Product Description
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One of the most talked-about movies of the year is also one of
the funniest! In this hilarious comic fantasy from
writer/director Kevin Smith (Clerks, Chasing Amy) two banished
angels (Ben Affleck and Matt Damon) find a loophole that would
get them back into Heaven. The only snag? They'll be destroying
existence in the process. In an effort to stop them, The
overworked Voice of God (Alan Rickman)taps cynical mortal Bethany
(Linda Fiorentino) to save the world by preventing the angels
from reaching their unholy destination: New Jersey! Throw in two
unlikely prophets named Jay and Silent Bob (Jason Mewes and Kevin
Smith), the quick-witted yet little-known thirteenth apostle
(Chris Rock) and a sexy, former muse with a case of writer's
block (Selma Hayek) and you've got an hysterical and thrilling
race against time packed with an all-star cast.
.com
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Kevin Smith is a conundrum of a filmmaker: he's a writer with
brilliant, clever ideas who can't set up a simple to save
his life. It was fine back when Smith was making low-budget films
like Clerks and Chasing Amy, both of which had an amiable, grungy
feel to them, but now that he's a rising director who's
attracting top talent and tackling bigger themes, it might
behoove him to polish his filmmaking. That's the main problem
with Dogma--it's an ambitious, funny, aggressively intelligent
film about modern-day religion, but while Smith's writing has
matured significantly (anyone who thinks he's not topnotch should
take a look at Chasing Amy), his direction hasn't. It's too bad,
because Dogma is ripe for near-classic status in its theological
satire, which is hardly as blasphemous as the protests that
greeted the movie would lead you to believe.
Two banished angels (Ben Affleck and Matt Damon) have discovered
a loophole that would allow them back into heaven; problem is,
they'd destroy civilization in the process by proving God
fallible. It's up to Bethany (Linda Fiorentino), a lapsed
Catholic who works in an clinic, to save the day, with
some help from two so-called prophets (Smith and Jason Mewes, as
their perennial characters Jay and Silent Bob), the heretofore
unknown 13th apostle (Chris Rock), and a sexy, heavenly muse (the
sublime Salma Hayek, who almost single-handedly steals the film).
In some ways Dogma is a shaggy dog of a road movie--which hits a
comic peak when Affleck and Fiorentino banter drunkenly on a
train to New Jersey, not realizing they're mortal enemies--and
segues into a comedy-action flick as the vengeful angels (who
have a taste for blood) try to make their way into heaven.
Smith's cast is exceptional--with Fiorentino lending a sardonic
gravity to the proceedings, and Jason Lee smirking evilly as the
horned devil Azrael--and the film shuffles good-naturedly to its
climax (featuring Alanis Morissette as a beatifically silent
God), but it just looks so unrelentingly... subpar. Credit Smith
with being a daring writer but a less-than-stellar director.
--Mark Englehart