Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001)
By Matt Reedy
It seems forever ago that unknown film director Kevin Smith first broke on to the scene with Clerks, his $27,000 indie flick which went on to cult status. As you know, he went on to make several other films, each one differing from the other, but containing one common thread, the dope-dealing dimwit duo of Jay and Silent Bob.
As you might gather from the title, Smith’s latest movie features Jay and Silent Bob as the main characters, instead of the usual bit-part comedy relief. The plot, which only exists to string together a series of jokes and parodies, centers on Jay and Bob’s journey to Hollywood to shut down a movie based on themselves. There are more cameo appearances than you can shake a stick at, including most of the characters and/or actors from the previous Smith films. In a hilarious twist, actors Jason Lee and Ben Affleck appear as multiple characters, even though their appearances hardly differ at all. And although no characters from Dogma are present, both George Carlin and Chris Rock return in what are even better roles, with Rock’s scenes being exceptionally hilarious.
Of course, the movie is not perfect, not by any means. Some of the gags try too hard, Silent Bob’s non-speaking gestures tend to get annoying, and the sheer number of gay and fellatio jokes may be a bit much for some viewers. That being said, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back is still quite a bright spot in this somewhat lackluster summer movie season. Smith claims that this will be the final movie with these characters, but I have the feeling (hopefully) that we haven’t seen the last of them.
MR