unfortunately, he mugs for the camera like a hog. Real subtle, peckerhead.
Smith's other films succeeded because they had a wonderful verbal interplay between the characters and moments of true wit that also contained a simple statement on the humanity of the characters had some important statements slipped in about daily life. They were smart movies (aside from the Golgothan Shit Demon and Jay and Silent Bob) that respected the intelligence of the viewer. None of them are without their faults (some have a truckload) but at least they reach for something bigger. "Jay and Silent Bob" does not. "Jay and Silent Bob" is like the worst parts of all his other films multiplied by a hundred. The realistic relationships have been jettisoned. The clever dialogue and wit are long gone. What we have instead is the leftover shit that results from their departure. It is not funny. It is not clever. It is not fun. If this is what Kevin Smith thinks his fans want, then he doesn't know his fans. I am a fan and I laughed more during "Schindler's List" than I did during this film. I wanted to walk out, I wanted to tear this film to shreds and piss on the ashes. Spending two hours in the company of these characters is like spending two hours locked in a room with people you hate.
I hated, HATED HATED this film. If you have any good sense, so will you.