Just saw Clerks II. Me & the rest of the audience at the packed theater in Silver Spring, MD (!sharktown! there is a huge shark on top of the Discovery Channel building right now, Shark Week promo) enjoyed the movie a lot. There are 3 kinds of Kevin Smith movies: the comedies, the drama (Chasing Amy), and the one I was not interested in seeing (Jersey Girl). Of the comedies, Clerks II is the best, and the original Clerks comes in at a close second. Cinematography in Clerks II was the best, if I recall correctly, out of all the Smith flicks. Tonally, this movie feels right. There is more sadness in this one than in the original Clerks. There is also one of the wildest climax (end of Act II?) scenes ever in this movie, involving confession of important secrets, the police, the fire fighters, a donkey and a half naked man in leather. Whereas his peers (of sorts) Jarmusch, Hartley, & Linklater staked their claims to a certain kind of storytelling & kept getting it right more than half the time film after film, Smith offered up a promising combination in Clerks and then did not return to improve on his debut until this current film, Clerks II. Congrats to Smith & the rest of the team. Go check out the flick for yourself, lemme know what you thought.
By the stream review - from Lincoln Center, NYC viewing - no spoilers The hype is real - By the Stream is very good by Hong movies standards and also normal comedy-drama standards. There were like 30-40 people at Lincoln Center for the 1PM Fri 8/8/25 (opening day) screening of By the Stream. People in that neighborhood are serious about their foreign films. Cinematography is very simple, from a canon XA small sensor HD cam, I could see familiar details, how those cams film the moon, scenes at night - it’s like a 1980s or 1990s early indie cinematography style that we do not see much these days - works well for Hong’s movies. No color grading, very simple video/cinematography. A more fleshed out movie than some recent Hong movies. In the movie a skit is prepped, and we actually get to see it performed. A couple of serious issues are discussed. Some unexpected, light things happen. It’s a comedy-drama chill hangout movie w/ creative South Korean people - good times. Probably o...
