Clerks (10th Anniversary Edition) (1994)

It's one wacky day in the life of a pair of overworked counter jockeys whose razor-sharp wit and on-the-job antics give a whole new meaning to customer service! Even while bracing a nonstop parade of unpredictable shoppers, the clerks manage to play hockey on the roof, visit a funeral home, and straighten out their offbeat love lives! The boss is nowhere in sight, so you can bet anything can--and will--happen when these guys are left to run the store.
 
"The funniest movie of the year!"  New York Newsday
"Screamingly funny!"  Rolling Stone
"Two thumbs up!"  Siskel & Ebert
 


Editor's Note

Chronicling a day in the life of Quick Stop clerk Dante Hicks, CLERKS captures the hilarity of the humdrum even as it raises slackerdom to existential proportions. From behind his counter, Dante desperately tries to exert some power over the crazy customers, his own love life, and his incorrigible friend and fellow clerk Randal--the type who sees nothing wrong in closing the video shop he works in to go rent movies from a better store.


Plot Summary

Made for less than the cost of an SUV, Kevin Smith's first film finds 22-year-old Quick Stop clerk Dante Hicks (Brian O'Halloran) called into work on his precious day off. There he is besieged by customers ranging from the agitated to the insane, not to mention Randal (Jeff Anderson), the clerk from the video store next door whose commitment to service is made clear when he observes, "This job would be great if it wasn't for the f@&%!#* customers." Dante's love life is a shambles, and the situation at the store goes from bad to worse, but he and Randal are never so beleaguered that they can't find time to discuss why the destruction of the Death Star in RETURN OF THE JEDI may have been morally dubious (uninvolved contractors were probably aboard). In fact, it was the clerks' clever dialogue, saturated with pop-culture references, that elevated CLERKS to cult-hit status among Generation-Xers and transformed Kevin Smith from film school dropout to indie auteur. Smith himself plays Silent Bob, while Jason Mewes plays Jay, his drug-dealing other half. Together the duo provide added comic relief, continuity, and wisdom in each of the the director's films.