0
0
Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back is the fifth installment in Kevin Smith’s New Jersey Chronicles. But, unlike Dogma and Chasing Amy, this film in no way tries to make a moral point about how to live your life. Instead, it takes the two comic relief characters from those movies and elevates them to star status. The plot is pretty thin: Jay and Silent Bob discover that the creator of a comic book based on them has sold the movie rights to Miramax films. That launches them on a road trip from Jersey to Hollywood to stop the movie from being made.
Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back is one of those movies that you won’t want to tell friends that you rented. As movies go, this one is not much more than a stream of profanity, sex jokes, and drug related one-liners. The F-bomb gets dropped almost twenty times in the first ninety seconds, and the rest of the movie pretty much follows suit. The scene of Velma and Daphne’s undulating bra tops in the back of the Mystery Machine will no doubt mortify fans of the Cartoon Network. (Although that segment of the movie does explain why Shaggy always had the munchies and why Scooby could talk.) There’s also a barrage of gay jokes, inside jokes, and obvious and obscure comic references.
Still, in watching it, I laughed myself silly. Will Ferrell is funnier in this movie than he has been in any other of his big screen appearances. Chris Rock is hilarious as the race-obsessed director of the movie that Jay and Silent Bob are out to stop. Shannon Elizabeth is her usual sexy, goofy self—much like the character she plays in the American Pie series. Ben Affleck is good both playing himself and reprising the role of Holden McNeil from Chasing Amy. The rest of the cast includes names like Mark Hamill, George Carlin, Carrie Fisher, Jason Biggs, Matt Damon, and even Morris Day of the Time.
Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back is definitely not for everyone. If you’re easily offended, I’d recommend that you take a pass on it. If you have a high tolerance for vulgarity and adolescent bathroom humor, it’s a funny way to spend 104 minutes of your weekend—especially if you’re half loaded.
