An Evening With Kevin Smith Details

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Don't be put off by the criminally brief synopsis above - <b>An Evening with Kevin Smith</b> contains 2 disc and 3 hours 45 minutes of highlights from Kevin's 2002 lecture tour of US colleges. The word "lecture" conjures images of stuffy professors, overhead projectors and a strange smell of Ajax mixed with dope, but this is nothing of the sort. If you've ever seen Kevin doing interviews or Roadside Attractions on <i>The Tonight Show</i>, you have a taste of what he's like in these shows.

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The basic format is a question and answer session with Kevin at a podium in front of an auditorium full of students. They come up to a mike in the aisle and proceed to ask Kevin a variety of humdingers, ranging from queries about his movies and past, through various offers for him to come back and "just party, dude" and even pointed questions about his sexual proclivities - every answer Kevin gives is one, some or all of interesting, funny, and somewhat self-deprecating.

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Kevin gives insight into the production of his movies, his breakneck path into the industry, offers many anecdotes about his friends, his family, movie studios, <i>High Times</i> and the plate of weed, what people will do for five bucks, why he hates Tim Burton and a 45 minute saga of his trek to Paisley Park to make a documentary about Prince.

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There are no clips from his movies, no guest appearances from his troupe of actors - except Jason Mewes, who really doesn't seem lucid enough to be on the stage! - it's just Kevin, the audience and you, and it's fantastic.

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Smith is consistently informative & entertaining

Kevin Smith, director of Clerks, Mallrats, Chasing Amy, Dogma, Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back and recently Jersey Girl, has been hosting Q&A sessions at American universities over the last few years, and this DVD is a compliation of some of the more enlightening moments of those events.

Smith's charisma shines through; self depricating, open, on the level and bubbling with movie geek coolness, his cult appeal has clear routes. His live appearances make the stem of his film comedies obvious- he makes no pretenses about who he is; he's simply a comic book loving dude from New Jersey, and his films make no attempt to over step his borders.

He makes for 3 hours of hugely enjoyable company; he's arrogant yet self conscious, funny yet human, cool yet nerdy. He represents film as an accessable medium for the average Joe. He frequently goes off topic to make fun of audience members or go into a lengthy story about an embarrasing sexual escapade. Upon hearing one of the audience members lost his job to attend the Q&A, he calls the boss up, purely in the name of irreverancy.

Particularly enlightening are his comments on Tim Burton, his surprise phone calls to fellow cohorts Mewes etc, memories of Mewes and an anecdote about joining a protest to ban his own movie Dogma.

A worthwhile companion piece to his films, but much more worthwhile for fans than casual viewers.