Mallrats

After the series of Bourne movies and The Man in the Iron Mask, I was in the mood for something a bit more light hearted. So I popped in another Kevin Smith movie, “Mallrats”, and of course this movie had Jay and Silent Bob. Though this isn’t your typical high school movie, but it is a movie about high school dweebs, geeks and slacker. Read what I thought about it after the jump.

Best friends Brodie and TS are dumped by their girlfriends, they decide to hang out at the mall to clear their minds a bit. While at the mall, they go through this ‘spiritual’ quest which leads them to meet some interesting characters from William to Jay and Silent Bob. Eventually the two best friends realize they need to win their girlfriends back and lo and behold there is a love matching game show being shot right at the mall. Biggest problem is the host is TS’s ex’s dad (who hates TS) and Brodie’s ex is going out with his arch nemesis Shannon (Ben Affleck).

TS and Brodie

The movie has a certain charm to it, maybe because it is slightly geeky (comic books, Sega references and Stan Lee) or because it plays off the cliché’s of high school drama. But certainly this movie does not feel like your everyday teen flick. Though one thing is certain, the movie’s humour took a while to kick in. That said, the jokes were flowing in from the start, but nothing really clicked with me until 30 minutes in.But straying away from the main plot, almost everything Jay and Silent Bob did was great. It’s amazing when you can put those two in any scenario and they just make it work for them.

Similarly to Clerks, where the movie shines the most is the wacky characters. We have William who stares at a 3D stereogram for the whole movie, never being able to figure out what the hidden picture is. Shannon is a hot shot manager at a male clothing store, and hates mallrats, especially Brodie. Gwen is the high school bimbo who gets around, if you catch my drift. She offers relationship advice to the two best friends. And lastly we have Jay and Silent Bob who can only be best described as those kids you always see hanging out at the local store/park/anywhere, but never actually doing anything. All they do is cause a ruckus and entertain themselves.

Shannon is fed but with Brodies, and he lets Brodie know.

I was actually surprise how much the movie deals with the relationship between TS and his ex-girlfriend. Though I should have seen it coming, but the ‘romance’ is nice between them. They are typical high school lovers, always off and on that ends with a happily. And this really gives it that teen flick mood, which one in a while isn’t all that bad. And to contrast that, Brodie gives a sway of sexual innuendos throughout the whole movie, most of them are pretty funny and some just sick.