Kevin Smith's Red State

Kevin Smith has gone on tour showcasing his latest movie, Red State. For the tour he personally introduces the movie, sits at the back of the theater to watch alongside the audience, and then performs a Q&A. He admonishes that this is nothing new as movies such as Gone With the Wind were handled in a similar manner, although he is perhaps the only person in my lifetime to have done so.

Red State was not picked up by a movie studio. Instead of selling his movie for very little and having a third party represent it, Smith opted instead to showcase his movie in the same style that he has been providing his stand-up and Smodcast tours for the past 5+ years. At first Smith had toured extensively across the United States, leaving myself and others wondering if he would ever grace his audiences in Canada with the movie. Sure enough, on August 17th 2011 he did just that in the city of Calgary, Alberta.

I follow Kevin Smith's career with a level of regularity that fits somewhere between the obsessed and the curious. I love pretty much all of his movies equally and for that I am easily pleased with anything he produces. Not surprisingly I thoroughly enjoyed this movie. It is not a laugh-a-minute movie like Clerks but more akin to Dogma with a little more dry humor and levity. The story revolves around a hard-lined biblical group in the United States that kidnap three teenagers and as a result the FDA are called out to end the situation, ala Waco. The acting is excellent, which is not surprising as Smith bring out the best in his actors. The storyline is for the most part quite original and engaging with some very memorable moments. The only downside I wish to point out is that (and this is not a spoiler) the preacher has a very lengthy sermon that needed to be edited down. At some point during the sermon I believe the audience was beginning to get lost, however, the sermon does add a great element of fear and trepidation for what would come next. A positive note is that this movie feels like an indy art-house flick, with frayed edges and a richness that can be studied and discussed ad nauseum.

Following the movie Smith entertained the audience with over 2 hours of great commentary on everything from what occurred while and following the filming this picture to events in his personal life, along with answering numerous questions from the audience. In the early phase of this tour Smith was sometime accompanied by actors in the movie, but in this case it was solo Smith. It is hard to not like Smith because he is incredibly personable and real. There is not a moment when you feel that he is up there only for the money or that what he is doing is an act. This is a rare quality that is a driving reason as to why Kevin Smith has become so popular over the past two decades. 

I wholeheartedly recomend anyone reading this blog to go see Kevin Smith on his tour or at the least watch his latest movie Red State once it becomes available on DVD sometime later this fall or early winter.

A Legendary Rant by Kevin Smith

Something motivational for today. Considering it's New Year's Eve it seems appropriate. So here I've copied out a rant that Kevin Smith posted on Twitter a few weeks back. This rant is a rare bird and I encourage everyone to follow him on twitter (@thatkevinsmith) or check out his free smodcasts from where this tweet was copied from (http://smodcast.com/home.html).

Smith is a large man to say the least and has been loosing weight since October, which I believe began right after he finished filming his latest movie Red State. Over the summer he was dejected from a plane because the flight attendants believed him to be too large to fly, which was horse shit. He has since been on the defensive about his weight but likewise advocating a healthier lifestyle that included copious amounts of sex, pot, and cigarettes.

Now for his rant:

Dec. 30th, 2010

We’re all too fat, sir.

But weight loss, while a frustrating proposition, is the key - because when you’re thin, you’re healthy, & nobody bothers you - so life’s always a non-caloric-cupcake-&-firework party!

However, having met one or two thin people (or “normies”) in my life, I’ve been able to glean that it’s also not always a picnic being skinny. So if life blows for fat and thin people sometimes, then it’s all relative - except for your packaging.

So remove the whole “IF I CAN JUST GET THIN, EVERYTHING WILL BE BETTER!” bullshit and approach the weight loss with a realistic perspective: losing weight will solely make you thinner & heart-healthier. Other than that, it’s no different from being thin - except all the sweating & getting a hard-on for Devil Dogs.

So when the fantasy factor of weight loss is eliminated (fact: your life may stay the exact same & your problems may not suddenly evaporate), you’re left with un-hyped, non-augmented truth: when you lose weight, you’re doing just that: losing weight.

Now - if you need to attach drama to weight-loss, as a sort of motivator, there’s no better gas in the tank than the simple desire to shut motherfuckers the fuck up. S’fun to watch the endlessly opinionated suddenly choke on a reality they’d never prepared for: the mutable you.

Folks wanna cast you in a walk-on role in the movie of their lives: they wannna minimize you to one aspect/role/title that their self-esteem can handle. Don’t settle for being a last-billed extra in some other prick’s feature; be the goddamned STAR of your OWN movie. The best revenge is when folks who’ve tagged & bagged you suddenly realize their true roles: they amount to little more than a footnote in the film of YOUR life. Then? #CuttingRoomFloor

Now, I’m not spectral communicator & I don’t claim to congress with the dead. But I doubt ANY of this can be accomplished from the grave.

As far as I know, you get one life. Milk it, sir. Chocolate-milk it, if you’ve gotta, but milk it for all it’s worth (without harming others). Treat yourself like you treat the things you own: bag & board your life & put it somewhere fuckers can’t bend your pages, maybe even framed.

But whatever you do, don’t even whimsy about ending shit. It all ends soon enough, without our input or agreement.

Drop a little weight and it’ll be easier to drop a little more. For me it’s more about portion control: I’m an American, so everything I eat is like four feet tall. On Weight Watchers, I’ve been rocking the Smart Ones meals, which I’m using to train myself to remember that two boxes of cereal in one sitting is not a meal; it’s a freak show that belongs on the boardwalk at Coney Island, in the summertime.

Make the portions smaller. It’s the thing no chubby wants to hear, but it’s the only path: eat less & exercise. I’ve been doing that since November first and I’ve lost 40 pounds now. And if I can do it, ANYBODY can do it. I’m the laziest, fattest slob I know. My gut has a gut. But I’ll go Christian-Bale-In-The-Machinist before I give this wicked, wicked world one more second of my life any earlier than I’ve gotta…

Batman watched his parents get killed and rather than crumble in defeat, he opted to stay above ground to make sure the same didn’t happen to anyone else. Granted, Batman is fictional… but then, so are most of the people you look up to. They’re fictional, too: you don’t see their struggles, you only see their wins. Life is a zero-sum game: there has never been a winner.

Find a role model: someone who’s done this life in a way that inspires you and use the lessons of their life to enrich your own (hands off Gretzky, Lunchbox: he’s mine). But find a role model, not a hero. Learn from others but be your own hero.

Long story short: next meal, eat less.

Meal after that? Eat half.

Leave food behind. Start like that.

In a week or two, step it up a little: go out walking. Bring an iPod (I recommend loading with some SModcast Network shows). Walk for 10 minutes. Then 20. Then 30. Increase weekly.

A week will go by. Then a month - at the end of which, you’ll have lost some weight. It may not be a breathtaking amount, but it’ll be enough to make you wanna lose a little more, maybe. And then a little more.

But you can do this. Just know you’re going to do it ALONE - and that’s okay. This is YOUR journey. From time to time, even when nobody else understands why, we have to act against their grain - to get shit done.

Expect some taunts and teases from the swine. I suggest finding a somewhat less-traveled road (but always let someone know where you’re going); and to paraphrase Teddy, a walking stick’s good for balance and for making fucktards think twice about shooting their mouths off.

So no more of this suicide bullshit: how the fuck do you know you’re not the one who’s supposed to cure cancer? Or change shit? Or inspire the one who will change shit? The flick has three acts, sir; stay above ground - or you’ll never know what was possible; just what wasn’t…

So today, eat only HALF that Ho-Ho. All this week, eat only half the Ho-Ho. Next week, it’s Anti-Claus time: meaning NO Ho-Ho. Ho-Ho’s won’t vanish in our absence: there will always be Ho-Ho’s. Months from next week, maybe years even? You can have another Ho-Ho - after which, you may mutter to yourself “Wasn’t worth it…” because that Ho-Ho becomes an hour walk to even make a dent in the caloric burning department.

We’ll lose weight, @thedarkknight98 - that’s easy. Much harder to lose: the yapping, negative swine.

Like herpes, they’ll be with us always.