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They're not there to shop. They're not there to work. They're just there. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=toFqw3d7TlA Mallrats is to Clerks as Paul's Boutique is to Licensed to Ill. Both were highly anticipated (and highly funded) follow-ups to groundbreaking debuts that, at the time, made no impact on the general populace and nearly ruined their creators' careers. The difference, however, is that while Beastie Boys' second album has been reassessed as their magnum opus, Kevin Smith's second film is merely a cult classic when compared to his later, more commercially successful films Chasing Amy and Dogma. The movie features a simple premise: two men are dumped by their girlfriends on the same day and decide to go to the mall to brighten their moods. There, they meet a variety of colorful characters (one of which is a bit problematic, now that I think about it) and devise a plan to win back the women they still have feelings for. What makes Mallrats a movie that needs to be seen is its writing. While Clerks is a string of incidents with very little overarching storyline, this prequel has a story that goes from opening credits to closing credits. In spite of this, both movies feature a wide cast of memorable characters that don't wear out their welcome and are endlessly quotable (one line from the movie lends itself to a podcast hosted by two of Smith's friends, uncoincidentally the ones who speak it). Mallrats is available from Arrow Video on Ultra HD Blu-ray, and currently streams on Starz in the United States. Please note that there's also an extended edition, but I wouldn't watch that unless you're familiar with the theatrical cut - there's a good reason it's called The Version That Should Not Be. Previous Movies of the Month
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Mar 1, 2024 07:15
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Funny enough, I've got a VHS copy of this movie (and a working VCR) but have never actually watched it. I guess this is as good an excuse as any to get around to doing so.
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Mar 1, 2024 23:53
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In high school I had a friend who said this was her favorite movie. She'd only ever seen the tv edit.
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Mar 2, 2024 19:11
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Good soundtrack, awful movie.
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Mar 2, 2024 19:19
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we dance on the ruins of the stupid stage
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Mar 2, 2024 23:45
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decent soundtrack, amazing movie i got this recently on 4k bluray and hadn't watched it in a really long time. it was one of my absolute favorites as a kid and it totally holds up in this stamp of the 90s type of fantasy nerd reality type way.
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Mar 3, 2024 00:51
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I really enjoy Mallrats but literally the only reason I have it on blu-ray is because I wanted a copy of the bizarre and hilarious TV edit. It just kind of forgets how to be a movie like 50 minutes into it.
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Mar 3, 2024 14:26
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Kevin Smith calls it his 6 million dollar casting call for Chasing Amy.
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Mar 4, 2024 00:42
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"You fuckers think just 'cause a guy reads comics he can't start some poo poo?" was truly an anthem of a line for people of a certain generation. (Suffice it to say that I had the Drew Struzan poster on my wall all through college.) But for me it'll never get better than the "fear and respect that escalator" monologue. And Brodie is right, not a year goes by, not a year, where I don't read an article like that in the news… It's funny to watch this movie now and realize there was once a time where Stan Lee was someone who sort of needed to be explained to a mainstream audience. Who knew that one day people would be watching for his cameos in the biggest movies of the year. Of course, it's also funny that Ben Affleck plays an embarrassing little role in this and it turned out to be a crucially important step in getting "Good Will Hunting" made and launching everything that came after. Proof for every aspiring creative type that there are no small parts! Anyway, my only real comment on this movie is that for whatever reason I simply can't watch it and *not* follow up with the "Buttercup" music video.
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Mar 5, 2024 03:08
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Icon-Cat posted:
I know he's kinda the villain, but "The customer is always right? No, the customer is always an rear end in a top hat!" Struck a cord with me once I started working in the service industry.
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Mar 5, 2024 07:23
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I still haven’t seen that damned sailboat. No movie has captured my pain about not being able to see Magic Eye so succinctly.
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Mar 6, 2024 18:22
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Awful pacing, wooden characters, mean spirited but not in a fun way, script that sounds like it was written by a non native English speaker, embarrassing gen x nerd culture stuff, Kevin Smith started off as a bad filmmaker and never grew. I’ve watched this like 50 times 
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Mar 9, 2024 08:14
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Watching Mallrats again was an interesting experience, I've been thinking about Kevin Smith a lot lately because he was just a guest on Blank Check. OP gets into it a bit but you can't really separate this movie from your feelings on Smith himself. It's weird how I've gone from loving him to hating him to being solidly okay with him. I still remember in 2011 when he went off on how he hates critics and refused to screen Red State for them, making a big stunt out of it. I remember these here forums turning on him around that time. In my teens, it was cool that Smith didn't seem to put in effort and was just making bullshit with his friends. In my 20s, I was pretty pissed at him for being a lovely director on a hypocritical anti-critic rant who had to learn about camera lenses from Bruce Willis. Now I'm 35 with a job and a mortgage and I just don't care if he ever grew as a filmmaker and he just makes movies for his dumb cult following. Whatever. He seems like a nice enough guy and people seem to like working with him and that counts for something, I guess. He's a locker room guy. So, Mallrats. The funny stuff is funnier than I remembered, the bad stuff is way way worse than I remembered. I think the writing is pretty good in parts but there are just bizarre decisions all around that make it a rough watch. The best parts are Jay and Silent Bob doing a Looney Tunes schtick in the background. Jason Lee is a delight to watch as he plays a wretched character in a likable way. But there's just something sort of flat about this movie to me. It's hard to recreate the slacker angst Smith captured in Clerks, especially when we're no longer dealing with characters who are working. Dante in Clerks is tragic because he wants to have a better life, but Brody and T.S. have no interest in growing and they're basically rewarded for it. This movie feels like Smith saying "this is as good as I'm getting" on movie #2. Ultimately I still like Mallrats but OP is wrong, it's not Paul's Boutique. Paul's Boutique deserves a critical re-evaluation and Mallrats... doesn't. I think they were right about it the first time.
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Mar 13, 2024 04:07
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I had a two day window to get this movie watched while I was home from work, and managed it this evening. It has its moments, but little stuck out as particularly memorable apart from the repeated Magic Eye bit, which never wears out its welcome. Also Jay and Silent Bob beating up the Easter Bunny. For whatever reason Jason Lee really seems to be the only member of the primary cast able to work well with the material he's given; the "main" couple come off as complete non-entities--for all the screen time Jeremy London's character takes up, we never get a feel for who he is, the girlfriend even less so, especially as she only has three scenes in the whole movie. Also, maybe it's just me, but Claire Forlani seems to be trying to do some sort of accent with half her lines and it isn't working, so her delivery comes off as extra-stilted. So all in all I'd say it's one of Kevin Smith's lesser movies, about on par with Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back. Which was the last one I saw, and honestly I'm fine with having left off there. I've never felt the need to revisit any of the ones I've seen, they're just sort of there as part of the cultural detritus taking up an uncomfortable place in the back of my
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Mar 17, 2024 06:27
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Meaty Ore posted:Also, maybe it's just me, but Claire Forlani seems to be trying to do some sort of accent with half her lines and it isn't working, so her delivery comes off as extra-stilted. You're halfway there, Forlani is English and trying (and failing) to hide her accent, it's really noticeable in the game show scene.
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Mar 18, 2024 00:07
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If you watch that Game Show scene, the lighting changes DRAMATICALLY between certain shots, it's wild. I think this is such an interesting movie because it's right on the cusp of Gen X and its early 90s culture getting rapidly flavor-blasted into irrelevancy. In another couple of years they stop being media's favorite think-piece and it moves on to the Millennials and Y2k. So much of this movie was functionally dead a handful of years later. There's no mention of the internet or cellphones, the attitudes of the protagonists are archaic, and even the fuckin' Hartford Whalers (the team that Brodie is playing in the iconic NHL game) aren't around anymore. Yeah it's a mean-spirited and frequently stupid but (to paraphrase Ferris Bueller here) so is high school.
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Mar 19, 2024 00:48
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hartford, the whale
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Mar 22, 2024 17:31
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this thread inspired me to revisit another k smith movie i probably only ever watched once: dogma. i remember all the controversy around it but barely anything from the actual movie. turns out it's a nice attempt and kind of insane that it even got made at all, but it really is kind of a crap movie. mallrats works so much better bc it's in smith's wheelhouse and the characters are written in the way he knows how to write characters and grounded slacker stoner 90s fantasy scenarios.
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Mar 22, 2024 20:14
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This was a fun pick. I've seen my fair share of Kevin Smith's movies, although Clerk is the only one I tend to revisit. This is the most prominent entry in his filmography that passed me by. I'm sure this would have hit me a bit more as a teenager, but aside from some crude, juvenile bits of humor, I don't think I aged out of this as much as I'd have feared. It's a decent mix of the Clerks style plus an attempt to make it a more straightforward mainstream movie. This has actually got a pretty forward-moving plot with a pleasing comedic set piece at the end. There were even a few attempts at framing shots in a more creative way beyond "medium, flat two-shot," particular in Jay and Silent Bob's cartoon sideplots. This must have been before Kevin gave up. And the dated '90s elements are a huge part of the charm, from the mall setting itself to the really talky pop-culture dialogue to the awesome soundtrack. Jason Lee is the MVP, obviously. P.S. I have no idea if this was intentionally chosen for this month, but I got a good laugh out of this also being a stealth Easter movie.
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Mar 31, 2024 12:20
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