Jay And Silent Bob Reboot

Snoogans Bluff

Jay And Silent Bob Reboot
USA 2019 Written & Directed by Kevin Smith
View Askew HMV Exclusive Blu Ray Zone B

Warning: Very mild spoilers.

I’ve been a big admirer of Kevin Smith’s Jay and Silent Bob movies for quite some time now (although apparently not as big an admirer that I only now find out there was a cartoon Jay And Silent Bob movie directed by somebody else about seven years ago). I tried to see this latest movie last year at the cinema in one of its very rare UK screenings in London. Heck, I even had my ticket booked but a real life situation arose so that I wasn’t able to get to the cinema and see it, sadly. So I’m really pleased that HMV have brought out a Blu Ray version of it this year, that’s for sure. I think this is now the third one, including the first two, that I didn’t get to see at the cinema.

Jay And Silent Bob Reboot is the seventh in the series of live action Jay & Bob movies, following on as a direct sequel to... let’s run the list in order... Clerks, Mallrats, Chasing Amy (my favourite), Dogma, Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back and Clerks 2.

This one is also a kind of reboot in a way because, even before the various characters in the movie have discussed how Hollywood reboots are just old movies where they take the good stuff and change it just enough to make a load more money off the reputation of the old ones (I think I got that right... it gets complicated but, as is Smith’s way, rings completely true), you will probably realise already that this is almost the exact same story as the fifth in the series, Jay And Silent Bob Strikes Back. In that film you had Jay and Bob going to try and stop the production of a Bluntman And Chronic Movie, based on the fictional comic strip that Holden McNeil (played by Ben Affleck who played the character in Chasing Amy, Jay And Silent Bob Strikes Back and this one) based on Jay and Silent Bob. They even beat up Harvey Weinstein at the end... that'll date it.

So, once again we have Kevin Smith reprising his role as Silent Bob, along with Jason Mewes as Jay. It’s really great seeing these two back as the titular characters again and lovers of the View Askewniverse will surely be delighted with this new movie. Now, for me, Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back was always the weakest link in the series of films but, honestly, Smith is a great writer/director and so even the weakest in the series was better than most comedy movies of the last 20 or so years.

Jay And Silent Bob Reboot is... well it’s kinda tying at the moment in my brain as least greatest of the films but... oh yeah... you can bet I got a lot out of it too and, since there’s so much going on in this one, I’m sure that once my head begins to unravel this properly, I’m going to love it even more the second time around.

Okay, so the film starts strong and reveals the exact same plot as the fifth in an unusual way. And I really don’t want to give away too many spoilers... at least not those unrevealed in the trailer but I will give you the heads up that, once again, Kevin Smith’s daughter Harley Quinn Smith, is in this movie playing the daughter of Jay, who he didn’t know he had. There are also, as to be expected, a heck of a lot of cameos for both actors and characters from the previous six films, including Smith’s wife Jennifer Schwalbach (as the manager of the branch of Mooby’s in this movie). Fans of the series will love seeing people like Affleck, Matt Damon, Jason Lee, Joey Lauren Adams and Shannon Elizabeth reprising some key roles. Although, bizarrely, none of them are playing dual roles here... they are all limited to only one character call back each. It’s also great to see Chris Hemsworth playing himself here and getting in on the “f*ck me ‘til I’m Thor” jokes. There’s also one very special ‘’pre-cameo’ during the many scenes shown during the end credits and I don’t want to ruin it for people but, this guy’s last ‘real’ cameo was in Jason Mewes directorial debut Madness In The Method (reviewed here) and Marvel fans might take note.

Like all the Jay & Bob movies, the film is absolutely crammed full of jokes and references to other films, including many of Smith’s own and yes, you will hear a lot of familiar lines from the series turning up when you see this. As with any film which shoehorns so much in, some jokes will hit right with you and some won’t... this is not my favourite of the series by a long shot but there’s enough in here that it hit the right spots for me and there are even some quite touching moments in the ongoing character arc between Jay and his daughter Milly, short for her full name Millennium Falcon. Yeah, you get the usual Smith Star Wars references in this too... that stuff never gets old. Silent Bob also has a ‘37’ football shirt on at one point so, yeah, you all know what that means, right (if not, watch Clerks immediately, you’re missing out)?

Actually, Smith originally had a full role written for Stan Lee, who would have been a big presence in the third act but who died before filming. Lee famously played himself in Mallrats, of course, and his cameo in Captain Marvel (reviewed here) last year was of him learning his Mallrats lines on the way to the set. However, after Stan ‘The Man’ Lee’s death, Smith wrote himself into the movie again, playing himself directing the new Bluntman And Chronic Reboot movie... so Smith has a dual role in this film and it actually works out quite well.

And yes, if all this sounds a bit too metatextual then you’d be right. Like the fifth movie, this thing goes so far beyond metatextual that it goes right back around to textual again. In addition to the Smith family roles mentioned earlier, you also have Jason Mewe’s infant daughter turning up as Holden McNeil’s daughter... but that’s okay because Kevin Smith plays Kevin Smith here, telling his audience that he hates nepotism so... again, it works out okay in the end. In fact, he’s as ready to send himself up as anyone else so you gotta love the writing on this. For instance, there’s a scene where Smith’s real life daughter playing Jay’s daughter says she hates Kevin Smith for always forcing his daughter to be in his movies. There are very few writer directors who would be in a position where they could get into that level of irony, I suspect so, yeah, good stuff. There’s even a great running gag where Jay tells people that God looks just like Alanis Morrisette (who, of course, played God in two of these films).

Additional references to Smith’s heart attack a couple of years ago materialise as an explanation for both him and his fictional alter ego, Silent Bob, having lost so much weight. Mallrats fans may particularly like the “Fly, Low Fat Ass, Fly” line here.

And that’s me done with the Jay And Silent Bob Reboot one I think... it’s a shame they couldn’t get Mark Hamill back as Cock Knocker but there is a Cock Knocker Army here and also a villain which, yes, did actually take me by surprise. So there’s that. All in all, Jay And Silent Bob Reboot is not the best of the Jay & Bob movies but that really doesn’t matter... it’s still pretty good and should certainly keep the fans happy. And, heck, yes I want Smith to keep knocking these movies out (I say that being one of the few people on the planet who actually liked Jersey Girl so, you know, judge me by that). If you’re not a follower of the Jay and Silent Bob movies or just plain haven’t seen them then, sure, you’re not going to get many of the jokes here so go see the others first. If however, you love these movies as much as me and are interested in seeing just what Holden McNeil and  Alyssa Jones have been up to... and just what the heck did happen to Bartleby and Loki after the events of Dogma, then you’ve come to the right place. Incidentally, for my money, Matt Damon gets the best punchline in the whole movie in his cameo scene so... it was worth me getting this just for that. Not the greatest of Smith’s oeuvre, for sure, but still an absolute hoot. Also, definitely check out Mewe’s movie Method In The Madness if you’re a fan of the Jay & Silent Bob films.

Madness In The Method

Methadone Actor

Madness In The Method
2019 USA Directed by Jason Mewes
screening at FrightFest 24th August 2019.

Okay, so my second feature at this year’s Arrow Fright Fest (now in its 20th year) was a much more positive experience for me than Ghost Killers VS Bloody Mary (which I reviewed here).

Madness In The Method is the directorial debut of actor Jason Mewes, who most people would best know as Jay to director Kevin Smith’s Silent Bob. This one was a blast and though I was initially skeptical of this guys ability to helm something like this, given his on and off screen personae and how easy it is to be fooled into thinking the character created by Kevin Smith based on Mewes,,, and Mewes himself... are one and the same, I found myself very pleasantly surprised at how good this was. Of course, since I am already an admirer of the duo in all their big screen appearances (I even forced myself to watch Scream 3 just to catch their cameo), I am part, of a ready made target audience and, although this movie wasn’t written by Jason himself (I suspect he had a fair amount of input in that process, credited or not), it’s actually a kind of mockumentary fantasy written about him.

Right from the outset, fact is blended with fiction as Mewes fills us in on just who he is and charts both his career path with Kevin Smith (done with some nice animated Jay and Silent Bob inserts) and his various trouble with substance abuse in one form or another. We learn about his former trade as a roofer and how tough it was for him growing up etc. And... I suspect it’s one of those films which Hollywood loves where fact and fiction are blended. The film is full of cameos, some as major roles such as Vinnie Jones and others falling somewhere in between that and what is, in this movie, Stan Lee’s final cameo performance. So, for example, both Dean Cain and Teri Hatcher, the two title character actors from TV’s Lois And Clark - The New Adventures Of Superman, have recurring roles in this.

It’s a bit like Fellini’s great masterpiece Eight And A Half, only filtered through a young Hollywood vibe.... in terms of the central character, Mewes playing a fictional version of himself who very consciously wants to crawl out from his stoner typecasting in which he finds himself trapped and reading a not so mythical book about Method Acting before ‘really’ getting into the ‘killer’ mindset of his latest role. I should probably also mention Paul Mazursky’s 1970 movie Alex In Wonderland as a kindred spirit to this film also... but I haven’t seen it myself (or I have and it's been so long I've forgotten it) so I’ll just drop that here in passing.

Okay, so this is a film which never gets dull and explores Mewes’ ‘descent into the method’ as he turns from accidental murderer to, by the end of the film, something else entirely. This is not a horror movie rather than a comedy thriller with the emphasis firmly on the comedic (so I don’t know why it’s playing at FrightFest but I’m certainly not complaining) but it is quite impressive and I especially liked the way the film is edited. Mewes calls some nice cuts here and, although it annoyed me at first, there’s good use made of a little, rotating, ball of Mewes’ head bouncing off the sides of his computer on a screensaver which shouts his catchphrase ‘Snootchy Bootchies’ every time it hits a side of the screen, used to punctuate the structure of the film and to show time and location shifts in the narrative... which is, by its nature, quite freestyle.

I also loved the idea that Brian O’ Halloran, who played Dante Hicks in three of the Jay And Silent Bob movies to date, plays himself as a director who is about to direct a large budget, major Hollywood production of Homer’s The Odyssey. It was genuinely nice to see this guy again although he is in a somewhat darker story here. And like I said, this film is full of cameos from the likes of Danny Trejo, Judd Nelson and even Kevin Smith’s daughter Harley Quinn Smith. There’s also an interesting performance by a modern character actor (future Elisha Cook Jr in the making?) called Mickey Gooch Jr, who plays a handle-barred moustached detective obsessed by his suspicion that it is, indeed, Mewes who is behind the killings in the movie. He’s pretty good in the movie but he was even better in the Q and A before the movie, regaling the audience with his tales of the production, which is obviously set in LA but had its shooting locations split between LA and Derbyshire, here in the UK. A very entertaining fellow, despite his choice of head gear.

Oddly, Kevin Smith himself comes off as a little of a darker version of what I perceive to be his true life persona here. However, I’m pretty sure this is one of a few deliberate deviations from real life, especially when Mewes and Moobs (Smith) do the lion face, lemon face routine from Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back. Also, it’s kind of a dead giveaway that this is definitely portraying a heavily fictionalised scenario bearing in mind the final fate of Vinnie Jones in the movie, which is actually pretty funny, I thought.

So there you have it. Turns out Mr. Mewes can actually direct pretty well, as well as act and, cannily, put together a movie which, in spite of its free form narrative style, holds together very well as a coherent, linear story. Whether it will actually get any kind of physical home media release over here in the UK is anybody’s guess but, if it does, I’ll certainly be shelling out to have another look at Madness In The Method, for sure. So now looking forward to the next film in my 2019 FrightFest experience, The Banana Splits Movie. Review to follow in a couple of days.