Kevin Smith is your fat boyfriend

Maybe it’s cause he was stoned, but filmmaker and one-time Vancouver resident Kevin Smith sure covered a lot of ground when he called the Georgia Straight last week. He’s bringing his new horror film Red State to the Vogue Theatre on Thursday (August 18) for a screening and Q&A, and we did actually talk about that, eventually—along with the controversy it caused at Sundance—but not until Smith had gotten a number of other things off his chest. I think I asked a total of one question, which you can read about in the paper on Thursday. But here’s the exceedingly entertaining Mr. Smith on a number of other occasionally irrelevant matters. I really recommend that you get on the phone with him for an hour, if you can.

On the Georgia Straight

I used to read it religiously when I lived there, cause it’s kinda like the Village Voice, right? I’m sure when you guys go to New York, you’re like, ‘Hey, this is like our Georgia Straight!’ The first alternative weekly I knew was the Village Voice, and that’s where I found the Vancouver Film School, through an ad in the Village Voice. So I go up there to Vancouver, and to my fucking delight, they have an alternative weekly as well. But I’ll never fucking forget, there was a letter printed in the Georgia Straight, post-Clerks, where a dude was calling for more Canadian pride because Clerks, which is getting a lot of attention at film festivals throughout the country, nobody was even commenting on the fact that it was Canadian made.

Georgia Straight: But it wasn’t Canadian made.

The dude assumed that because of the hockey on the roof. I thought it was genius, dude, that the film played like a Canadian film. That’s like somebody going, ‘Wow, your film brought peace in the Middle East.’ That was huge to me, dude. The person that wrote that letter was so convinced when they watched the movie that it was Canadian that they literally wrote, months after they saw the movie, a letter to the editor of the Georgia Straight. I love that. I still have that laminated in a binder somewhere.

GS: Your next film, Hit Somebody, is kinda Canadian, isn’t it?

I said, ‘Hey I’m gonna retire, I’m finished with filmmaking, I’ma go out and Hit Somebody,’ and the logical conclusion for most people, well, number one they get suspect when you wanna conclude. They’re like, ‘Why are you stopping?’ I’m, like, ‘I dunno, it’s just timing, sometimes shit stops, you do something else,’ but they get suspect. They maybe think you’re hiding something and/or getting fired from Hollywood. Cause they still think Hollywood is a job, a person, like, this one thing like the great and powerful Oz that makes these decisions, or something like that. So as you try to explain to them, when they finally understand that you wanna end, they’re like, ‘Okay, you should end with Clerks 3.’ And I’m, like, ‘Well, that’s what everyone would kinda expect and the reason to not do it is that very reason.’ I came in like an artist, and then I got complacent at a certain point, and I want to go out like an artist. So at that point you go, ‘Okay, it can’t be Clerks 3. It’s gotta be anything but Clerks 3.' Instead, you find something else that for you makes more sense. Ending on a Canadian film is so fucking appropriate. It is insanely appropriate, so much so that even saying it out loud makes me tear up. And granted, I’m stoned, but still. And weed tends to make us more emotional, but that’s a beautiful sentiment, like, ‘Oh my God, he’s gonna end not only with a fuckin’ hockey movie, but a hockey movie about Canada.’ Cause if anyone’s paying attention closely, they know it’s not just a movie about hockey, it’s a movie about Canada. A big, bad movie about Canada. That, for me, is so fucking appropriate. That would definitely bring me full circle. If you think about it, how poetic is that, dude? That would be like Gretzky finishing, not in New York, but back in Edmonton for the last season of his career. It makes me cry even talking about that. So the notion of me ending with a movie about Canada, considering my formal film training, and View Askew, and Clerks, as that man who wrote into the Georgia Straight years ago said, the origins are in Canada, literally in Vancouver as the epicenter. If you apply a Batman overlay to my life, that is where all the ley lines meet and the Lazarus Pit is. You know what I’m saying?

GS: Honestly? Not really.

Sometimes you have to define things through the prism of Batman. And in the Batman universe, the Lazarus Pit is where Ra's al Ghul immerses every once in a while, comes out stronger and powerful and shit, he’s thousands of years old, he’s ancient as hell, but thanks to the Lazarus Pit he’s rejuvenated and timeless, and in this metaphor, the Lazarus Pit has to be Vancouver. Cause I meet Dave Klein there, and Scott Mosier. And it’s like, of course, the origin point for my mythos, if you will, everything that followed, the foundations for it were laid there. The first movie I ever made was with Dave Klein, my DP, and Scott Mosier, my producer, two guys I met there at the VFS.

On revisiting early hostage videos and crediting Vancouver for absolutely everything.

Before I went off to Vancouver, I sat down with a video camera and did what I can only describes as what looks like a terrorist or hostage video of me addressing the camera, not with a manifesto, but talking about the future and how everything was about to change, and thanking my parents for everything they had done, and how I was off to Vancouver, and who knew what was going to happen, but everything was going to be different. It was weird, I documented that last moment of my life before I went to Vancouver. And thank God, my parents weren’t, like, ‘What a creepy, emo bitch,’ and just threw it out. They saved it! And so I got to watch it, and it’s so strange seeing a portrait of this dude I haven’t seen for decades. You know, the guy who didn’t know what the future held, but had a good idea that going to Vancouver would change everything. Could you imagine, dude? I don’t think anyone in the history of Man has ever credited Vancouver with as much as I have. I know they like Lord Stanley out there, they named a park after him, but I don’t think even Lord Stanley was as moved by Vancouver, or was as changed or transformed by Vancouver as I was. It was a big part of my life.

GS: In the mission statement for your Harvey Boys production company, you write, ‘Don’t hate the studio, become the studio…’ which is precisely what Francis Coppola and George Lucas set out to do. Have you become George Lucas?

Uhhh… Um. Don’t do that to me, man. Argh. I don’t know even know how to take that anymore. I mean, there was a time where I would have been, like, ‘Yes!’ Now, I’m, like, ‘I’m not sure. Which Lucas are you talking about?’ … I’ve said it a bunch of places, it’s a ridiculous art form that I fell in love with, and unfortunately it was the only one I was half good at. And most people will tell you I’m not even half good at it… It’s one of these art forms where you just feel like shit for taking all this money to make a pretend story you’re not even sure is gonna work or not. Maybe it’s the catholic thing in me, but it never sat right. When a lot of my contemporaries were looking for bigger budgets, I was just, like, ‘How do you sleep at night?’ They were like, ‘It’s expensive, that’s what it is, that’s movies.’ But for me, I dunno, I was always looking for a cheaper way to do it. Not so much just to beat the studio at their own game, cause there’s no winner there. The only problem I ever had with studios was when they applied studio marketing to our films, and unfortunately it’s all tied into the era when I came into this business… I came of age in that era when independents were owned by studios and still calling themselves independents. Quasi-indies. People would sit there and be like, ‘Kevin Smith, you’re an independent filmmaker,’ and I’d be, like ‘Am I? Cause every time I fly somewhere, the ticket comes in a sleeve that has Mickey Mouse on it, and I’m always in first class. Is that fuckin’ indie?’

On the reason Miramax bought Clerks after Disney bought Miramax

Disney buys Miramax, suddenly Miramax has deeper coffers to take weirder chances and risks with, and at the time people were going after Miramax, saying, ‘They’re gonna lose their edge, no more Crying Game, no more fucking The Piano, if Disney owns them, they’ll be soft.’ And Harvey (Weinstein) was very sensitive to that and he was like, ‘Alright, I’ll show them. I’ll pick up the fucking most American, down and dirty, fucking nasty-looking piece of shit indie film from this year’s Sundance,’ and we fit the bill. We were a great message to send to a business that was, like, is Miramax gonna change now that it’s owned by Disney? And then you buy Clerks, and clearly, the message is, ‘Oh God, no!’

On the meaning of Kung Fu Panda 2

In a world where there’s a Kung Fu Panda 2, there’s only one reason for that. Because somebody could still make money off of it. It’s not because there’s still more story to tell. Like, I loved Kung Fu Panda, but the story was told. We all learned an important lesson. ‘Be yourself,’ whatever the fuck. Guess what the lesson of the second one was? ‘Be yourself again, in 3D.’ I’m not saying it’s a bad thing, but that’s the naked truth.

On retiring from film.

There was writer who was saying, ‘Well, you’re just retiring because of the Cop Out reviews.’ I was like, ‘What? Dude, I lived through Mallrats reviews, Jersey Girl reviews, and the Cop Out reviews were no worse than those two,' and years on from those two, nobody remembers. People love Mallrats now. So the Cop Out thing would never be intense enough to make me go, ‘I’m quitting filmmaking!’ You just get to a point where you’re, like, ‘I’m done in this medium, there’s not much left for me to do, or say.’… Movie’s started to feel like bullshit. There’s no immediacy with film. It takes so fuckin’ long to communicate your idea with films. Look at Red State. I wrote it four years ago. Took me that long to communicate the idea to the audience. If it wanted to do it as a podcast, it would have been done fuckin’ an hour after I was finished writing it. I saw a great Steven Soderbergh quote where he was, like, ‘I just can’t get it up for one more over the shoulder shot.’ Like, there are only so many ways you can skin the cat, cinematically.

On podcasting

It’s the best kind of filmmaking I could possibly be involved in, because it doesn’t require me to direct. You’re building the movie in your head. I don’t even have to work anymore. I can talk! And you get to make the film, and you’re a better filmmaker than I’ll ever be. We know this, I’ve been trying for 20 years. Boom. Done. It’s not like, ‘Hey man, now I gotta figure out how to make a guy with a giant hand punch Mewes in the balls. Get us Mark Hamill.’ With a movie, I could get you when you got the time. When you sit down, put aside your entire fuckin’ life and all your choices, and you dedicate your attention to this visual art form I’m putting in front of you. But, if I’m podcasting, I can live with you in the nooks and crannies of your life. I’m a fat boyfriend. You know what I’m saying? You don’t ever have to go looking for the fat boyfriend. Fat boyfriend waiting for you at home, waiting for you to call, so he can eat your pussy. I am the fat boyfriend. Then I’m right there, in your ears, telling you stories. If you’re waiting in the fuckin’ dentists office, dude, I can be your best friend while waiting for the worst moment in your fuckin’ life. I take people’s minds off stupid, inane bullshit by being in their ears, or their iPods, or their mp3 players. And that, to me, is way more interesting.

On trying to explain podcasting to Jon Lovitz.

It took me two months to explain what a podcast is to Jon Lovitz. I’m, like, ‘Dude! It’s not difficult.’ Literally, I said, ‘Go on stage, I’ll record your act, I put that on the net, that’s a podcast.’ He goes, ‘But that’s my act.’ And I was, like, ‘And now it’s a podcast.’ He’s like, ‘But it can’t be two things.’ I’m, like, ‘Oh my God…’

On Red State.

Red State will always be a spiritual sequel to Clerks for me, because it was the same kind of notion. When we took Red State on the road, we saw everybody light up, man. It’s like that old thing they say, ‘Not every one bought the Velvet Underground’s first album, but everyone that bought the Velvet Underground’s first album went out and recorded their own album.’ It’s that kind of thing. It was like an art film rock concert, every night of that tour. And I will guarantee you that tons of that audience is out there trying to do their own thing now with more gusto and energy they had before.

On the Westboro Baptist Church picketing Red State in Kansas.

I was, like, ‘You guys are awesome, you’re like my marketing partners… We left five tickets for them. They called back and said, ‘Can we get 15 tickets?’ I was like, ‘God hates fags, but he loves a bargain, doesn’t he?’