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Clerks. (1994)

DVD Cover (Miramax)
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Overall Rating 78%
Overall Rating
Ranked #856
...out of 20,196 movies
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Convenience and video store clerks Dante and Randal are sharp-witted, potty-mouthed and bored out of their minds. So in between needling customers, the counter jockeys play hockey on the roof, visit a funeral home and deal with their love lives. --TMDb
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Review by Chad
Added: April 25, 2006
The movie begins with a situation familiar to anyone who has worked in some sort of minimum-wage job, as our star Dante Hicks (Brian O'Halloran) is called in on his day off to fill in for a sick employee at the local Quick Stop convenience store. This ruins his plans of playing hockey, especially after he finds out that his boss has lied to him about how long he would have to work and Dante winds up having to man the counter from open to close. The film showcases a day in the life of this brave young man, with his video-store clerk friend Randal (Jeff Anderson), his girlfriend Veronica (Marilyn Ghigliotti), and of course, those lovable drug dealers Jay (Jason Mewes) and Silent Bob (Kevin Smith) coming along for the ride.

To be honest, there's not a lot to the storyline that can be adequately described with words on a screen for the benefit of the three people out there who haven't seen this movie. Besides the whole "a day in the life of" plot that takes up the majority of the film, the only real storyline to be found here is the attempt made by Dante to get an old relationship rekindled with his high-school girlfriend Caitlin Bree (Lisa Spoonhauer) without his current girlfriend finding out about it. This storyline is mentioned a few times throughout the movie and it comes to a, ahem, climax late in the running time, but this is actually a pretty small part of the grand scheme of things.

Instead, what we're treated to is dialogue; lots and lots of dialogue, and a couple of brief events thrown in to spice things up every once in a while. We witness a chewing gum representative trying to persuade smokers to give up nicotine for gum under the guise of being a health-conscious bystander, we witness Dante and Randal attending a short-lived funeral wake, and we get to see what happens when two clerks attempt to shut down their respective stores in order to play a game of hockey on the roof. There's dialogue about the various customers and the way that everyone, regardless of how intelligent they may be, seems to lose 95% of their IQ when stepping foot inside of any sort of retail establishment, there's hostile remarks made by our stars towards the customers, and there's even a discussion about Star Wars thrown in for good measure. Needless to say, the movie is not action-packed, nor is it chock full of visual humor; however, the dialogue, the reality of the situations (people who have worked this sort of job will recognize familiar faces in some of these customers), and the brilliant performances given by the stars makes this one of the most hilarious movies in the history of cinema. Yes, that is a broad statement, but in my opinion, it's nothing short of the truth.

This movie is a cult classic, and it should be required viewing for new employees entering the workforce to prepare them for what they have ahead of them. I could use some space in this review to describe a few scenes in more detail than I have, and while it would bring about a touch of nostalgia for those of you who have seen it, I feel that ruining the punchlines of any of the jokes found here would be a grave disservice to the handful of kids out there who haven't witnessed the genius of Clerks for themselves. Therefore, I'll omit that section from this particular review, but I will say this: if you don't find yourself laughing aloud almost constantly as the various situations unfold, you're not human. If you've ever worked at a convenience store, a grocery store, or a certain town-killing department store, you'll find yourself laughing even more than that.

I think the praise that I've shoveled onto this film thus far in the review should give a clear indication of my final rating for it. The movie is a cult classic and it's loved by nearly everyone who has seen it, and this is one of the few times where, even with the amount of attention it receives, the final product still isn't overrated. A perfect film: 10/10.
Lucid Dreams #1: Lucid Dreams - added May 30, 2010 at 10:36pm
I am shocked that no one has commented on this yet. A great movie from Smith and I almost wished that they would have kept the orignal ending, but then we wouldn't have had Clerks 2. 10/10
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