‘Ballerina,’ ‘Bring Her Back,’ and ‘Dogma’ Reborn, with Kevin Smith!!!

Sean and Amanda are joined by Chris Ryan to discuss their disappointment with the newest installment in the John Wick franchise, ‘From the World of John Wick: Ballerina’ (2:08). Next, they cover the second horror feature film from the Philippou brothers with the deeply upsetting ‘Bring Her Back’ and explain why it was an interesting follow-up to their first feature, ‘Talk to Me’ (25:45). Then, they revisit Kevin Smith’s 1999 classic, ‘Dogma,’ and share everything they loved about it when they first watched it, and all of the things that have aged so well since then (37:00). Finally, Sean is joined by Kevin Smith for the first time to discuss the re-release of ‘Dogma.’ They discuss why it has been so difficult to access the rights to the movie, what made Smith’s return to the Cannes Film Festival so special, and share a myriad of incredible stories across his entire filmmaking career (51:19). Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guests: Kevin Smith and Chris Ryan Producer: Jack Sanders Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Amanda Dobbins?

  Hello Bay Pick psychos. You already know we're coming to Chicago this summer and we're so excited for our live show on July 21st, but there's more.

• 0:09Sean Fennessey?

  We're heading to the Music Box Theater to watch number 14 on our 25 for 25 list on the big screen with you.

• 0:17Amanda Dobbins?

  We're keeping the movie a secret, but we promise you won't be disappointed and we'll have a conversation right after to talk through what we all just watched.

• 0:25Sean Fennessey?

  Tickets go on sale this Friday, June 13th at 10 a.m. Central Time. More information will be available soon at theringer.com/events.

• 0:34Amanda Dobbins?

  Again, we're going to be screening and talking about number 14 on our 25 for 25 list live at the Music Box Theater in Chicago on Sunday, July 20th, and you can join us.

• 0:46Sean Fennessey?

  Tickets go on sale this Friday, June 13th at 10 a.m. Central Time with details to come on theringer.com/events. We hope you'll join us.

• 0:54Speaker 02

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• 1:19Speaker 03

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• 1:51Speaker 03

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• 2:18Speaker 04

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• 3:17Speaker 05

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• 3:35Sean Fennessey?

  I'm Sean Fennessy. I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is the Big Picture Right Conversation Show about ballerinas and not-so-silent bobs. Later in this episode, a big name comes off the old bucket list. Kevin Smith joins me for one hour, or perhaps to put a finer point on it. Kevin Smith, the writer-director of such beloved classics as Clerks, Chasing Amy, and Dogma, delivered an hour-long mega-story on this show about the birth, disappearance, and reemergence of his fascinating, hilarious Catholicism satire-comedy-action epic. If you love Smith the filmmaker and Smith the storyteller, you will definitely want to stick around for that conversation. Amanda, Chris, and I will also briefly teleport back to 1999 to dig into Dogma a bit as well.

• 4:16Sean Fennessey?

  Also on this episode, we are about to dig into from the world of John Wick: Ballerina, as well as the Filippo Brothers' follow-up to 2023's horror-smash Talk to Me. It's called Bring Her Back. To do those things, CR Chris Ryan is here, coming to us from Zoom. Hello, Chris.

• 4:33Speaker 06

  I love dance, and I love demons, and I love coming on this podcast. Thanks for having me, guys.

• 4:38Sean Fennessey?

  Amanda, let's get right into Ballerina, okay? You've been anticipating this movie for the 12 years since it was completed production. Right. It's shot in the 2010s, and we've been waiting a long time for it.

• 4:53Sean Fennessey?

  This is, of course, the new movie, the fifth film in The Ballerina Story. It's directed by Len Wiseman, sort of, we'll get to that, written by Shay Hatton. It stars Ana de Armas, Gabriel Byrne, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Norman Reedus, Angelica Huston, Lance Reddick in his final screen appearance, Ian McShane back into the Wick world, and of course, Keanu Reeves, John Wick himself. It's a movie that takes place, I guess, during the events of John Wick Chapter Three Parabellum, a movie that I don't remember as well as I would have liked. It's about a woman named Eve Macaro, who we've seen in the Wick world before. That's de Armas's character. She's begun her training in the assassin traditions of the Ruska Roma, which is also something that you endured to become the co-host of this podcast. And along the way, she encounters the hidden world of the Continental and a secret cult responsible for the death of a family member.

• 5:37Sean Fennessey?

  To avenge this family member, she must glow on a globe-trotting killing spree.

• 5:42Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean.

• 5:43Sean Fennessey?

  Amanda, I will start with you.

• 5:44Amanda Dobbins?

  Yes.

• 5:46Sean Fennessey?

  Before you begin your killing spree, did you like the movie Ballerina?

• 5:50Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, I would say this is a tenuous, at best, connection to the world of ballet. So that was, that was tough for me. No, I was kind of disappointed by this, I'm going to be honest. And because, as you said, is it really a globe-trotting? I don't know. They go one place that seems nice, and everywhere else is various nightclubs, you know, that are lit purple, like every other nightclub in the John Wick universe. I was a little underwhelmed by the action of it all, which, and I guess we can talk a little bit about flamethrowers and like your general relationship to fire at a later date. I'd like to, I think that that could be some psychology, but there's like, I don't

• 6:33Amanda Dobbins?

  know, it was like, fine, I guess, but it doesn't have any of the wit and flair that I associate with certainly John Wick four, but like really the whole franchise and also what Ana de Armas is capable of. You know, at this point, I think the no time to die scene is like an albatross hanging around her neck because like, we know she can do it and we know that that's possible. And no situation seems to be able to be replicated where like she can do it again. But. Yeah, to be honest, I was somewhat bored.

• 7:06Sean Fennessey?

  Chris, I'd love to hear your opinion about this. I think I echo Amanda in many ways.

• 7:11Speaker 06

  Yeah, I'm not a huge fan of this movie, although I did find some stuff in it to like. So especially the back half of it or the back third of it. When the ballerina character goes to an Alps village full of killers. I thought was a pretty ingenious little invention and had some of the charms of like John Wick. When an entire city gets the alert to kill him kind of thing. And all of a sudden there's like attacks coming from all these different directions. That was like playful. It had charm. It had invention a little bit. And that's what this movie was kind of lacking because the first hour and a half almost are is really just like this sort of trudging.

• 7:55Speaker 06

  Vengeance origin story, training origin story, not nearly enough training. I wanted way more black swan, like kill school stuff. That would have been dope. And just a lot of like franchise service of like dragging old people from the John Wick movies in to kind of. Do their their five minutes of Ian McShan-ing, do their five minutes of Angelica Huston-ing. And yeah, it's a tough one. Obviously, this this has had like so many major surgeries done on it that it's kind of a miracle. It's as good as it is.

• 8:26Sean Fennessey?

  It would have been an interesting experience to watch this movie, not knowing any of the backstory. In fact, when we talked about it after our trip to CinemaCon, Matt pointed out to me, he was like, I feel like you're holding something against this movie. Because you just know that there has been reshoot city with it. And we know that Chad Stahelsky, the auteur of the John Wick universe, came in and apparently had to kind of save it by installing a set of new action set pieces.

• 8:49Speaker 06

  Bellany said that to you?

• 8:50Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 8:51Speaker 06

  He said you were holding something against a movie?

• 8:53Sean Fennessey?

  He did, uh, which, you know, it was kind of a direct shot. I'm usually pretty open minded about these things, but I think that this movie has got an incredibly mediocre script and a tone that doesn't actually fit the world that it is meant to exist inside of. I think, as Amanda suggested, the Wick movies over time have become more and more sort of like self referential and self aware about their place, not just in the action universe, but in the silent comedy universe, that just the world of physical filmmaking. And this is just a regular old mediocre revenge movie. If it was extricated from the Wick world, maybe we wouldn't have had standards that are as high as they are, especially because there are a couple of times where the action shows you what it could be. That's the sort of like the creativity.

• 9:36Sean Fennessey?

  I personally thought a lot of the flamethrower stuff was new. Like I'd just not seen that before. And so that's part of what Wick does, which is like, they show you a kind of way of creating something that is almost like external to the story of the movie. It's just like, are you ready for some cool shit? And I enjoyed that, but almost everything else around it. I was like, this is, just feels very pro forma. It feels very serviceable.

• 9:58Speaker 06

  Are we about to get science corner? Are you going to science corner?

• 10:00Amanda Dobbins?

  No, no, this is more psychology corner. I mean, you, you really do anytime fire comes out of any sort of gun vessel. I also think of that battle scene in John Wick four, which like I thought was cool because it's filmed, you know, from like up above and is at least interesting, but you were just like, there's a gun and it has fire. And it's like, well, I mean, like, it's okay. Like it, I, first of all, I really don't think, science corner, here we go.

• 10:27Speaker 04

  Welcome to Amanda Dobbins's Science Corner.

• 10:34Amanda Dobbins?

  That the pressure of the hose.

• 10:36Speaker 06

  This is what I was gonna ask.

• 10:37Amanda Dobbins?

  Could actually withstand the fire in the way that, uh, it is demonstrated in Ballerina.

• 10:45Speaker 06

  You guys should recreate this on stage in Chicago.

• 10:51Sean Fennessey?

  Chris, what will you be doing?

• 10:53Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 10:53Speaker 06

  In Chicago?

• 10:54Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 10:55Speaker 06

  Am I invited?

• 10:56Sean Fennessey?

  Are you not, are you not coming?

• 10:57Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 10:59Speaker 06

  Am I, I didn't know if I was gonna be like a surprise guest, like I was gonna-

• 11:02Sean Fennessey?

  We don't wanna sell tickets on the back of your fandom, you know? We wanna see if we can do it all by ourselves.

• 11:07Amanda Dobbins?

  Right, right. But the tickets are sold out.

• 11:09Sean Fennessey?

  Actually.

• 11:11Amanda Dobbins?

  They're gone.

• 11:11Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah. People were very mad, by the way. They were very mad that they sold out in one minute. I don't really know what to do about that. I received angry messages on social media about the fact that the show sold out.

• 11:20Speaker 06

  You can move it to a larger venue, like the United Center or something like that, like where the Bulls play?

• 11:25Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, that's a good idea. We should definitely do that. Um, anyway, back to Ballerina. We were talking about literally the final action sequence of the movie in some of the tail here. So if you don't wanna hear about those things, don't listen, I guess.

• 11:36Speaker 06

  It's in the trailer.

• 11:37Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 11:37Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, but, okay. So in addition to, I don't really know whether the fire hose can stand up to the blowtorch in that way, even at like high water pressure or whatever. Who was that guy? You know, with the blowtorch?

• 11:52Speaker 06

  He was like the, like, he was a late-breaking, uh, second-to-last boss that they obviously kind of were like, he's supposed to be like Mr. Joshua in Lethal Weapon.

• 12:04Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 12:05Speaker 06

  Or, you know, like blonde badass who's like the super killer of the village and is Gabriel Burns' boy.

• 12:10Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay. But he kind of showed up from nowhere and I understood that he was like part of the cult, but like, I didn't really feel invested in it.

• 12:19Speaker 06

  He was in Prague when Norman Reedus' daughter is kidnapped, Ella.

• 12:23Amanda Dobbins?

  Right, right, right, right.

• 12:24Speaker 06

  So he makes an earlier appearance in the film.

• 12:26Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 12:27Speaker 06

  Sorry for paying attention to this.

• 12:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Where is Norman Reedus? I mean, I understand-

• 12:32Speaker 06

  Norman Reedus is a great, this is a great example of what maybe happened to this film, because Norman Reedus arguably was being set up to be, I don't know, like the McShane to Ana de Armas' John Wick.

• 12:45Sean Fennessey?

  I thought even a battle co-conspirator, somebody who might have participated more aggressively in some of the fighting. And in fact, he's just kinda shanked shortly after he's introduced. And he spends the rest of the movie in a hospital bed, which we learned at the end of the movie. So he doesn't, Norman Reedus, you know, one of the badasses of television, I guess, over the last 10 years? You would think if you're gonna put him in your movie, Boondock Saint that he is, that he'd be shooting people and he doesn't.

• 13:08Speaker 06

  Yeah, especially with crossbows, which is his preferred weapon of choice on Walking Dead, I believe.

• 13:13Sean Fennessey?

  So yeah, I mean, that's a good example of just trying to remember a movie that you saw five days ago and that is kind of slipping through your fingers a little bit, just because it's just ultimately not very good. I would say it is not bad, but usually boring Amanda. And there were times when I did feel like I was kind of checking out from the film. And, you know, it didn't really do very well at the box office and it's not terribly surprising because it doesn't feel like the buzz is very good on it. I don't know if like, could you guys sense that it was kind of Frankenstein together or did you just know that going in?

• 13:43Speaker 06

  Um, I will, so I think that the second half of the movie or the, once she gets to the, to the village feels like a different, more fun movie or a more interesting movie, but also has a lot of weight of like, that's where your sister happens to live, you know, who you've seen earlier and did feel a connection across the hotel lobby and all the stuff that gets like exposition dumped at the end about like this community of killers and how no one's ever allowed to leave, which I actually thought was like, pretty interesting, but just, you can't really like, take that on after an hour and a half of like, rumorouska and like, her dad living on the beach in Valencia or whatever. Did you like that little Catalina?

• 14:27Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, I did. I did. I noticed it. Can I just say, great, great out village. Like the, I was really into that, that it looked cool.

• 14:35Speaker 06

  And whenever, and when like, everybody's, who's just like a waiter or like a family walking by just pulls out fucking automatic weapons. It's like, oh shit, this is actually like the John Wick vibe that I know and love. I will mention Sean, you asked about the Frankenstein thing. I did a little bit of spelunking onto the internet and read about the script that this is based on, which is a 2017 spec script by Shay Hatton, when he was just kind of right out of college and was very hot for a second, because I guess there is a cottage industry, or at least appears to be, of people writing like spec John Wick spinoffs to just kind of throw out there and like, you know, kind of throw into the, this is Lionsgate, right?

• 15:17Speaker 06

  Like the machine of John Wick. Cause I think for a while there, it looked like John Wick was going to be like, we're going to pump one of these out every two years and we're going to do TV extensions and spinoffs and all this stuff. So the script itself, which I read like a little bit of from what I could see on different screenwriting sites. Is very, very Shane Black eighties vibe like it's like the prose and the descriptions are all very flippant and funny and tongue in cheek. And like throughout the movie and the screenplay, uh, the early screenplay version, it's like her kill count starts when she's a kid. And it's like, it's all like, kind of like.

• 15:52Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, it does in this movie too.

• 15:54Speaker 06

  Yeah, but like, it's like.

• 15:55Amanda Dobbins?

  But in a traumatic way.

• 15:56Speaker 06

  Noted on screen and as like a joke, like.

• 15:58Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 15:59Speaker 06

  Like Eve Macaro kill count one, and it she's like a six year old who pushes somebody down the stairs, you know, it's like. Supposed to be a little bit more comic, I think. And I wish we got to see Anna Darmis do that because that's a little bit more of the knives out Anna Darmis like that's a little bit more of the like. She can do a couple of different things, but I feel like she's really trapped in like. She's almost in the little glass ballerina case in this movie where it's like, you have to just get tattoos and be Gothic and be vengeful.

• 16:29Amanda Dobbins?

  There were two tells for me in terms of Frankenstein-ing. One was Anna Darmis's hair, uh, which her like her slicked back style, which I like honestly thought looked great. Um, and I'm dealing with a lot of flyaways right now, so I was really invested in it. But it starts as soon as she becomes like a Ruska Roma. And you could say it's part of the characterization, but there is such a difference in the grooming and like. The, the early origin story stuff and all of the ballet stuff. And then once she's acting, then I'm like, oh, okay, like this was. This didn't all happen at the same time, like the conception didn't all happen together. And then obviously Keanu, right?

• 17:09Amanda Dobbins?

  Who just like shows up in like, almost tacked on in a couple of places. Um, and you can really feel the way that he's worked into the script and also what he's asked to do to like. Is very separate from the rest of the movie.

• 17:24Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, I want to talk about both of those things that you guys brought up, but on Chris's point about the tone of the movie. There's a middle ground that I guess I'm looking for in an action movie, which is neither. Trauma core revenge, which is what the movie ends up becoming.

• 17:38Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 17:38Sean Fennessey?

  Nor wink action, which sounds like what you're describing, Chris. This idea of like a very, very openly silly, self referential, almost like. Grand Theft Auto style video game.

• 17:50Speaker 06

  Well, I think he would like the screenplay would probably be like we want it's like supposed to be like long kiss, good night.

• 17:54Sean Fennessey?

  Totally.

• 17:55Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah.

• 17:57Sean Fennessey?

  But I think that that we've lost that tone like we've lost the ability to hit that tone of like, we're having fun and we know what we're doing and having fun, but we're not breaking the fourth wall. It would have been interesting to see them attempt that. And then, you know, related to that, this like obviously sweaty edition of Keanu Reeves, kind of pointlessly to this movie. And the fact that I don't know if it's the studio or the filmmakers or somebody just getting nervous that the movie wasn't going to hit and just feeling the need to literally have the ballerina walk past John Wick in a hallway halfway through the movie, just to be like, in case you forgot, because we put the words John Wick in the title of the movie, John Wick is a part of this world. In fact, this was a scene from John Wick three that you may recall.

• 18:41Sean Fennessey?

  Now we're going to show you him and you're kind of sort of going to get a fight sequence with him, but mostly he's going to be talking on phones, looking through a sniper rifle.

• 18:49Speaker 06

  Right.

• 18:49Sean Fennessey?

  Just like extremely banal, pointless, just like juiceless in general. And like Keanu is amazing. I love the Wick movies. I think they're getting better and better. I hope they do a John Wick five, even though it would make no sense relative to what happened in John Wick.

• 19:05Speaker 06

  Save that guy's knees, man.

• 19:06Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 19:07Sean Fennessey?

  I know, I know. I almost felt bad for the other thing I read too, is that, um, apparently Keanu was up for a role in the Acolyte that eventually went to the star from Squid Game, which I did not know, but I guess he didn't do that because he had to do this instead, which is an interesting sliding doors of like, we almost got Keanu as a, as a Jedi, but it was on a show that nobody watched or cared about, which is sort of like this beautiful little metaphor for what's happened to the franchization, you know, like literally one of the greatest franchise action movie stars in the history of movies in Keanu, somebody who's born to be a Jedi in so many ways, has a whole, like his whole being as an, as a performer is this kind of like inner calm, this sort of like trying to endure the epic

• 19:52Sean Fennessey?

  pain of galactic struggle. And then he couldn't do it or wouldn't do it or didn't do it because he had to walk past Anadarmus in a hallway in the fifth John Wick movie is a little depressing.

• 20:03Speaker 06

  Can I just make another point about like the tension between building franchises and telling good stories? The, the idea. That that's the character introduction sucks because the cool character introduction is the one that maybe they had in mind, which is he's on the train and the train arrives in this snowy village and he's the one that's been sent by, uh, by McShane to take care of this, but like winkingly because he's gonna have this conversation with Eve and they'll kind of like chastely fight and he won't let her, you know, he's like, you have until midnight. All that stuff is like good mechanics for action scenes. Like there's a clock. We're, we're gonna have a fight, but I'm not gonna hurt you. You know, like I understand your pain, all this stuff. But his arrival would have been really cool if

• 20:48Speaker 06

  that was the arrival. That's like a Sergio Leone arrival. He's arriving on the train. But instead they're like, people are gonna get nervous. They don't think John Wick's in this movie. So we have to show him in the first 35 minutes and it has to be a scene from John Wick three that they may remember that kind of places this within the timeline. And it's like, dude, you fucked it up. You could have just had John Wick arrive on a train in a snowy mountain village and step off and we would have been like, whoa. And instead it's like, yes, I remember this scene from John Wick three. I have been paid back for my, my consumerism, you know, it's, it's just like, think guys.

• 21:22Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah. Can I pitch a, a concept to you guys that I was thinking about as I was watching the movie? So Stahelsky comes in and he reshoots a bunch of the action that Len Weisman shot. They, he, you know, does his stunt design that he is acclaimed for. And you do get more juice. You get this great scene in this restaurant where he goes to, you know, she goes to battle with this assassin who comes to kill her. She dispatches him fairly quickly and then she goes to battle with people who literally work in the restaurant and live in the town. It's probably the most pure, like fun sequence in the movie. And I thought Anadarmus acquitted herself very well, especially in that sort of like close up hand to hand stuff where they're really like, not cutting away to the stunt doubles. And that, that's just, there's like literally references to, to other films in that sequence. You can see this Stahelsky

• 22:06Sean Fennessey?

  touch of like loving Buster Keaton and, and loving the slapstick comedy that is interspersed in those movies, the plates smashing over the heads.

• 22:13Speaker 06

  Would it be better ultimately in the world of movies if rather than continue to make John Wick movies or make his new Highlander movie, if Chad Stahelsky was just the action fixer for every movie? If it was just, we have an action movie, it's fine. It's the amateur starring Rami Malek. But three different times during the movie, Chad Stahelsky will give you an absolute banger sequence that makes it feel worth the price of admission. Is that a better, as a movie watcher, as a movie consumer, is that a better fate for us, for his, his tools, his talents to be utilized?

• 22:51Amanda Dobbins?

  I don't think so, because I then, I think you end up with a lot of movies like this, where there are some good action sequences, but it's divorced from the rest of the movie, the rest of the story. And so you get the lame hallway reveal, you get this mishmash Frankenstein, you know, we, we've seen what happens when you build movies around action sequences and it's called Mission Impossible, Final Wrecking Thing, which Chris is still just like really big mad about. And I don't think we've explored, like his level of anger. What we like about Stahelsky and about the John Wick movies is that he can make the action, like of a piece with the film itself.

• 23:35Amanda Dobbins?

  And when they're working together is when it's really great. So I think he's very good at what he does. And it's clearly the best part of this movie, but, but no.

• 23:44Speaker 06

  Completely agree.

• 23:45Amanda Dobbins?

  I say, I say no.

• 23:47Speaker 06

  I completely agree with her. I think we've gotten a little too over, over invested in like designing a film around action sequences and then writing the script after the fact, rather than like, be like, what would make, what, what are the steps that lead us to a place that would be a cool setting for an action sequence? And what are the elements of the character that would actually make it? Cause I, I was kind of thinking about how she doesn't do much dance in her fighting, which

• 24:11Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 24:12Speaker 06

  would be interesting. I mean, I think one thing that she-

• 24:13Amanda Dobbins?

  She doesn't do much dance before either. It's like

• 24:16Speaker 06

  True.

• 24:16Amanda Dobbins?

  one scene to like techno Swan Lake and she can't stay up on her leg, you know, which as we learn on center, no, she keeps slipping on her blood because it's tough and ballet is tough. But as we learn in center stage, you gotta stay on your leg.

• 24:29Speaker 06

  Um, I would say that I enjoy the fact that like Anna de Armas has like a, like guttural yell when she's getting her ass kicked that I, I found new and original. And and something that I'm honoring, you know?

• 24:45Speaker 06

  I don't want to replicate it now because like there, there are people outside my window and I don't want to start screaming.

• 24:50Amanda Dobbins?

  She does get her ass kicked a lot.

• 24:52Speaker 06

  It's awesome.

• 24:52Amanda Dobbins?

  In the beginning.

• 24:53Speaker 06

  Fuck people up. Yeah.

• 24:54Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah. But she's like the, the first scene, she's just kind of like roll, like doing a lot of somersault. That's sort of like a toddler ballet class, you know, just like, ah, um, and then she gets back up. I understand it's part of the training, but I was kind of like wincing a little for her. I was like, oh, come on, Anna.

• 25:13Speaker 06

  You know, you mentioned Mission Impossible, Amanda, which I am still, I just want you to put in the paper that I'm not mad. I'm laughing about Mission Impossible Final Reckoning, but fantasy, I think you had like a point where you're like, this movie can just start here. And it was like lopping off like 40 minutes or an hour of it.

• 25:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 25:30Speaker 06

  There, I definitely like through watching trailers and just like knowing about John Wick and anybody who goes and sees this movie is gonna say, I bet this chick is motivated by revenge. You know, and the 15 minute sequence in a castle in Spain, wherever the hell that was, and all the training and stuff like that. Like honestly, if this movie starts with Anna de Armas in that bathroom with her hair slicked down.

• 25:56Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 25:57Speaker 06

  Taking a picture of the dead guy and then being like, doing the elevator joke when she gets off, where she's like, oh, I was very scared.

• 26:03Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 26:04Speaker 06

  This movie is like 10, 20% better if that, that's the case.

• 26:09Sean Fennessey?

  It's ironic because part of the appeal of the John Wick film is sort of like, so this guy's just mad because they killed his dog.

• 26:15Amanda Dobbins?

  Dog. Right.

• 26:15Sean Fennessey?

  It's just not, it's, it's such a simple, undersold concept. It's so small. And then it leads to some of the most epic action, gun fu that you, we've ever seen.

• 26:26Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 26:27Sean Fennessey?

  And that was the joke of the movie. So to just give us this kind of retrograde, traditional, like they killed my father, that just an Inigo Montoya ballerina. It's just weird. Um.

• 26:36Speaker 06

  But the reverse is cool. If she's just like, I'm an assassin, but for some reason, these people with X's branded into their wrists, keep showing up to fuck me up at my jobs. What is going on? I'm going to follow the trail. It's kind of neat. You know what I mean? I kind of, I kind of dig that. It's just like, but the entire thing is broadcast from the beginning. If you know that she's like always been searching for somebody with this mark on their wrists.

• 26:59Sean Fennessey?

  Let me ask you guys, do you think there will be another John Wick movie that isn't a John Wick movie? Another spinoff, another extension of this world?

• 27:08Amanda Dobbins?

  Well, this didn't do very well, but they're clearly trying to set it up because it's the Roma Ruska versus the what? What are the guys with the X's on their wrists? What's like, what's the official name of the village?

• 27:18Speaker 06

  You know, I don't, I don't know that they ever really got a name. I think it's like referred to as a cult, but like burns, like we have great benefits here, you know, like.

• 27:26Amanda Dobbins?

  I mean, it seems like a good deal if you're just like living in this bucolic village and also like highly trained. You know what I mean?

• 27:37Amanda Dobbins?

  So, and for the most part, it doesn't seem like people come to their village very often. So, you know, it's.

• 27:44Sean Fennessey?

  It's, it's Hallstatt Austria is the town, but Chris is right that it's only referred to as the cult.

• 27:48Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, the cult.

• 27:50Speaker 06

  And it's apparently a big, big secret, but that guy who has the gun shop is like, don't tell anybody, but it's right there.

• 27:58Sean Fennessey?

  Another terrible scene of just like showing guns and explaining things.

• 28:03Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, this movie is a disappointment to me. I was hoping it would be better and it comes at an interesting time. It's like the first kind of like dip in the summer, you know, it felt like things were just like hot.

• 28:10Speaker 06

  Right.

• 28:11Sean Fennessey?

  The movies were very hot for like six consecutive weeks and they slowed down a little bit. Speaking of slowing down a little bit, Bring Her Back has been a somewhat of a mild disappointment at the box office this summer as well. This is the Filippo Brothers movie that I mentioned. Talk to Me was one of the surprise films of 2023. It was a Sundance acquisition by eight 24, released in the middle of the summer, a high school possession horror movie from these YouTubers who displayed a style that I did not know they had based on the YouTube videos that they made. This movie is them diving even deeper into traumatic, upsetting horror. Amanda, you have not seen this movie.

• 28:53Sean Fennessey?

  I would not recommend that you see it for a variety of reasons.

• 28:58Amanda Dobbins?

  So let me guess, don't even tell me. Okay. So like

• 29:03Amanda Dobbins?

  deep gore and, and kids in peril.

• 29:07Speaker 06

  Absolutely.

• 29:08Amanda Dobbins?

  And, um.

• 29:12Amanda Dobbins?

  Let's see, what else do I really not like? Is it, I mean, is there like a supernatural element to it?

• 29:18Speaker 06

  Yep.

• 29:18Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 29:18Amanda Dobbins?

  Out, don't care. Yeah, okay, but tell me, okay, give me the scene.

• 29:21Sean Fennessey?

  I don't think we can play by play it.

• 29:23Speaker 06

  I was, I was kind of thinking about this, Sean, like, this might be one of those, we can describe it if you want, or we can do the plot, but like, it's almost a bum out to think about telling Amanda the plot.

• 29:34Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah, it is extremely grave. And on the, okay, I'll, I'll just say this. One, I think this movie is very well made. I think it is like an accomplished, it is an interesting step forward for these filmmakers, and I think that they are extremely talented. I really liked talking to them. They're like goofball Australians. It's so strange that this is their second movie. I never would have guessed this would have been inside them. I have to give them credit for making something so focused and sticking to its guns. They're very, very gifted. It is a really unfun time at the movies. It is so bleak and so hard to sit through at times. Some of it is like fun horror, but it's a, it's literally a movie about a woman who has lost her daughter. Her daughter drowns, her nine-year-old daughter.

• 30:17Amanda Dobbins?

  Jesus, do you see that?

• 30:18Sean Fennessey?

  And you.

• 30:19Speaker 06

  You see flashbacks.

• 30:20Sean Fennessey?

  In flashback.

• 30:21Speaker 06

  Great. He's actually, he's soft pedaling the opening of the film, which is a snuff film. You open the movie with a snuff.

• 30:28Sean Fennessey?

  It's a snuff film about the sort of revivification of a, of a, a dead person's soul into a different body. That's like the setup for the movie.

• 30:37Speaker 06

  Unlike a fucked up VHS tape. And you're not really sure what's going on, so it just looks like naked guys are killing children, right?

• 30:45Sean Fennessey?

  And there's like drool and blood and pus and kind of like eyes turning black. Like, it is, it is very well made and very upsetting. And it felt a little bit more to me like an early 2000s horror movie. Do you know what I mean by that, Chris? Like, it's not in that kind of like 824 trauma core thing. It's, it was a grungier aesthetic than we usually see in these movies. And then it shifts to a much more classical contemporary style that we see in horror movies where it is like basically a kitchen sink drama with supernatural elements. And Sally Hawkins is a woman who has lost her daughter. She, uh, becomes a foster parent to two children who we see have just witnessed the death of their father.

• 31:22Speaker 06

  A teenage boy named Andy, right? And a, uh, mostly blind girl named Piper!

• 31:29Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 31:32Sean Fennessey?

  Two very good child performances, Billy Barrett and Sora Wong.

• 31:35Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 31:35Sean Fennessey?

  They're really good in this movie and they go to live with Sally Hawkins. Sally Hawkins, you know, a phenomenal British actress, probably best known for her work in Mike Lee films.

• 31:44Amanda Dobbins?

  Right.

• 31:44Sean Fennessey?

  And she-

• 31:45Amanda Dobbins?

  And the Paddington movies until she was rudely replaced without credit.

• 31:48Speaker 06

  Well, this is like a full rebuke of her Paddington past.

• 31:52Sean Fennessey?

  It is amazing that she skipped Paddington 3 to make this movie. This is a remarkable thing that happened. She plays a woman who foster cares kids and who we later learn in the movie had previously been, had previously worked at the, the, the sort of institution that helps place children in homes. And she has lost her daughter and it's sort of slowly revealed that she is attempting to harness the powers of the supernatural to revive her daughter in the body of the young girl.

• 32:26Speaker 06

  Yeah, it turns out that this snuff film that we thought we were watching is in fact for Sally Hawkins's character, like an instructional video.

• 32:33Amanda Dobbins?

  Cool.

• 32:34Speaker 06

  Of how to resurrect people by having a like very specific kind of what she believes to be an angel, do a lot of sucking the soul out of one body and then regurgitating it back into a vessel body and the Piper character is going to be the vessel because like Sally Hawkins's late daughter day, she is also blind. So there's like this perfect symmetry. I don't know, that we, we actually don't get too into the bylaws of resurrection in this film.

• 33:00Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay.

• 33:02Speaker 06

  This movie, yeah, I think I was pretty surprised because Bring Her Back, no, sorry, Talk To Me actually had like, to Sean's point about this being grungy early 2000s, Bring Her Back or Talk To Me had like 90's scream fun to it, you know, there was like teens in peril, but also making jokes at one another's expense, then, you know, punctuated with like these extremely like upsetting moments. Bring Her Back is almost exclusively upsetting moments with none of the fun, which is a choice and it's like a way of, of, of, of doing things and it's much more traumatic. This just happened to feature one or two things that I am not cool with, especially tooth violence.

• 33:47Amanda Dobbins?

  Okay, so that's, that's your line.

• 33:50Speaker 06

  It is a line that I have, you know, it's like I, it is so extreme in this movie that I actually, hand to God, looked away. And I, I rarely, rarely, rarely look away.

• 34:01Sean Fennessey?

  Are you speaking about the butcher block table?

• 34:03Speaker 06

  I'm talking about the cantaloupe, uh, scene. Yeah, the butcher block table.

• 34:07Sean Fennessey?

  Okay, so let's, let's talk about this. This is important.

• 34:10Speaker 06

  You're gonna explain this to her?

• 34:12Amanda Dobbins?

  That's fine. I don't really like melon very much, so.

• 34:15Speaker 06

  That's not the problem. The melon is the least of your worries.

• 34:20Sean Fennessey?

  So, there is an actor in this film named Jonah Ren Phillips. He's, he's, look, maybe a 10 or 11 year old boy, who plays this kid Oliver, who's another boy who's being fostered by Sally Hawkins' character. And he is that sort of like soul transporting vessel, we learn in the movie. He is being groomed to become this sort of, you know, he's described as an angel, but he's clearly like a demon, who has the power. As he becomes less and less human, he, he has this insatiable appetite. And we can't, it's, you know, he wants to eat like live flesh. He wants to eat anything that's in front of him. And this little kid plays this role, and he is very upsetting and very effective. It's an amazing performance by this young kid. And there's a scene in the film when he's sort of left alone at the house,

• 35:06Sean Fennessey?

  where we're getting closer and closer to the potential resurrection, where we're going to have.

• 35:10Speaker 06

  He's getting hungry, quote unquote.

• 35:12Sean Fennessey?

  Yes. The Sora Wong character is out and about. The, it turns out that the corpse of the dead daughter is in a freezer in the back house. And he's getting so hungry.

• 35:24Speaker 06

  And he's there with, with the older boy, Andy, who's really extra, extra to requirements for Sally Hawkins. She doesn't really need him around. So she's gaslighting him. She's peeing on him at night so that he thinks that he's losing his mind. She's doping his, his protein shakes. He's like, real fucked up.

• 35:42Sean Fennessey?

  This is a deranged movie.

• 35:44Speaker 06

  Yeah, it's, this is just like, it's just fucked up, Sville. And then Sean.

• 35:48Sean Fennessey?

  So Oliver is seated at a table, almost like waiting for his next meal. And nothing arrives for him because he's by himself in this house. And he just takes a giant bite out of the table.

• 35:59Speaker 06

  Andy's trying to break through to him. He's like, we, cause Oliver's nonverbal. And so Andy's like, I can, I can break through to this kid. Like I can just reason with him. And he's like, oh, do you want to write? Do you want to write something? And he gives him a pencil and a pad. And he's like, if you write something, I'll, I'll give you some melon, some lunch. But it's like quid pro quo. And he's like, okay. And he cuts this melon with a knife and the kid like reaches out for it. And he's like, here you go. And Andy turns his back. And like, when he comes back, Oliver's like sawing his teeth out with this butcher knife.

• 36:31Sean Fennessey?

  Oh, that was the part you were, you were, you were, you wanted to talk about. Okay. Yeah. That is, um, yeah. Amanda has frozen at an amazingly opportune time. I don't know if she knows that. Should we just continue talking through this, these terrible sequences? We've lost Amanda. Did she sign off?

• 36:49Sean Fennessey?

  Did she tap out from the teeth sawing?

• 36:53Speaker 06

  I miss these kinds of technical disruptions that happen. It really is opportune.

• 36:58Sean Fennessey?

  Especially deep into the description of truly upsetting horror.

• 37:01Speaker 06

  Of dental violence.

• 37:04Sean Fennessey?

  I, um, I, I did find this movie effective and unpleasant, and I don't want to revisit it at all.

• 37:11Speaker 06

  Yeah, that's a, that's a good way of putting it.

• 37:14Sean Fennessey?

  And I, I do think some people really enjoyed it. Amanda, you have returned.

• 37:18Amanda Dobbins?

  I, I literally, he was sitting at the table and waiting for his meal. And then what happens?

• 37:24Speaker 06

  He stabs himself in the, in the mouth with a knife with a cantaloupe at the end of it. And then proceeds to flip out all over the house and starts biting into a wooden butcher's block. And it's just like a lot of mouth blood and mouth, mouth.

• 37:38Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, that's gross. And teeth going places?

• 37:40Speaker 06

  Fuck, yeah. It's just like, I, those are all my stress dreams or like my teeth.

• 37:44Amanda Dobbins?

  Oh, really?

• 37:45Speaker 06

  Cause I grind my teeth. I have to use like a little mouth guard. And when I take it out, I often have like, if I wake up at like six and I want to sleep for like another hour, I'll often take my mouth guard out and then I have like fucked up dreams for that last hour.

• 37:59Sean Fennessey?

  I find that teeth violence is not terribly upsetting to me. But after enduring one hour of a teenage boy being completely gaslit by a deranged woman attempting resurrection, it was a little bit of a cherry on top. I was like, okay, in addition to just being like sad and upsetting, this movie is extremely gross and doesn't resolve itself in the most emotionally satisfying way. I would say everyone is pretty traumatized by the time we get to the end of this movie. Interesting choice by the Filippos to do this, obviously comes from a very personal place. I believe the story is that they were either going to make a new Street Fighter movie or this movie, and they opted not to make Street Fighter and make this.

• 38:41Speaker 06

  Someone is making Street Fighter, though, right?

• 38:43Sean Fennessey?

  Someone is making Street Fighter. I'm not sure who that is right now.

• 38:46Speaker 06

  It's actually me. I was gonna announce this in Chicago, but my directorial debut will be Street Fighter.

• 38:52Sean Fennessey?

  That's really exciting.

• 38:54Amanda Dobbins?

  I saw Chris on Saturday afternoon after he had seen Ballerina and then bring her back in succession. And I just have to say, it was like, not the best CR mood that I've ever witnessed. Uh, when you were talking about the movies, no, you were great. You were like, you were a wonderful party guest and you, you know, hung out with my three-year-old terrorist son and we appreciate you. But like, when you were talking about the movies, you were like, oh, that sucked.

• 39:18Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah. It was tough. I think those are also like tough movies to see alone, because then you walk out and you're like, what have I done?

• 39:27Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 39:30Sean Fennessey?

  Let's pivot to something we did 25 years ago, or at least I did, which is see the movie Dogma and-

• 39:36Speaker 06

  I was right there with you, brother.

• 39:38Sean Fennessey?

  Chris and I, obviously, we pray in the temple of Kevin Smith, especially 20th century Kevin Smith is insanely formative for me as a person. And we've talked, we've kind of hinted at it at times. I think there's honestly a chance to do like a four or five hour episode of a podcast about his movies.

• 39:57Amanda Dobbins?

  Long threatened. I've taken two parental leaves in the time that you've been threatening to do this.

• 40:01Speaker 06

  You fucked up, Sean.

• 40:02Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah, yeah, it was your, you could have done it. It was there for the taking.

• 40:05Sean Fennessey?

  Amanda, I have news for you. I can do it whenever I want. Just because you're not a parental leave doesn't mean I can't do it tomorrow.

• 40:12Sean Fennessey?

  Nevertheless, this was, it was a really kind of interesting experience I just had with Kevin, because I've never talked to Kevin before. I've never met him. He looms large in terms of like my taste and point of view. He's, he's gone through like several cycles of evaluation, but he did the thing that I have been honestly so fond of that he does, which is he just like took over and he just podcasted for an hour because this is something he's been doing for the last 15 years. And by the time he got to the end of his conversation, he almost in a way kind of made me realize one of the things that I really like about him and that is Inside of Dogma, which is that I just really like watching Kevin work out his ideas through character in a, in a movie setting.

• 40:55Sean Fennessey?

  You know, he's often criticized and criticizes himself for his inability to basically like direct well, you know, that he doesn't stage sequences very well. He doesn't block well. He doesn't really have that sense of kinetic visual excitement that so many of his peers, like he kept referencing Tarantino, Linklater, Robert Rodriguez, all the guys he came up with. These guys are such like gifted, dynamic visual filmmakers. But what I like to watch is a Kevin Smith character giving a monologue. Like that actually gratifies me. And obviously it partially invented podcasting. It invented a whole way of living in the world. And Dogma was a kind of like logical endpoint, I think, to what he had been writing through, through that decade, which is sort of like taking the stuff of his childhood and the fascinations of his adolescence,

• 41:41Sean Fennessey?

  Star Wars, video culture, dating, personal relationships, kind of blending them up and making fun of them and about them in movies with his friends. But Dogma is about something much more serious, right? It's about faith. It's about religion. It's about the extension of like how far you can go without actually seeing what is real in the world beyond the world. It's also like a silly action comedy. So revisiting the movie and then talking with Kevin, it's like very personally gratifying experience for me. I loved Dogma when I saw it, even though I was like, this is so strange that every time there's an action sequence, he cuts away to a reaction of a person's face and doesn't show you any action. He doesn't want to shoot the action sequence. But I think there's like a lot of good stuff in it that I want to talk to you guys about, but.

• 42:26Sean Fennessey?

  It was just nice that it's sort of like it held up as a time capsule. I felt a little bit like my dad listening to a classic rock radio station where I was just like, hell yeah, man, the Eagles still fucking rock. Like this is the Hotel California will never be bad to me. And I was comfortable in that. Chris, I know that you saw it at the time. Did you revisit the movie for this chat?

• 42:46Speaker 06

  I sure did. Yeah. And it was awesome. I can't believe how good this is. I was kind of, it almost made me wonder whether or not, you know, the other element to this film is it was in some ways like theatrically controversial at the time, both as a selling point of the film, but also as a performative act of culture war stuff that was going on in the late 90s. But, you know, it was knowingly a hot button movie, you know, like Linda Fiorentino's character in the film works at an abortion clinic. There's a lot of stuff about God and whether he exists or not. There's all, you know, like a lot of stuff about corporatization

• 43:26Speaker 06

  of everyday life going on with the movie corp stuff. And maybe even at the time, I think I remember being like, it feels like he's pressing the button down a little hard with like what he's trying to say about the world. And now, all these years later, I'm like, this completely, A, I feel like I'm way more in agreement, not even in agreement, but it's like, this rules. And two, like, maybe we'll look back on some films that we found overly prescient, you know, over the course of the last five, six, 10 years. And we'll look back on them in 10 years and be like, oh, this was really good. I just didn't, I just had an allergic reaction to it being ripped from the headlines.

• 44:08Sean Fennessey?

  Amanda, did you see it in 1999?

• 44:10Amanda Dobbins?

  Of course I did, because this was post Good Will Hunting, Matt and Ben. And so, I mean, it was like a sense memory, rewatching this, because I was so young, but they are also so young and so charismatic. And obviously, like, they were trained in like the, you know, the Kevin Smith school of just talking a lot and like being a wise ass. But like the two of them on the Like the airport walk, you know, walkouts, they're just like yelling at each other. Like I, I felt 13 again in the, in the best way. And they have it, you know, that's also like a, it was a nice reminder of, oh, so that is why they are now like Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. There is something so powerful.

• 44:53Amanda Dobbins?

  But I do also remember being, you know, I went to the movie theater because it was Matt and Ben. And let's see, I was what 14, 15 when this came out. So like, I had no idea what was going on. I mean, I understood, like, I remember that, you know, the news events, like I knew what the Catholic church was. I was aware of the headlines that it was like something scandalous. And I knew a lot of Smarset was in it, but um, I don't, I, to Chris's point, it's not even that I was like allergic to it. I was just kind of like, what? Okay, well, this is weird that they made a movie about the Catholic church. And so rewatching, and I was like, wow, this is like very smart and, you know, very funny.

• 45:31Amanda Dobbins?

  And it is, you know, talky in the, and like with big ideas and like the tiniest bit of like philosophy 101, like as an undergrad, but actually not in it, it's not annoying. I think it's like, it's like well done and amusing. So yeah, totally holds up.

• 45:50Sean Fennessey?

  I was kind of, I was impressed by the boldness of combining the stupid humor of a giant shit monster with, I thought like fairly sophisticated understanding of the complexity of being raised in the Catholic faith. Like, obviously I related to this movie instantaneously. I was 17, raised in the church, confirmed, spent every Sunday at church. And from the age of probably like nine, all the way through when I stopped going to church at 18, sitting in a pew and just baffled by the utter contradiction of the experience, by the inability to understand mass groups of people not more deeply questioning the illogical nature of the story.

• 46:33Sean Fennessey?

  And the movie takes this really smart choice of using these kind of fallen angels, these descended earthbound angels and having them be. Even though they're the villains of the movie, the vessels for the questioning. Lynda Fiorentino's character is somebody who is also sort of like coping with a loss of, she has faith, but like a loss of hope because she's unable to conceive. And that that using that as a sort of like Virgin Mary North star throughout the story. But Matt and Ben are the ones who get like most of the big speeches and they're the ones who are kind of like dissecting the nature of faith and the nature of their role as, you know, God's disciples. And Matt and Ben, I didn't have the same relationship to them, Amanda, obviously. I wasn't like super horny for those guys, but I was like, these guys are so cool.

• 47:18Sean Fennessey?

  And the thing that Kevin Smith knows is that they're so smart. You can tell that they're really, we know they're really smart guys because we've been watching them do press for 35 years now, but nobody gets Ben Affleck to me like Kevin Smith. Like Matt Damon is the smart guy in Good Will Hunting, but Ben Affleck's the real smart guy to me. He's the one who's actually really bright. It's just that he is like so self-defeating in everything that he does. And he always casts him in roles of the guy who's incredibly smart and great at giving, is great at giving great monologue, but blows it every time, you know? He like, he overreaches. He doesn't quite know how to get out of his own way, which is like such an elegant little, you know, mini portrait of the Ben Affleck experience over the last few decades. And the scene between the two of them in the parking garage in this movie, Oh, yeah.

• 48:01Sean Fennessey?

  Where Affleck is sort of like, has his dawning realization and starts making his pitch to Damon's character. And Damon's like, whoa, man, settle down. Like, you know, we're just two angels here. We don't need to get crazy. Affleck, I'm like, this is like award-winning performance, you know? Like, it isn't a silly movie with Salma Hayek as, you know, a muse who's a stripper and the shit monster and Chris Rock as a, the 13th disciple that we, it was written out of history. But I think I was just surprised, I think Kevin Smith was like in his early 30s or late 20s when he wrote this movie. It's just, it's oddly mature for being as immature and silly as it is. And I agree with you, Chris, like. It's pretty, it's really smart about corporate influence and the bad actors inside and the

• 48:43Sean Fennessey?

  way that they capitalize on people's, you know, inability to go beyond what's convenient for them. And, you know, the George Carlin character in this movie is very funny. This sort of like golfing cardinal who's trying to modernize faith to kind of keep as many people in the church and keep the money flowing into the church as much as possible. George Carlin, obviously like such a huge influence on Kevin Smith. And you can tell when you listen to his monologues, they're basically just like stand-up specials that Carlin was doing in the 90s. I just was, I was, I think I was impressed by this movie. I was like, how did he convince Alan Rickman to do this movie? Alan Rickman just cooking when he's right in that like galaxy quest zone where he's like, yeah, sure. I'm in Sense and Sensibility, but what I really want to be doing is stupid R-rated Hollywood

• 49:26Sean Fennessey?

  comedies. Just, just, the whole cast in general is delightful. I don't know. Any takeaways from the movie, Chris?

• 49:32Speaker 06

  Just like the same sort of, maybe not singular, but maybe generationally defining voice and eye that he applies to Star Wars movies and comic books and his characters in previous films are talking about those kind of more pedestrian things. He applies to like, um, like Catholic doctrine. So listening to these two characters be like, here's the loophole that we'll use to get back into heaven. Or here's, you know, like all these like basically like ideas that these guys have are essentially the same as, you know, the Death Star or, you know, talking about X-Men or whatever, but they're actually talking about the Catholic Church. It's like such an ingenious application of

• 50:17Speaker 06

  a very specific voice and a very specific sensibility. And I gotta say, like, I found it like, I found the end very affecting, like the, the sawing off the angel wing stuff. And, and I just was like, very, very happy to have this movie back in circulation and back in the mix. I wonder whether or not it will, it will kind of get revived. I know he's taking it around and it's doing, I did like a million dollars over the weekend, right? On like, it's, it's like small opening, but. You know, the Askewverse is right there to be rediscovered.

• 50:51Sean Fennessey?

  Amanda, what about you? Any other observations from the movie? And it's, you know, it was, it was gone. And the only way to watch it for years was just on DVD, basically, until they remastered the film in 4K. And as Chris said, basically put it on a thousand screens over the weekend and it made a million bucks.

• 51:05Amanda Dobbins?

  I do wonder what people seeing it for the first time, people younger than us, will make of it and whether it will be totally baffling or if it is sort of just like yet another Rosetta Stone of like, oh, this is why you guys are like this. Like this is why you talk like this. This is how you see. I do think that it does a great job of explaining why those of us who were raised in the 90s think and speak the way that we do, which is, you know, a testament to Kevin Smith and his powers. I'm not like in this, you know, I'm not going to do a five hour podcast with you guys about it, but I have a lot of respect.

• 51:44Sean Fennessey?

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• 52:26Sean Fennessey?

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• 53:11Sean Fennessey?

  Snacks arriving with Prime. What pairs with the big game on Prime Video? That new couch arriving with Prime. Whatever feeling you're after, Prime helps bring it to life with great entertainment and fast shipping that delivers what the moment calls for. From streaming to fast shipping, it's on Prime.

• 53:28Sean Fennessey?

  I wonder if it's, it's gotta be similar to the way that I felt in the 2000s, going back and trying to watch every Elliot Gould movie and being like, oh.

• 53:36Amanda Dobbins?

  Right, yeah, yeah.

• 53:36Sean Fennessey?

  This is why I'm Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice. This is why my parents were the way that they were.

• 53:40Amanda Dobbins?

  Yeah.

• 53:41Sean Fennessey?

  Mash, God, Little Murders. Like you go deeper and deeper and you keep finding these kind of defining cultural aesthetics and points of view that then characterize your favorite annoying podcast hosts who have like a very specific attitude towards things like Ballerina because they were raised in the fire of a movie like Dogma. And it's cool. It's nice. I have no, I actually have no angst whatsoever about getting older and this movie getting older. And I think part of it is because, as you'll hear from Kevin, he's just such an enthusiastic and grateful avatar for this period in cultural history and the work that he was able to do. And it's just like, I mentioned it to him at the time, and I wrote a column about him

• 54:23Sean Fennessey?

  some years ago on The Ringer, how I saw him in 2000, uh, speak at Cornell when I was going to Ithaca College. And it was the, I think it was the second date of what was going to be a four city college tour where he sold out whatever, like 2,000 seats in a theater at a college and just talked about his life. He talked about the things he had been working on, the movies that he had made, the experiences he had, he had had as an independent filmmaker. And then he would open it up for Q and A and he did like two hours of Q and A. And we were there for four hours and it was honestly one of the most fun nights of my life because he opened the doors to the world that he was living in, in a way that no filmmaker ever had to me or really, I think in any way since. And he's just a remarkable storyteller.

• 55:05Sean Fennessey?

  And I view that night as very meaningful for me. It's very much like wanting to get closer to the world that he was living and understand things the way that he was starting to understand them and was willing to share with people why they were the way that they were. So I'll use that as a way to tee up my conversation with, uh, with Kevin Smith. CR, Amanda, thank you guys. Let's go to Kevin right now.

• 55:32Sean Fennessey?

  For the first time ever, Kevin Smith is on the podcast. I'm honored and delighted. And, you know, to prepare for this conversation, I had to break out my special edition 2000 Dogma DVD, because it's been damn hard to find this movie until now. So why is that? Why was it been so hard, even though we all loved it so much in 2000?

• 55:51Speaker 07

  For those who weren't around at the turn of the century, in 1999, let me paint you a picture. Disney doesn't own Marvel yet. Marvel's not even a thing. Marvel's a struggling comic book company that is almost about to fold. The movies are a ways off. So Disney, like a lot of majors, were, for some reason, interested in winning awards. They can make box office numbers, but none of them could win awards like, say, a company like Miramax. Miramax, for those who don't follow film history all that closely, although on the big picture,

• 56:36Speaker 07

  I'd be shocked if you didn't know this, but to put it in the parlance of our times, kids, they were the A24 of their day. All of the interesting shit was coming out of Miramax back then. And so in 1993, I believe it was, Disney, the Walt Disney Company, bought Miramax, which came with the brothers that ran it, tighten your sphincters, I have to say the name out loud, Harvey Weinstein and Bob Weinstein. So I feel, this is my theory, and I can't prove this, but I feel my entire career has

• 57:15Speaker 07

  been a result of a reaction to a criticism that came from the sale of Miramax to Disney. Now, there was no internet then, kids, if you can believe that shit. So if you wanted to let people know you were mad about a thing, you'd write a letter into the newspaper, or you wrote, you know, an article in the paper, you know, and this is pre-internet, versioning internet was just starting to enter homes at this point. There was no, like, way for everybody to get on Twitter and be like, "I'm pissed." There was no Twitter, or even X, or whatever the fuck.

• 57:51Speaker 07

  That being said, when the sale of Miramax to Disney went through, criticism arose. And again, I don't know where we would have heard it. I guess just in articles, probably in the trades, probably in, in a lot of indie filmmaking magazines like Filmmaker Magazine or AIVF, that it was the death knell for independent film. Now that Disney, now that the mouse owns Miramax, nothing interesting will happen. They're gonna start homogenizing, like, you know, Miramax was coming off of The Piano and The Crying Game. Those were gonna be out, out the window. Everybody's clutching their pearls. I honestly feel,

• 58:36Speaker 07

  and again, I never had this conversation with anybody to prove it.

• 58:41Speaker 07

  But I believe that Clerks was purchased at the 1994 Sundance Film Festival, not because of its quality,

• 58:51Speaker 07

  which, if you've ever seen the movie, it looks like it was shot through a glass of milk. It's an enjoyable movie. Audience really got into it.

• 58:56Sean Fennessey?

  It's a wonderful movie, Kevin. Everyone loves it and you know it.

• 58:58Speaker 07

  Wonderful movie, but, but it's, you know, it's outsider art. It's like, you know, it's some kid from Arkansas who's never been anywhere, who made a Mona Lisa. People are like, oh, my God, he made it out of cow shit. Like, it's that kind of thing. So I feel, because, you know, going into Sundance, anyone who could have bought the movie had seen it and passed. We had fans in every company. Your Fine Lines, your Arrow, your IRS, your, Miramax, of course.

• 59:36Speaker 07

  Was October didn't even exist back then. So we had fans in every company, but nobody could pull the trigger. Nobody was in charge. Generally, a youngster who worked in the company was trying to hip somebody to our flick. But nobody could pull the trigger. So when we went to Sundance, we went going like, you know, that's it. The best it could ever be is we're going to Sundance. Which, mind you, was pretty much what Sundance was about in those days. Prior to the year that we went to Sundance in 1994, no film had ever sold at the Sundance Film Festival. Now, well, the festival's changed in many ways over the course of the last few years, but it was defined for a long period of time.

• 1:00:19Speaker 07

  As a Cinderella Story location where these young filmmakers carry their film up to the top of the hill and come down with movie deals. That never happened until 1994. Most deals were made prior to Sundance and after the festival was over. Nobody had ever sold a movie at the festival until John Pearson sold Go Fish. First movie that ever sold at Sundance while the festival was going on. He sold it right before the first screening, I think he was negotiating because it was a unseen, very hot movie. He also represented Clerks. Clerks was the second movie that ever sold at Sundance. So I honestly feel, because then I was introduced to Harvey Weinstein and then I was introduced

• 1:01:00Speaker 07

  to Jeffrey Katzenberg, who had, you know, they were like, this Kevin Smith, he made Clerks. It cost like 30 grand. And he goes, oh, we'll give you 10, we'll give you 3 million, you can make 10 of those. So introduced to like him and knowing the climate at the time, I honestly feel that we were purchased to indicate to anyone who was writing about film that nothing had changed at Miramax. It was almost a defiant like, oh, you think we've sold out to Disney? We are going to pick the filthiest, most foul-mouthed, basic, independent film that

• 1:01:42Speaker 07

  we could find at Sundance and we're gonna slap a fucking Disney logo on that shit. So I do feel like my career was a reaction to the sale of Miramax to Disney. That benefited me. In 1999, it came back to bite us in the ass. So we make Clerks, uh, Miramax picks it up. Next movie we make is Mallrats with Universal Gramercy Pictures, which was co-owned between Universal and Polygram. Um, and then the next thing we do before Mallrats comes out, I'm wise enough to make an overall deal at Miramax with our friend John Gordon, uh, who went on to produce Red State with me and then produced David O. Russell's Academy Award winning movies. He was like, come here, man.

• 1:02:27Speaker 07

  Like you, you did Clerks with us. I don't know why you went to Universal, but set up your shingle here. So we set up our shingle there and Chasing Amy was the first movie we had made under their aegis and then Dogma was the second. They were told from the jump by Michael Eisner, don't make this movie. Like it's gonna cause trouble. Now here's another theory of mine. Again, no proof whatsoever, but this is my theory. Harvey and Bob went through a similar process with what they would go through on Dogma with Larry Clark's first movie, Kids. It was a Miramax film.

• 1:03:10Speaker 07

  Until Disney was like, this is tantamount to child pornography. Get rid of this. Turned it, it was a polemic, according to Disney. So Harvey and Bob, rather than sell it to a competitor, they bought the movie away from Miramax themselves, paid Disney for the movie, and then released it themselves to a company they created called Shining Excalibur. Now, since the Miramax deal with Disney, whatever money came in for those movies went to Disney. And, you know, I think the Weinstein brothers rewarded themselves appropriately. I don't think they were hurting. But all the box office went to the parent company. With kids, all that money went to them. And they made a lot of money.

• 1:03:53Speaker 07

  So my take on the situation was since they knew, since Michael Eisner made it very clear, even to an underling like myself, that like Dogma was not to be made at Miramax. They wanted no trouble, you know, with Catholics or anything. Harvey still made the movie. And I believe it's because, you know, I would like to believe it was because of a commitment to art. I think he knew, if I make this movie and they hate it like they hated kids, I got a model. But this time around, and this is just my contention again, no proof whatsoever. But this is my conjecture and I'll tell you why. But this time around,

• 1:04:38Speaker 07

  why would we pay Disney? Like they're gonna want it gone. So we were initially being kept to a budget of $4 million on Dogma, which would have been nearly impossible. The movie was very ambitious. We barely got it made for the, for the 10 that we had. Because the boys were in Good Will Hunting and Good Will Hunting blew up and they won an Oscar, that gave us more breathing room. We moved to a $10 million budget. I think they wanted to keep it close to four because it's much easier to like make $4 million movie disappear than a $10 million. But I think at the end of the day, the heat was so strong, you know, the Catholic League, it was never the Catholic Church. Some people

• 1:05:21Speaker 07

  like, man, the Catholic Church, Pope never said shit about this movie. Catholic Church, guilty of many things, smart enough to understand if you don't want people paying attention to something, you don't point at it and say its name. We were attacked by the Catholic League, a self-appointed media watchdog group here in the States, run by a guy named Bill Donnie, who had white hair then, so I can't imagine he's still around in this day and age, but he was older then. So they were making all this noise and it got so bad that, you know, we had 400,000 pieces of hate mail, three legitimate death threats. They had to install metal detectors at the Palais in Cannes for the first time because there were death threats. When we showed up at the New York Film Festival to debut the film,

• 1:06:06Speaker 07

  1,000 protesters in front of Alice Tully Hall. So it was pretty contentious. So Disney was like, get rid of this. And I think they were like gladly. And that was it. I don't think, for years, we were told they bought the movie. And I'm like, oh, I guess that makes sense. Like, why would Disney just let them walk away with that? But years later, we asked Disney to provide a receipt. Like, you know, I was, I said, this sounds stupid, but I would have to imagine if ownership of a movie changed hands, there'd be some paperwork somewhere or a receipt indicating that, yeah, they paid us back the $10 million. And we waited to find that for a while. And one of the answers I got back was, all of

• 1:06:50Speaker 07

  this took place before records were digital. So all of this lies in a warehouse somewhere in the valley.

• 1:06:59Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:59Speaker 07

  If, if we can find it, we cannot locate.

• 1:07:02Sean Fennessey?

  The Indiana Jones Ark of the Covenant Museum is where it's hidden. Yeah.

• 1:07:06Speaker 07

  So I don't want to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but having worked at that company, I, I do feel like. Disney was happy to be rid of that movie. And I don't think they were ever doing paperwork to see if they got paid back. An unimportant part of the story, except later on, when I'm trying to get this movie back. You know, I'm like, wait a second, do I even have to get it back? I may own it based on the fact that like, if no money exchange hands, it comes back to the guy who made the movie. So back in the day, Miramax owned by Disney. Uh, they told them, get rid of this movie. Harvey and Bob took it.

• 1:07:47Speaker 07

  They released it not through a company they created, but they broke it up. Theatrical rights went to a fledgling Canadian company called Lionsgate. That hadn't done a lot, but had done enough. Mark Erman was the guy that was running the company, Tom Ortenberg at that point. And they were kind of an indie upstart, did very small films. But Harvey didn't want to let the movie go to focus or let the movie go to fine line. Uh, they were competitors. He didn't see Lionsgate as a threat and he knew Mark Erman and stuff. And so they made a sweetheart deal. Theatrical went through Lionsgate.

• 1:08:29Speaker 07

  When we hit 30 million at the box office, Lionsgate took out a double page ad in Variety going, $30 million! Lionsgate has arrived. You know, years later Lionsgate would go on to make Twilight and Hunger Games and they'd make a lot more than 30, but it was charming. I still have it framed at that Smod Castle Cinemas. So, um, Lionsgate had theatrical and that ended once the movie was done with its theatrical life. Uh, Sony, Columbia TriStar and Mike Stratford, he was the guy who was in charge of DVD division and the, and the father of bonus value material on DVD. He's the one that pushed that forward in the medium.

• 1:09:13Speaker 07

  Um, they had the home video rights. Columbia, uh, not Columbia, uh, Criterion, we had done a Chasing Amy DVD with Criterion. And so they're like, we'll do Dogman a heartbeat. But, uh, Criterion in those days, and it's probably the same still now. Didn't pay as much as like the studio Columbia TriStar was like, we'll give you way more. And so it wound up going there and they did a phenomenal.

• 1:09:39Sean Fennessey?

  It's a great disc. Yeah.

• 1:09:41Speaker 07

  UBD, no complaints whatsoever. So. Let me see, what year? Two thousand eight. I I go from Miramax to the Weinstein Company when when the Weinsteins leave Miramax behind and. Start the Weinstein Company and we do Clerks Two with them in two thousand six and then we do Zachary Mirian two thousand eight and then that was it. And I walked away. So two thousand nine represents the 10th anniversary of Dogma. And so I start writing, hey, 10th anniversary, like what what are we gonna do? Nothing. Um, I go for the 15th, same thing. Hey.

• 1:10:23Speaker 07

  Dogma 15th, what's going on? During this time, they were doing stuff like, remember they had the artist? They were they were back on top, winning awards and shit. So I and my dopey ass movie from a decade or more ago was an. Afterthought, if any thought whatsoever. And I would write and I'd reach out. Nobody ever got back and stuff. I I would hear from people all the time who were like, hey, man, I can't get Dogma anymore unless I pay a hundred bucks on eBay and stuff. I was like, I'm not in charge of that. The video deal must have lapsed. I'll put in a word again and I would write and nobody would write back and stuff. So I didn't talk to anybody at Weinstein or Harvey in particularly.

• 1:11:04Speaker 07

  When I left from two thousand eight, the only other time I spoke to him, because I would reach out, never hear back. When we took Red State uh to Sundance, I was uh, we were, you know.

• 1:11:17Sean Fennessey?

  Doing the auction thing.

• 1:11:19Speaker 07

  Yes. I thought I would save independent film.

• 1:11:22Sean Fennessey?

  It's a cool idea. I liked it.

• 1:11:24Speaker 07

  It's fun. And it also birthed the model that I worked off of for the next 10 years, touring the movie myself. It wasn't a revolutionary idea. Really, I could have truncated the speech down to. I'm gonna take my movies to smaller places and charge more money. Goodbye, you know, and that was it. So it was a model that has worked for us ever since and including just recently with with the Dogma tour. So while I'm there for that Red State screen, you know, we we're telling people, we're gonna auction the movie and shit. And so it was packed and everybody wanted to buy it was there. I'm sitting in the back of the theater and it was at the uh Echols, which is the the the uh school essentially.

• 1:12:02Sean Fennessey?

  Yeah. It's like the grandest room at Sundance. Yeah.

• 1:12:05Speaker 07

  Huge, like a thousand seater or something. But technically it's at the high school. It's just a big high school theater. So if you're in the back, they don't have traditional doors. They got a curtain. And I'm sitting in the back leaning on the back wall watching my flick. And then I hear from out in the hallway.

• 1:12:24Speaker 07

  An unmistakable voice of Harvey. And so I opened the curtain and looked and there he is barking at some underling or something like that. And I close the curtain and because he stopped talking, roll my eyes, go back to watch my movie. Then blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, even louder and shit like that. And if I'm hearing it, that means everyone in the back of the theater is hearing it. And it's at the beginning, first fifteen minutes of Red State. So I did like something completely uncharacteristic. Uh, cause I'm not a brave person, nor am I a tough guy by any stretch of the imagination. I opened the curtain. I said, hey. And he looks over at me. He's talking to his assistant. He looks over and I go, shut the fuck up. And he looked so fucking surprised.

• 1:13:06Speaker 07

  And I was like, I'm showing my movie in here. I would never do this to you if you were showing one of your movies. Shut the fuck up. And I closed the curtain. I waited for him to come storming through and punch me. But he never showed up. So I wouldn't consider that a conversation, but I did address him after I left for after Zach and Mary and between this moment when I get this phone call. I get a phone call one day. And it's like I haven't been at Zach and I left Weinstein Company at least almost a decade ago at this point. And I get a phone call and they go, hold for Harvey Weinstein. So click.

• 1:13:43Speaker 07

  Kevin Harvey say, hey, how are you? And he goes, good. You know what? I just realized I got dogma. I said, yeah, you do. And everyone's always asking me about home video, man, because the Columbia TriStar deal laughs. He goes, I know. He's going like, look, this movie's got an amazing cast. He's going, all these people are still working and, and we could, we could make a sequel. And I was like, what? Yes, I would love to do that. He goes, or at least a streaming series. I got to figure we could carry the story on. Are you interested in that? Said, yeah, man, I'm very interested. He goes, all right, so I'll give you a call next week. We'll get into this. And I was like, all right. And I hung up and I was so fucking excited because I felt like I'd been forgotten. Like a part, an important part of indie film history for Miramax in the beginning. And then when we left, they were like, fuck them.

• 1:14:25Speaker 07

  And, you know, this is also right around the time, same time, the, the internet is also to some degree like, fuck them. So it's kind of starting to feel like, oh my God, like, we never should have left, but we did. And I was trying to make it on my own and stuff like that. And so the fact that suddenly he was talking about Dogma again, after me trying to fucking like remind these cats, hey, you own this movie, was music to my ears, man. Couldn't wait. Three days later, the New York Times piece comes out. And I was like, you know, like, I, I've seen many people online be like, they, everyone had to know. Nobody knows when somebody's fucking committing crimes. They don't broadcast that kind of shit.

• 1:15:06Speaker 07

  So all of us who I know were like fucking reading the New York Times like, holy shit. So you start calling everybody that you ever worked with to be like, what the fuck, man? What the fuck? Did you know what the fuck? So I'm talking to John Gordon, who's our exec there for years. And then, you know, John went on to, he ran Universal for Red, one Red Hot Minute with Donna Langley. And then, then he went on to like produce, well, he produced Red State with me, but then he made like David O. Russell's like award winning movies and shit. So I'm talking to John, because I met John at Miramax. He was our guy that got us to do the overall deal. So we come up together. So I was like, you know, oh my God, this is fucking, what a horror show. What the fuck?

• 1:15:51Speaker 07

  So after we talked for like 10, 15 minutes, I said, John, I said, I gotta tell you something. And, and it honestly makes me fucking queasy and I feel dirty. He's like, what? I said, this guy called me last week. He goes, what? I said, I haven't heard from this dude in like a decade. And he called me last week to talk about doing a Dogma sequel. And I got real fucking excited, man, because like, I've always wanted to like revisit Dogma. And like, you know, after I've been trying to get in touch with them, talking about the home video deal lapsing and the anniversaries. Like, that was music to my ears. And John goes, he's real sober as a judge. He goes, Kevin, he had no interest in Dogma. He was just calling to see if you were one of the people who was a source for the New York Times article.

• 1:16:35Speaker 07

  If you didn't answer the phone, he would have assumed you were one of the sources. But the fact that you answered the phone and you were happy to hear from him, told him that you were oblivious. So he had no intention of doing anything with Dogma. He was just casing himself before he knew the inevitable was about to happen. So in terms of the egregious things that Harvey Weinstein's done, let's all agree, that doesn't even make the fucking list. But it was, you know, yet another fucking blow and, and it just, it sucked, you know? And then what, but what sucked even worse was finding out Clerks, Chasing Amy, Dogma,

• 1:17:15Speaker 07

  Jersey Girl, Clerks 2, Zach and Mary. These were all made under the aegis of this guy. Like my dreams came true under this monster. For others, he was this fucking nightmare. So he carried our cross with you. Like, you know, up until then, there'd been no price for my art, so to speak. And now it's like, oh, like for me, there'll always be this kind of taint to it. So what happened, happened and he went through some legal troubles, wound up in jail. For the 20th anniversary, as the 20th was coming, I started reaching out again. Cause I was like, you know what, man? Like, maybe he'll just sell it now.

• 1:17:55Speaker 07

  So I wrote a heartfelt letter to a convicted rapist, sent it in through the lawyer, saying, "Look, you made many movies. I've only made a few. This one is tied in with my childhood faith, with my dead father. You're not doing anything with it. Please sell it back to me." And I offered 250 grand. It was a place to start. Heard back from the lawyer, absolutely not. Wrote another letter, offered 500 grand. Heard back from the lawyer, absolutely not. That's about where I could go, and that would have been me closing Jane's Silent Bob's Secret Staff. So beyond that, I had to reach out to some people who might have a vested interest in seeing Dogma live further and whatnot. Then

• 1:18:36Speaker 07

  I got back to the dude, wrote another letter, offered a million bucks. Still heard back from the lawyer, no. So what we'd heard from inside was, he was holding out for 5 million. And if I had 5 million dollars, like, I'd make a brand-new movie. Motherfucker buying some old-ass movie. I love Dogma, but... So at that point, that was that. I was like, I'm never gonna get 5 million for it. And even if I could raise 5 million, like, I wouldn't feel good about paying that. And it would take a long time to make that kind of money back in this environment. Like, shit, 10, maybe 15 years ago, we could earn

• 1:19:16Speaker 07

  that back with, you know, home video licensing deals and stuff, and just selling DVDs and Blu-rays. Now, in the streaming age, it's just, it's a different world altogether. So it would take me, if I spent 5 million to buy that movie, of my own money, which I don't fucking have, so I'd be on the hook for money to somebody else, it would probably take me 10 years, if I could earn it out, you know, just by licensing the movie, showing the movie, not talking about making a sequel or turning it into something else. So I was like, you know what, maybe it's for the best. I didn't have the money anyway, so fuck it. Then, eight months ago, I get this phone call from Alessandra Williams,

• 1:20:00Speaker 07

  who's like, "I have Dogma. Would you like to come talk about it?" And I was like, "Well, you have my interest. I'm intrigued." So I met with her at the Sam and Zendaya bungalows. And she, what we learned at that point, what we were told then, was she was in charge of a company, a hedge fund, that bought a tranche of movies from Harvey Weinstein. He was going back into court. I guess he's in court right now. So he knew he needed money, and I guess he liquidated whatever assets he had left. So in this tranche of movies was some karate films, I guess he had bought in the wake of Kill Bill. Larry Clark's movie, Kids.

• 1:20:44Speaker 07

  Michael Moore's movie, Fahrenheit 9/11, which went through the same experience that me and kids went, that Dogma and kids went through, with Harvey and Bob buying that movie personally and releasing it and making a hundred million dollars. And Dogma. So, you know, they sold off everything and they were like Ben Affleck's in this. So, you know, she was like, "So we have it." And I was like, "Can I buy it?" And she was like, "No." So I was like, "Fair enough." And she was like, "What would you do with it? What would you want to do with it?" And I said, "Well, I've been touring movies lately." You know, like Clerks 3, Jane's Son Bob Strike Back, all the way back to Red State. Like, it's great. It's a party and stuff. And this movie would be like an instant, easy fucking sell. Are you kidding me?

• 1:21:28Speaker 07

  Like, you know, I didn't tour the 430 movie because I was like, "Oh, man, I'd have to educate everybody on this, what this is." Clerks 3, Jane's Son Bob reboot, easy to tour because people are like, "Well, I know what the originals are and stuff." And Dogma, I was like, "Oh, my God." Taking out that movie, like, in this day and age, where people are like, "Take me back to the fucking 90s." Like, it was gonna be an easy sell in my book. So she was like, "Would you put it in theaters, re-release it?" And I was like, "Well, I mean, the way we do it is we just go to like big theaters, four-wall and shit like that." And she goes, "You wouldn't just put it on a big screen again?" And I was like, "I don't think anybody's interested in that sort of thing." June 5th, the movie comes out on like fifteen hundred screens everywhere. Because I, at one point, I was like, look, why don't you sniff around AMC, man?

• 1:22:12Speaker 07

  Like, instead of sniffing around a studio, found a partner. AMC did that deal with Taylor Swift, and she seems very smart, so why not try that out? And so she did it, and bam, we're coming out on all these screens. So, I was like, I thought I knew the story. Then about, shit, six weeks ago, eight weeks ago? Well, at this point, because I went on tour for the whole last month, so maybe at this point, ten weeks ago. Um, Alessandra's like, hey, I produced a movie that's at the Beverly Hills Film Festival. Will you go watch it? And I said, oh my god, absolutely. So, I go watch the flick, is it Beverly? Interestingly enough, the Beverly Hills Film Festival is at Roma's Chinese Theater, which is not in Beverly Hills, for those that don't live in the area. But it was an easy walk for me, because I live right up the hill from the Chinese.

• 1:22:56Speaker 07

  So I went to watch the flick, had a good ass time. I talked, texted her afterwards, I said, hey man, like, I have a festival at my own movie theater. I said, I got, you know, I got Smog Castle Cinemas over in Atlantic Islands, New Jersey. And the fourth edition of the film festival's coming up, so if you give me a link, I'll submit the movie to Ernie, you know, Ernie O'Donnell, who runs the place, and he'll put it in the festival. And she goes, oh my god, that'd be great, then my mom could see it. And I was like, oh, does your mom live in Manhattan? Because we're like across the, the river from, from the city. And she goes, no, my mom lives across the street from the movie theater. And I was like, we've been working together this long, is the first time you thought to mention that? And she goes, well, I didn't want to creep you out. And I was like, too late? And she goes, well, it gets even creepier.

• 1:23:41Speaker 07

  I said, what? And she goes, you know Jane, Silent Bob, Secret Stash? I said, quite well, it's my comic book store. And she goes, I used to work at Coco Peri, right down the street. And I was like, who the fuck are you, man? And then finally, she dropped dime. So at age 10, her very permissive mother lets Alessandra watch Dogma. And she loves it. Some of it she understands, some of it she don't, but she watches it over and over again. Alessandra grows up, becomes an actress, producer, mover and shaker. She's one of the most insanely well-connected people I've ever met in my entire life. And I haven't met her until recently. So she's sitting around, I guess, watching fucking YouTube,

• 1:24:22Speaker 07

  or she sees me give an interview someplace where I'm sitting there going like, ah, I tried to get the movie back from Harvey, but we can't get Dogma back. And she goes, oh, my God, I used to love that movie. More people should see it. I'm gonna help him. And that's exactly how we wound up here. She went and fucking raised money, and then hit up his lawyer and right place, right time, I guess that dude needed money more than he needed it when we were trying to fucking get the movie five years ago or whatever the fuck. Cause he sold off that tranche of film store, and she was able to sell off the other movies and be like, great, now we can concentrate on fucking Dogma. So she's like, you know, would you ever think about doing a sequel?

• 1:25:04Speaker 07

  I was like, uh, yes, like, fuck, yeah, that'd be fantastic. When I started my career, I was like, I'll never do a sequel. I got enough original ideas to last me a lifetime. But, you know, you can watch Clerks 3 on home video right now. So in a world where I'm open to playing with my toys again, as I like to express it, you know, fucking Dogma would be amazing to play in that sandbox again. Because the kid who made Dogma, who wrote it and directed it, believed in everything you see on the screen. Like, that's not him making fun of religion. That's his fucking faith. I don't have that belief, those beliefs anymore. Now I have good ideas, as we say in the movie. So heading into a Dogma follow-up

• 1:25:48Speaker 07

  is a complete, is coming in from a completely different angle. The one I, that we've seen that people like, not the one I'm gonna make that everyone will hate, but the one that I made that people like, came from like 21, 22 years of a life, including eight years of, you know, Catholic school, 12 years of being an altar boy, every Sunday in church and whatnot. So it was fed by my faith, and I, I wouldn't say I fetishized my faith, but I was a big fan of being Catholic. It was a big part of my identity and stuff. And then now... I don't have that way in anymore. Now, there's less life in front of me, you know, than there was behind me, which is the reverse of where I was when I wrote Dogma.

• 1:26:32Speaker 07

  I I'm not in the same, the same cosmology does not wash for me in the, in this day and age. So it's presented like this crazy bridge back into the material from the complete other side. Young man wrote that first movie. An old man who's scared of dying and almost died a few years ago and then went crazy two years ago is the one that's writing the sequel. So buckle up, kids. No, no, you know, if you love Dogma, just keep on loving it. No guarantees on the sequel, but I'm having a fucking blast writing it. And I couldn't have done it unless Alessandra just came out of the woodwork. Now, that point of that whole story is I know people and I made that movie

• 1:27:15Speaker 07

  and I have direct connections to all the players and could get money. And I could not make any of this happen. We're literally living in Alessandra's dream. She was able to accomplish what I couldn't with my own movie. As, you know, the, what the kids say nowadays, she can manifest. The, the best manifester I've ever met in my life. If you're an up and coming filmmaker or a seasoned old, uh, pro or an honest, down and out fucking old broken boxer of a filmmaker like myself, get to know this woman. I, it's fucking crazy. Like, we went to Cannes. I just got back from fucking Cannes. I'm like, I'm doing this as if I need proof. Here's my fucking Cannes badge from 2025.

• 1:27:58Speaker 07

  We, I've been to Cannes three times in my life prior to this trip. Once in 1994 with Clerks. Total accident. I never thought, you know, I was making a movie that would go to Cannes. Um, we went into International Critics Week and wound up winning the Prix de la Junes, the Prize of You, and the International Critics Week Prize. Fucking nuts, just blind locked first timer, whatever the fucking shit. So never, I never had an expectation of going to Sundance. Like I didn't make Clerks thinking about Sundance because I was like, oh, they only take color movies. Let alone did I ever think about Cannes. So I go with Clerks and oh my God, like what a first time. We go back in 99 with Dogma. This time we're official selection.

• 1:28:41Speaker 07

  So we get to walk up the Palais steps and we screen in the big theater in the Palais, but it's out of competition. So that's my second time to Cannes and magical. Third time, 2006, we go back with Clerks two. Once again, we get to walk the Palais step. It's midnight screening. We then go into the Debussy Theater for that. We get eight minutes standing ovation. Last time I was in Cannes, 19 years ago. It's been 19 years. What I assumed was being communicated was we're good. You know, with Kevin Smith movies because it's been a red hot fucking minute. Since I ever got anywhere near the festival and shit. So I had accepted that like I, you know, I'm one of these cats.

• 1:29:24Speaker 07

  It's like I'm a George Carlin acolyte, so I believe in entropy. He taught me about it at a young age in his comedy routines. Everything breaks down and shit. So in my head, everything's always breaking down. So in my head, I was like, well, you'll never go back to Cannes. That was a time in your life that's magical and the beginning of your career. But you didn't wind up being a Cannes type filmmaker. You don't make Cannes worthy movies anymore. So like, enjoy the fact that you ever went. I had my three certificates framed on the wall, my laurels and shit. And then all of a sudden, all of a sudden it was like, I submitted the movie to Cannes, Dogma for this year. I was like, I, I, I don't, that don't matter. We already went, like they ain't gonna take it. They took it like we wound up in a section I didn't even know existed called Cannes Classics, which normally the movie has to be 50 years old.

• 1:30:09Speaker 07

  But these cats were like, fuck it. And they said, let us go over. So I'm like, holy shit. Like I never thought I was gonna go back to Cannes, but I get to go back on the wings of, of Dogma. How, you know, pun intended, how awesome. So when I went back, I went back just ready for the victory lap. Like, you know, and last time I was there, Jennifer was pregnant with Harley. So she's walking up the steps and Harley's in her gut. This time I was like, oh, we could bring Harley. She could walk up the steps herself, man. It'll be fun and shit. So we went. With no expectation, I well, I should say, I went with zero expectation of just anything but, oh, how nice, they remember me here. And as I was walking around the closet for like the week that I was there, man, like,

• 1:30:53Speaker 07

  it was crazy. It was like I was seeing all the places of my youth. I mean, you know, it's not like shit changes in in the south of France, like it's beautiful and it stays beautiful. So there's the pizza place that me and Scott Mosher ate at when we first landed in Nice and we were fucking terrified. Didn't know what was going on and shit. Everyone speaking French and we're there with our dirty little black and white American film, which David Lindy, who was in charge of international sales at Miramax in the day, uh, and then he would go on to run Universal years later. He swore to us at the Sundance Film Festival, he goes, I'm gonna sell the shit out of this movie. It it oversees. And I was like, what? Why? How? Everyone speaks English. And he goes,

• 1:31:35Speaker 07

  that's why. He goes, this movie is so American, they're gonna eat this up. So when we went to Cannes, we got into the International Critics Week. Miramax went to work selling movies and sold it everywhere, you know, so like I had this kind of international profile at the beginning of my career. So as I'm sitting there walking up and down the closet, I'm like, there's that place. There's this place. I walked past the venue where they were doing International Critics Week, man. And I was like, oh, like I saw the award ceremony and people heading in. And I got like real misty where I was like, oh, my gosh, you tell them like, hey, man, I won the prize here. I'm I'm looking at the International Critics Week award ceremony, watching everybody, youngsters and oldsters going in.

• 1:32:17Speaker 07

  And I'm I'm like, do I tell them? Do I go like, hi, man, I'll give an award out, like I got one a few years ago. And then I remembered, it wasn't a few years ago, it was thirty one fucking years ago that we were at Cannes, you know, so as I'm going up and down, I was like, you know, why do you assume that you'll never make a Cannes-worthy movie? I'm very open to influence and always have been. And I've been a creature of the internet since its inception. So the internet has always told me like, you're bad, Kevin. And I'm like, yeah, you're right. So the internet tells me I suck at my job. I'm like, yeah, you're right. Just easier to believe. And I'm a codependent people pleaser. When I went nuts and I went to the booby hatch, they diagnosed me. Codependent people pleaser who cannot validate himself.

• 1:33:02Speaker 07

  So naturally, I'm prone to suggestion. So I, I just felt like, well, I guess, I guess everyone's right. Like, you know, I was, I did things when I was young and now I'm just waiting for the clock to run out. And I always kind of like chalked it up to like, yeah, I had your time and your time was wonderful. And I have no complaints and stuff, but I had zero expectation that that journey would ever continue. Like that part of my life I felt like was over. And now, like I wa- I'm telling you, it lit a fire into me. And where I was like, you know what, man? Come back one more time. Like sincerely try to come back. I never tried

• 1:33:42Speaker 07

  to come the first three times, right? Like I didn't try with Clerks. I didn't try with Dogma. We thought Dogma would be a Sundance movie. Um, and I didn't try with Clerks too. The timing just worked out. So I was like, just for once in your entire fucking career, before you leave this best of all possible world, try to go to Cannes. Let's see what happens. And so we were in the 78th edition this year. So I'm gonna try to go back for the 80th. The latest, the 81st, man. If I can, but if I can rush real fast and pull everything together and, you know, it could be that I can make it in time for 80. So I was on stage at the opening of, of the Dogma screening, which was like just last week, uh, eight days, nine days ago.

• 1:34:26Speaker 07

  And so, uh, Terry Formo like brings, brings me up on stage and, um, it was so lovely. They gave me like a standing ovation just for showing up, which I was like, oh, I'm old enough now where people are like, hey, he's been around for a long time. So when I was up there, I told them the exact story I told you. I was like, I, you know, honestly, I've been bitten by the bug. I said, I'm gonna come back in 80, the Cannes 80 with a Dogma sequel. And the whole audience like,

• 1:34:53Speaker 07

  And then Terry Formo on stage goes, if it is good. That was a yes, good point, excellent point. Way to bring my dreams crashing right back to reality, Terry. So, but the dream I'm in right now is not even my dream. This is Alessandra's dream. It's crazy that like somebody so completely out of the side of the situation, defined the current situation for Dogma, defined what it is now. So I've been out on the tour with the movie Twenty Cities for the last month. And then I did Cannes and my God, it's been blissful re-engaging with the movie. Cause I have no choice but to watch it over and over again. And I get to see all my favorite people when they were at their absolute youngest. Oh my God, they look so young.

• 1:35:37Speaker 07

  Matt Damon looks like Matt Damon's daughter in the movie. So fucking baby faced and shit. So it's been absolutely lovely and I have Alessandra to thank for it.

• 1:35:47Sean Fennessey?

  So, hearing you tell that entire story, I was teleported back to Cornell in 2000 where I saw you speak.

• 1:35:55Speaker 07

  Were you there? Were you at the Cornell show?

• 1:35:56Sean Fennessey?

  I was. Um, and candidly, um, kind of magical night for me. And I was a huge fan before that, but what you were doing in front of all of us, which is what you just did, which is speaking at length, in depth, charmingly, with incredible, um, self disregard, but we all knew you were the man. It was, it's a very interesting magic trick that you're able to pull where you constantly point out that you think that people think that you suck, but we all love you, which is a great move.

• 1:36:29Speaker 07

  I do though, I do. It's like, it's not you and it's not the people who do like my stuff. But you know, again, I'm, I'm, I'm a big boy. I was raised on the internet, thank God. So I met the first troll in the beginning. I remember his name was B Busters, lovely dude. I still know him to this day. His name's Mike. And he lived to be like, you suck and all this is, all these people who like you are stupid. And so that negative reinforcement, since I was, you know, raised Catholic, much easier to accept about oneself. You gotta remember. Like Martin Scorsese wanted to be a priest until he heard a different calling altogether. And that was his true vocation.

• 1:37:11Speaker 07

  But Martin Scorsese was put on this earth to tell stories with images. He is a true bona fide filmmaker, same as Quentin, same as Richard, Robert. These are cats that were put on this earth, Spielberg, to make movies. I was just a movie fan who was like, that looks fun and aggregated to trying it. And that first attempt was not meant to be the start of a career. It was meant to be like, well, if I make this right, then if I ever try to do this again, maybe somebody will give me money. I don't have to put it on my own credit cards. So the journey winds up ironically beginning off of the first effort. And I've been ill-prepared ever since, man. When I was on tour with Dogma, there was a guy, I think it was in Chicago.

• 1:37:56Speaker 07

  He was lovely. He was sitting in like the second row and during the Q and A after the movie, he goes, has his hand up, I said, yeah. He goes, I've been watching you for years, 30 years. He's gone, I started with Clerks and stuff and I've seen you. He goes, this is my 19th time seeing you live. And I was like, oh, my God. He goes, now I bring my adult children. And he had a bunch of 20-somethings sitting around him and stuff. And he goes, I just gotta know, I've always wondered, what's your end game? And I was like, I don't, I don't have one. I was like, it's so weird. Like, I wasn't ready for any of this. Like, I wish I'd been prepared for a life in cinema or a life on the public stage or whatever the fuck. And I'm not saying like, you know, I don't want it.

• 1:38:38Speaker 07

  Of course, I, I went after it, but I, I didn't think any of this was gonna happen. So I've just been making it up as I go along. So I told him, I said, look, my end game at this point, die on a movie set. Just go out toes up, doing what I love and doing what most people associate me with. Robert Altman, who was, you know, one of the greatest American filmmakers who ever lived, went out for my money, the absolute right way. Like, he died making a movie. He, you know, allegedly a massive stoner in his old age, which is, you know.

• 1:39:16Sean Fennessey?

  Admirable.

• 1:39:17Speaker 07

  Why not?

• 1:39:17Sean Fennessey?

  Yes.

• 1:39:19Speaker 07

  And then he had, he left this world with the comfort of knowing Paul Thomas Anderson will finish the movie. Like, take me out that way. Like, oh, my God, that's the dream right there. So that's the kind of ethos that now informs Dogma. You gotta remember, the first time it was written, none of this shit. Like, no career, no, what do people think about me? None of that. Like, now going back into it and writing a Dogma sequel, it's such a weird, different journey because I'm, for lack of a better description, I'm at the tail end of my fucking life at this point. I wrote Dogma at the beginning of my life. So it's, it's, I think it's worth the journey so far.

• 1:40:03Speaker 07

  I, you know, I feel like if you're good at this job, you know, the fucking movie begins for the audience before they even get to the theater. That's why I'm always talking about shit long for whatever. And if you're a magician, the movie keeps going. Like, for a lot of people in my world, Dogma has never ended. It coming back to theaters, they're like, oh, that's nice, but I saw it at Kev's Theater like last year and stuff. So I, I, I tend to keep things going, extending them. Sometimes like the movies branch off, not in, into strict sequels, but they're all interconnected. Sometimes I can write about them in comics and stuff like that. But my favorite way to keep the story going is this. Like, honestly, I'm, I'm pretty convinced that the last 20 years of my career have been me making movies just so I can go on stage and be like, let me tell you a story

• 1:40:48Speaker 07

  about making a movie. Um, I, I ran into, not even ran into, I went to the, they asked me to present an editing award, uh, to Waters. So they were like, you know, give a speech and then get out of the way because fucking Waters, he's like me, he loves the sound of his own voice. And he did not disappoint. His speech was fucking wonderful. But when we were backstage after the ceremony and stuff, taking selfies and shit. He said something to me that I that I really loved. Him and I, you know, he's he's an absolute maestro and whatnot. But him and I are similar in the way in as much as we're we're both very chatty.

• 1:41:31Speaker 07

  And, you know, I've I've seen many people say the same thing of him of me, which is like, you know, I'm not a real big fan of his movies, but I can listen to that guy fucking talk forever and stuff. And so I was I got to, you know, I saw John and I was just like, hey, man, I got a movie theater, like, can you come and do what you do? I know you and I, we do a similar thing and stuff like that. And he and then he told me about this like gig that he was just about to go to. And it was a pretty cool gig. And I was like, oh, that's awesome. And he goes, it's all storytelling. He goes, whether I'm on a movie set, whether I'm standing there telling the story of making these movies is going, I'm a storyteller, so it doesn't really matter what venue I'm in.

• 1:42:13Speaker 07

  And he's going in lately, this is the easiest venue to go into, like where he could just talk. And he's such a raconteur and he's got experience and wisdom on his side, so he's very easy to listen to. You know what I'm saying? He can talk the talk and walk the walk and plus he's just engaging as fuck. So I'm not saying, I ain't saying like Waters is like me, untalented. Waters is a genius. But I'm the filmmaker who, you know, like, I always think of Fincher. Fincher's a filmmaker who makes a movie and never fucking says shit. You know what I'm saying? He puts it out there and fucking.

• 1:42:45Sean Fennessey?

  He won't come on this show, Kevin. I've been trying to get him for 10 years.

• 1:42:47Speaker 07

  I met him finally at, I don't know if I'm, well, I mean, yeah, it happened. Ben Affleck and got married a couple of years ago and I think that's over. But I was at that wedding and I was standing outside. And was I, yeah, I just, I was, I can't remember if I was a smoker in those days. I don't think I was. So I'm standing, no, I was. So I was standing outside going grab a smoke. And this dude comes out. And we're standing there bullshitting for a second and then he goes, uh, Kevin, I never introduced myself, David Fincher. And I was like, that's what you look like? I was like, holy shit. I had no idea, man.

• 1:43:31Speaker 07

  Like, he's the filmmaker that like, you know, he ain't like, you know, fucking Charles Foster Kane.

• 1:43:36Sean Fennessey?

  He's not a recluse. Yeah, he just doesn't do a lot of stuff.

• 1:43:39Speaker 07

  You don't feel the need to go out and explain his fucking art. That's what I love about him as an artist. Like, he puts it out there. He's like, fucking the movie says everything I need to say. Cause that's the way it used to be done. I'm of a generation of filmmakers that because of Miramax, were pushed out in front of their movies because we were the cheapest way to market. Like, that's the only way I wind up being this guy. Because back in the day, I was the genius of Miramax's like no budget release of a movie. You got yourself a movie comes from France. You got yourself a movie comes from America. Made by unknowns, starring unknowns. You're not gonna get on The Tonight Show or Letterman or Good Morning America unless you got some famous people. Except,

• 1:44:25Speaker 07

  they found that these kids with their charming stories about how they got their movies made by hook or by crook, made for good TV and made for good like, you know, interviews. So, we were pushed out. That's how you know me, Quentin and Richard and Robert. We were of a generation of filmmakers where they were like, go speak for your work. And the directors, I'm not saying, nobody ever knew a director's name, obviously. George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, George Clooney. I mean, there are names, of course. But generally speaking, directors weren't the sexy. You didn't necessarily know the director's name unless you were Sin East and stuff. But now mainstream people who don't really even consider themselves film fans, so to speak, can tell you a Wes Anderson flick, you know, to say the very fucking least.

• 1:45:11Speaker 07

  So, but at that point, man, like, it was a, like, a different world altogether. And so, I, I feel like those cats were put on this earth to do it. I'm part of a generation that was just such a big fan that I was like, I wanna try it. And it worked out for me and stuff. And, and I still, I, I, I think about my man's question all the time. I'm like, what is my? You know, like, it should be like, win an Oscar, but that shit like is like, it was never part of my makeup. You might as well tell me to like, win a fucking Grammy. You know what I'm saying? Like, at least an Oscar makes more sense because I work in film, but I just never saw myself as a guy who made awards. Movies. And so, you know, it's, it's very easy for me to.

• 1:45:56Speaker 07

  Slag on, on Kevin Smith. Now, that being said, like, obviously, it doesn't affect me to the point where I like, I can't get anything done. Perhaps it's fuel. Like, you know, perhaps. I tell people that, that don't like me and come after me on the internet. I'm like, hey, man. You could do that, but it's a complete waste of your fucking time. Nothing good's gonna come of it. What you do is you use me as your avatar, as your, as a, as a, as a lily pad of some sort and recognize the fact that if I'm such an idiot and I'm making it work, then. It is inevitable that you, who are full of talent, are going to accomplish the thing as well. And when you do accomplish that thing, guess who you don't care about anymore?

• 1:46:37Speaker 07

  Kevin fucking Smith, because your dreams are coming true. So you're not sitting there going like, I hate this fucking guy. Suddenly, I'm just another cat doing the fucking job. And I know wherever I speak. Because I have been that person. There was people that I cared about before I did my thing, and then I did my thing, and. I don't care about them anymore. Are you kidding me? Like, I count my blessings, keep my head down and do my own fucking thing. So I, you know, it's, it's, it's been an interesting. Ride career wise, but it's so meta. Returning to dogma country in a way that I like, not just like, hey, we're doing a sequel one day, but like.

• 1:47:15Speaker 07

  To be out there and, and like, you know, meeting people who are like, I saw this movie with my grandmother. She's dead now, but that's why I came out to see it tonight. In memory of her, or, hey, man, I watched this with a girl when I was a kid, and now we got three kids together. It's your fucking fault. And then just some people who like, weren't around, like, you know, so many fucking young people came with their parents. It was like, you were cum when this movie happened the first time. But the most delightful.

• 1:47:43Speaker 07

  Public screening and I loved them all, don't get me wrong, the tour was great. Um, in Cannes, every night I would always ask the audiences like, "How many people have seen Dogma before?" And 98% of the audience would be like, "Ooh." I'd be like, "How many people have never seen Dogma in a theater before?" And then it would definitely be a high number, but not, a high percentage, not as high as like, "How many people have seen Dogma?" And then I'd be like, "And then how many people have never seen Dogma before tonight?" And it was always like, under 10. We'd make fun of people for overpaying $50 to see a movie they've never seen. I was like, "This movie could suck, fuck." When I went to Cannes and did that same thing, I was like, "How many people have, uh, seen Dogma before? Put your hands together." And it was the reverse, like, the, very few people had seen it in that room.

• 1:48:27Speaker 07

  I thought I was going to a room full of people who were like, "Hey, it's Cannes classic." But there were a bunch of fucking young kids in there that had never seen the movie. So I wasn't gonna sit there and watch the flick, but then I was like, "How do I pass this up, man?" Like, some of the kids there are American, working at the American Pavilion, but some of the kids are just in the east from France, Spain, all over Europe and shit. So I was like, "I can't pass this up, man. Like, what's it gonna play like for the fresh audience?" I've been on a nostalgia tour, where everyone coming to see it has seen it before and has a built-in affection for it. So to have this like, clean screening, so to speak, or the cleanest one I've had in a while, with a bunch of people that admitted like, "I've never seen this movie", was intriguing to me and it was so fucking rewarding, man. Cause it was like, oh, like,

• 1:49:11Speaker 07

  now after all these years, I'm like, "I think people just laugh in all these places to be polite." Like, it's the same way I think my wife just pretends to come to be polite. So being at that fucking screening, I was like, "These motherfuckers ain't pretending shit." Like, some of them are struggling to understand the language and they're still keeping up with it. So that felt good. It, like, I spend a lot of time hearing shit about me as a filmmaker, people telling me that I'm no good at my job. But there are moments where I'm like, "I don't know, like, like, not every movie gets to go to Cannes and I have one that went fucking twice. I've got two sets of laurels on one movie, like, and I know that was an old movie, so people can amend it and be like, "Well, you haven't made a good movie in a long time." That's fine, whatever. But like, I, I, I don't know, I, this is the one thing I feel satisfied about.

• 1:49:58Speaker 07

  When I'm done.

• 1:50:01Speaker 07

  Nobody's gonna try to replicate this stupid ass career. You know what I'm saying? It will be singularly mine, like a work of art. Like, people be like, eh, I ain't gonna try that. It was fucking dumb. He made a lot of mistakes, but it is his, you know? So I, I kind of appreciate that aspect.

• 1:50:17Sean Fennessey?

  I know you gotta go. I'm gonna proffer a quick theory and then I'm gonna ask you the last question. The theory is this. I think everything that you said is true about the way that you guys were utilized to market the movies and that you, this was a pathway to being able to talk publicly. But I would argue, and you can agree with it or disagree with it, but that maps perfectly onto your art. There is a sequence in Dogma where Ben gives a speech in a parking garage to Matt's character. And I was like, that's how Kevin's brain works. There are moments when Jeff Anderson is talking in the Clerks films and I'm like, that's how Kevin's brain works. There are sequences when Jason Lee's characters are talking in your movies and I feel like that's how Kevin's brain works. In the same way that when I was in the audience in Cornell and when I've been listening to your podcasts and seeing what your life and career has become over the last quarter century.

• 1:51:02Sean Fennessey?

  I'm like, I just like Kevin's brain, you know? And maybe I don't love every movie, but I like the brain and that's, but that is the art that you're making. So it's not, so don't denigrate yourself. You've done better than 99.9999.

• 1:51:14Speaker 07

  I went to the nut house and they couldn't even beat it out of me, man. After a month, they were like, are you cured? I was like, fuck no, I still don't like myself and I still think I'm shit. But it has fueled all this. I mean, that's the thing and the point that I made to them when I was in, in the booby hatch. Like, there are moments where, you know, I could trace everything back to like fucking where everything begins where, you know, I start needing fucking validation and shit. If it doesn't happen, and if I then am not this needy creature constantly seeking validation from strangers, I mean, that's the trick, mind you. I don't, my mother gave me validation, my father gave me validation, my wife gives me validation, my kid, my fucking dogs love me. Falls on deaf ears because I was like, they have to love me.

• 1:51:59Speaker 07

  Has to be, has to come from fucking strangers and shit like that. So with all this time of like, trying to.

• 1:52:10Speaker 07

  Grab, you know, thirty years spent seeking validation from strangers. I, I feel like, fuck, now I lost the question. What, what were we just talking?

• 1:52:21Sean Fennessey?

  It wasn't even a question. It was just, I think what you're talking about, that you like transformed your career into a certain thing, was always the art. It was always the thing you were making in the films. They may not look like Quentin's films or whatever, but that is still the art that you were making. The only question I had was just that we end every episode of this show by asking filmmakers, what's the last great thing that they have seen? So do you, has there anything, you, you run a movie theater?

• 1:52:40Speaker 07

  I do run a movie theater and, um, let me see. What did I, I just, here, this is a higher, as high a compliment as I could pay any movie. As I'm writing the Dogma sequel, you know, you look for nourishment from movies that are like, oh, and you know, sometimes they're, it's very rarely one for one where it's like, you know, I'm not watching Dogma to get inspiration. It has to be something else, things you aspire to or things that have captured your imagination. Or things that are incredibly fucking smart, which made me pay attention the first time around. So I've been rewatching the first hour of Heretic, which I fucking love.

• 1:53:24Speaker 07

  Like, not since I made Dogma, where I remember watching the movie and, you know, I'd seen the trailer. I was like, that seems interesting. So I was watching the movie and as it's playing, the first like twenty minutes, this is me the whole time. Where I was like, oh, oh, kindred spirit.

• 1:53:40Sean Fennessey?

  I was just gonna say, the pop culture philosophizing of the film is right in your wheelhouse.

• 1:53:45Speaker 07

  Oh my God, it was porn for me. So if you haven't seen Heretic, absolutely Heretic, um, I, I adore Companion, which stars the same actress.

• 1:53:57Sean Fennessey?

  Sophie Thaddeus, yes.

• 1:53:59Speaker 07

  Fantastic. She's such a great actress, but she was wonderful in Companion. And I thought Companion was so fucking smart and original. I'd seen the trailer and I knew kind of where it was going. I still didn't, like, on the day of, I was like, wow, I was very pleased by that. Um, the last year, I, I'm, you know, not like awards matter, but I was like, fuck, she, they should have cleaned up the substance. Jesus Christ, man. You, you talk about a movie that. Is like, hold my beer to itself for the last half hour. You know what I'm saying? Like, I remember somebody saw it and they're like, you're gonna love it. And I was like, why do you think that? Like, well, you made Tusk.

• 1:54:42Speaker 07

  And so I thought they made for the rubber horror of it. And so I talked to him afterwards. Like, you didn't know when in your movie either. And I was like, you're out of your fucking mind. I'll take the heat on Tusk. But that, the fact that she kept fucking going, when it was like, all right, well, that's, even if you ended it there, it would be further than most filmmakers would go. But every step of the way, I was like, this is one of the bravest acts of cinema I've ever seen in my fucking life.

• 1:55:08Sean Fennessey?

  Those are great recommendations. Kevin, thank you for everything and thank you for sharing some time.

• 1:55:12Speaker 07

  That's a pleasure, man. Thanks for having me. It was a great conversation.

• 1:55:21Sean Fennessey?

  Thank you to Kevin Smith. Thanks to Ciara and Amanda. Thanks to our producer, Jack Sanders. We'll be back on Friday. We're gonna, we were gonna do two different episodes. We were gonna do The Life of Chuck and Materialist. And I've seen Materialist now. I've seen The Life of Chuck. Do you see Life of Chuck yet, Amanda?

• 1:55:35Amanda Dobbins?

  Going tomorrow. I gotta talk to you about the schedule, actually, but off the, off, off mic.

• 1:55:40Sean Fennessey?

  Okay, off mic. I see some interesting connectivity between these two projects. So I think it would be good to put them together in a conversation about what we really want from movies and how do we get it?

• 1:55:55Amanda Dobbins?

  Isn't that every conversation?

• 1:55:58Sean Fennessey?

  Well, this one is uniquely well suited to Amanda.

• 1:56:01Amanda Dobbins?

  The two of us, yeah.

• 1:56:02Sean Fennessey?

  Yes. So we will, we will see you then.