Runaround: Horror Special (1981)

An occasional series where I write about works inspired by Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula…

These reviews reveal plot twists.

Faithful to the novel? Rather than an example of Dracula drama, this time we’re focusing on a chaotic, loud and untamed children’s game show – one episode of which featured a comedic appearance by the famous vampire. The British version of Runaround was modelled on a US format of the same name, and 103 episodes were churned out between 1975 and 1981 by Southern Television for the ITV network. The best-remembered and longest-running host was comedian Mike Reid, who later played a regular role in soap opera EastEnders, though Leslie Crowther and Stan Boardman also presented episodes. Dressed in a Slazenger T-shirt and barking his questions in his trademark east-London growl, Reid oversees the Horror Special we’re reviewing here like a supply teacher who went out on the lash the night before.

Broadcast on 25 February 1981 (so either four months late or eight months early, depending on your view), this Halloween-themed episode features the standard middle-class children as contestants. They run out onto the set in monster masks and are introduced by Reid, who reveals what hobbies they enjoy – stamp-collecting, rugby, horror movies – then sets a series of multiple-choice questions.

Best bit: The reason we’re reviewing this piece of archive telly is a pre-scripted comic interlude. The games pause and a hearse is pulled into the studio by some horses. The coffin lid then opens to reveal… Count Dracula, played by Carry On star Charles Hawtrey. ‘Ooh, hello,’ he says – the actor’s well-known catchphrase. Hawtrey and Reid then engage in some underrehearsed banter before a topical question is put to the contestants: ‘Where does Dracula come from? Transitania, Transylvania or Pennsylvania?’

Born in 1914, Charles Hawtrey had copied his stage name from a successful stage actor of a previous generation in the hope that people would infer a familial link. After working in music hall, revue and many films, he landed the most significant role of his life in 1958 when he was cast in ensemble comedy Carry On Sergeant. Hawtrey went on to appear in 23 of the first 26 movies in the Carry On series, always playing characters with his trademark persona: an effete, meek, mummy’s boy in NHS specs. But by the early 1970s, alcoholism, unreliability and an ill-advised attempt to secure top billing had blotted his copybook with the producers. He was dropped from the series after Carry On Abroad, and filled the remainder of his diminishing career with panto appearances. That’s essentially what his Count Dracula is in Runaround: a kid-friendly vampire who tells a few jokes.

Review: Not many of Runaround’s 103 episodes have survived, and in fact this Horror Special was missing from the archives for many years. Perhaps it was lost on purpose due to the noticeably inappropriate content used by the production team. Not many game shows aimed squarely at children begin with a title sequence that shows the host being guillotined and then holding his (still alive) head under his own arm. Elsewhere, the episode is peppered with horror references, with tame jokes about garlic sitting alongside more adult-orientated stuff. One question is based around a clip from 1974 film Young Frankenstein (‘Cost four bob to make that,’ quips Mike Reid, missing the subtly of Mel Brooks’s superior pastiche), while one of the prizes on offer is an LP of the soundtrack music from The Shining. The format of the game-show element, meanwhile, is bafflingly simplistic. As kids run around the studio like they’re on a sugar rush, there are presumably rules to be obeyed and points to be given out. But no one seems that keen on following or explaining them.

Five film projectors (for those private viewings of all your favourite super-scary movies) out of 10

Every Kevin Smith film – reviewed

Spoiler warning: a few minor plot points are revealed below

For nearly 30 years, American writer/director Kevin Smith has ploughed an idiosyncratic furrow. From his indie-classic debut, Clerks, right through to its 2022 sequel, Smith does not toe a line or clip his own wings to fit in. Whether it be potty-mouthed comedies, near-the-edge horrors or self-celebratory mash-up movies that reprise old characters, his work could not be mistaken for someone else – his fingerprints are smudged over every frame.

Not all his movies have been successful. Some have flopped financially, while many have bewildered and frustrated critics. But he’s acquired a large and dedicated fanbase, who he regularly connects with directly through numerous podcasts and blogs, and he has built himself into a brand: a film director who essentially moonlights as a stand-up comedian. Smith is clearly an extremely smart and savvy guy, very aware of the movie industry’s pitfalls and able to huckster his way through three decades of funding and releases.

If anything, he sometimes seems too self-aware for his own good. Watch just a few random interviews and you soon think that Kevin Smith hangs off every word ever written about him – by a critic, by a colleague or by a fan in a tweet. But if you keep watching those interviews and reading those blogs and listening to his many podcasts and DVD commentaries – and I have done recently – you can’t help but like him. With his working-class chumminess (he loves setting films in his beloved New Jersey; he has a habit of calling friends by their surnames), and his clear love of actors (having got their breaks in Kevin Smith films, stars Ben Affleck and Jason Lee keep showing up for small roles), Smith comes off as fun to hang around with – in person or via his movies.

He’s also a classic underdog. Not as cinematically talented as his peers Quentin Tarantino and Paul Thomas Anderson, nor as insightful as his hero Richard Linklater, Smith has nevertheless carved a stellar career by most people’s standards. Fourteen films in 28 years is an astonishing record, even if – as we’ll see below – quite a few are misfires.

To celebrate the fascinating CV of Kevin Smith, I set myself the challenge of watching his films and recording my thoughts. I’d seen about half of them before (I was a huge fan of Clerks and Mallrats at the time, then drifted away after being disappointed by Dogma), but others were new to me…

Clerks (1994)

Kevin Smith’s debut film is a low-fi gem – a vividly written comedy drama with an am-dram cast, set on one day in mostly one location, made in black-and-white on a über-indie budget of $27,000. (Smith raised the dough by selling his comic-book collection and maxing out several credit cards.) The crew was tiny, production corners were cut, some actors are pretty poor, and cinematographer Dave Klein has since admitted he didn’t know what he was doing. But while Clerks lacks professional polish, the rough-and-tumble aesthetic perfectly suits its drifting-through-life characters. The story takes place in a working-class convenience store. Stuck-in-a-rut twenty-something Dante Hicks (Brian O’Halloran, nicely sympathetic) has been coerced into doing a shift at short notice (‘I’m not even supposed to be here today!’ becomes his mantra). His slacker buddy Randal (Jeff Anderson, incredibly watchable) nominally runs the video shop next door but spends most of his time hanging out with Dante – and the rest deliberately insulting customers. Dante is also juggling a love triangle with current girlfriend Marilyn (Veronica Loughran) and ex Caitlin (Lisa Spoonauer), while a pair of dopeheads (played by Smith and his sometimes-drunk-on-camera pal Jason Mewes) loiter outside selling drugs. The film brims with comic energy, electric dialogue, ramshackle charisma and angry wit, even if some gags have dated badly (especially a bad-taste incident with a dead body). It’s easy to see why this film was such a critical darling and financial hit – and why Kevin Smith was soon being courted by Hollywood players Miramax.
Nine Death Star contractors out of 10

Mallrats (1995)

For Smith’s follow-up to Clerks the studio asked for a ‘smart Porkies’ – on the basis that there was a gap in the market for risqué teen comedies – but what they ended up with is more like a ‘childish John Hughes film’. As with Clerks this is a comedy set on one day, and sees friends TS (Jeremy London) and Brodie (a star-making turn from My Name Is Earl’s Jason Lee) hanging out in their local shopping mall. The loosely woven plot has several threads: both boys have problems in their love life and become involved in a scheme to sabotage a game show, Brodie gets into a feud with a bully played by Ben Affleck (in his first of many Kevin Smith roles), comic-book legend Stan Lee cameos as himself, the comedic drug-dealers Jay and Silent Bob return from Clerks, a Magic Eye picture causes confusion and a schoolgirl keeps a diary of her sex experiences with grown men. (Jay and Silent Bob’s role in the story establishes Mallrats and Clerks as part of a shared universe – the ‘View Askewniverse’, named after Kevin Smith’s production company. Mallrats is actually a prequel, taking place the day before Dante was called into work.) The film’s silliness grates a few times, especially as we follow Jay and Silent Bob’s slapstick subplot, while the naive misogyny on show is risible. The movie is also photographed appallingly at times – static cameras, ugly angles, bad pacing. (Smith has often been criticised for a lack of visual style: his early films are typified by a plonk-the-camera-down-anywhere vibe.) But Mallrats still has much going for it – the dialogue is terrific and reeled off at a clip, the humour has bite, while the Generation-X mood from Clerks is given a pump of immature enthusiasm that’s hard to dislike.
Eight schooners out of 10

Chasing Amy (1997)

Smith’s third movie – a romcom – is the first that feels like a proper Hollywood effort. Here, the leads have star quality, the camera moves, actors are well lit, the cutting is in sync with the storytelling, and scenes have dramatic beats – things that were previously in short supply. Ben Affleck and Jason Lee return from Mallrats, this time playing comic-book artists Holden McNeil and Banky Edwards. When Holden falls for a women he meets at a convention, he’s perplexed to realise that she’s gay. Despite this, Alyssa Jones (Joey Lauren Adams, who was dating Kevin Smith at the time) finds herself drawn to him anyway, while Banky suffers from jealousy as his friend’s attention drifts away from their partnership… The movie was criticised at the time for being an example of the ‘straight man turns a sexy lesbian’ cliché, but it actually plays better now in an era where fluid identities are more accepted; the drama concerns characters who are struggling with society’s idea of who they should be, whether that be an alpha male or a lesbian. Having said that, some of the sexual politics have aged very badly – or, rather, were already stale in 1997. Is it really plausible that a grown man wouldn’t know what lesbian sex involves? Overall Chasing Amy is decent, watchable and engaging. It also helps that Jay and Silent Bob – by now prerequisites in a Kevin Smith movie – are wisely restricted to just one key scene, in which they act as a sounding board for Holden as well as a burst of comic relief.
Seven figments of your fucking imagination out of 10

Dogma (1999)

Dogma starts with an on-screen disclaimer, imploring viewers to remember that it’s a comedy. The text was added to offset some controversy generated by the religious subject matter, but it turned out to be a wise move – because you’d never tell otherwise. Laughs are virtually nonexistent… Following several characters in a storyline about two fallen angels (Matt Damon and Ben Affleck) attempting to get back into heaven, Dogma is a disjointed and jittery work, seemingly made by people with short attention spans. Ideas and jokes are introduced, bounced around erratically, and often dropped. The dialogue, so strong in Smith’s earlier scripts, is lumpen, leaden and largely made up of exposition (Chris Rock seems to do little but explain and make fun of Christian mythology). And the religious satire itself – which somehow managed to raise the hackles of a few thin-skinned believers – feels like it’s been written by sixth-formers who think they’re the first people to ever spot that Christianity contains some contradictions. The movie’s de facto lead character is played by Linda Fiorentino, who flounders as a terribly written character who is either angry or blasé depending on what the scene needs. (Actress and director clashed, and at times weren’t speaking to each other during filming.) Affleck and Damon, meanwhile, who were cast here soon after their Oscar-winning time with Good Will Hunting, come off as complacently smug. Jay and Silent Bob are involved again for no real reason, Salma Hayek pops up as a pointless character, Janeane Garofalo is wasted in a one-scene part and Alanis Morissette cameos (mutely) as God. No one can save the film: things are so tawdry that even the great Alan Rickman, who plays a bitter, sarcastic angel, is annoying.
Three consequences schmonsequences out of 10

Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001)

Both Chasing Amy and Dogma had been very profitable for Miramax, who then gave Smith more or less free rein on his next picture. Sadly, the result was an abject lesson of what happens when a director with no willpower is allowed to just amuse himself and his mates. Jay and Silent Bob Strikes Back, which puts the stoner sidekicks front and centre, is ninety minutes of self-indulgent in-jokes, pop-culture references, appearances by characters from previous Kevin Smith films, actors playing multiple roles and nonsensical storytelling, all propped up by gross-out, misogynistic and ‘gay is funny’ humour. When the druggie double act realise that a Hollywood movie is being made about them – an idea spun off a detail in Chasing Amy – they begin a cross-country trip to stop the production… and get entangled in any number of tiresome diversions. The comedy often aims for the goofiness of Austin Powers but fatally lacks that movie’s self-deprecation, so ends up closer in tone to one of those latter-day National Lampoon films that desperately wants to be American Pie. Given by far the biggest role of his career, Jason Mewes (Jay) almost gets by on chutzpah alone – you *can* see why Smith has always been so enamoured with his troubled pal – but the rest of the cast is a hotchpotch of good actors dropping down a division (Ben Affleck, Eliza Dushku, Jason Lee), celebrities demeaning themselves in small roles (Carrie Fisher, Mark Hamill, Will Ferrell, Judd Nelson, George Carlin, many more) and Smith’s rep company being wheeled out (Jeff Anderson and Brian O’Halloran have pointless cameos). A kind, sympathetic view of this movie would be think of it as the flamboyant celebration of a film director’s personality, a one-man Avengers Assemble that collects elements and characters from his first decade of moviemaking for a blow-out party. In the cold light of 20 years later, though, it’s just a ghastly, hubristic experience.
Two communication tools used the world over where people can come together to bitch about movies and share pornography with one another out of 10

Jersey Girl (2004)

The slump continues. After Kevin Smith’s slide into more and more self-indulgence with the previous two films, Jersey Girl was supposed to be his mainstream breakout – a large-budget Hollywood romcom with bankable stars. Sadly, by toning down his inherent Smithism and stepping away from his View Askewniverse continuity (in part because he didn’t want to work with his muse Mewes until the latter dealt with his addiction issues), the writer/director ended up making a mawkish and moribund flop. The script features characters photocopied from a thousand other films: a sad, lonely but matinee-idol-handsome man (Ben Affleck), who’s widowed after the death of his angelic wife (Jennifer Lopez); their cutesy, cheeky young daughter (Raquel Castro); a Manic Pixie Dream Girl (Liv Tyler) who comes into his life and gives him a new happiness; and his frustrated but kindly father (George Carlin). Before release, the movie was adversely affected by poor test screenings, studio interference, and the negative publicity generated by Affleck and Lopez’s previous film, the lambasted Gigli. But none of that explains away the factory-line plotting, bland characters and rote acting (Liv Tyler does nothing with her blank character). Smith later more or less disowned the movie, even adding an apologetic gag in his credits of his next film, thanking Jersey Girl ‘for taking it so hard in the ass and never complaining.’
Five boobies out of 10

Clerks II (2006)

Dante and Randal, the two friends at the centre of Kevin Smith’s first film, have been a recurring presence in the director’s career. This is not surprising, given that they were inspired by his pre-fame days working in a convenience store. He even planned on playing Randal himself, before he realised how busy he’d be directing. The pair made a brief appearance in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, while actors Brian O’Halloran and Jeff Anderson had various other roles in Mallrats, Chasing Amy and Dogma. But in 2006, Smith made a full-blown Clerks sequel which shone a new spotlight on Dante and Randal – and the result was one of his very best movies. It actually took some cajoling to get Anderson to return. Clearly someone with no time for celebrity bullshit, the actor has seemed to struggle with the legacy of Clerks and at one point fell out with Smith over money. But having enjoyed reminiscing with the old gang while working on a Clerks DVD box set, he agreed to Clerks II on the strength of the script… As we catch up with Randal and Dante a decade after that chaotic day at the Quick Stop, they’re now working at a fast-food joint with Rosario Dawson’s branch manager Becky and Trevor Fehrman’s dopey burger-flipper Elias. The four bicker and discuss life, talk to eccentric customers, and get involved in an extreme and illegal piece of live theatre. O’Halloran and Anderson are terrific, instantly reigniting their old chemistry and perfectly capturing how their characters would be 10 years later. Dawson is absolutely *radiant* – she oozes smarts, sex appeal and star quality – while Fehrman is both endearingly sweet and very funny. Just like in the first movie, the humour is near-the-knuckle and adolescent, but often hits home. More importantly, there’s now genuine emotion that drives several character stories – will Dante turn his back on the boring middle-class life ahead of him? Will he admit that he’s in love with Becky? What will Randal do if his best pal leaves him behind? One reviewer said Clerks II has a ‘dirty mouth but a pure heart’ and that’s spot on. We also get the best cinematography yet in a Kevin Smith film, shot in colour unlike the 1994 original. Returning DOP Dave Klein (who’d missed the previous three Smith films for backstage political reasons) makes Clerks II simultaneously movie-beautiful and yet real; heightened and yet still connected to the makeshift Clerks. A theatrically staged musical sequence set to The Jackson 5’s ABC is also an infectious expression of pure joy. A wonderful film.
Nine donkey shows out of 10

Zack and Miri Make a Porno (2008)

When twenty-something housemates Miri (Elizabeth Banks) and Zack (Seth Rogan) can’t make ends meet, they decide to, um, make their own ends meet by starring in a self-made porn film – the theory being that all their former school pals will pay top dollar to watch them screw. The idea then mushrooms, with adult-industry actors hired and sexy spoofs of Star Wars planned. After the brief return with Clerks II, Smith again eschewed the View Askewniverse and instead attempted to tag himself into the then-current fad for frat-pack comedies about childish adults struggling with the real world. This genre, led by writer/director Judd Apatow and stars such as Seth Rogan, Will Ferrell, Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson, had been partly influenced by Clerks and Mallrats, of course, so in theory the move should have worked. But while the puerile sex gags in earlier Smith films hit home because they came from characters who were essentially teenagers (whatever their actual age), Zack and Miri are grown-ups with bills to pay and who attend a high-school reunion. The humour therefore tends towards crude and passé; then when actual sex is involved it’s relatively tame or played for embarrassed laughs. (Well, aside from one scatological gag that caused protracted aggro with the censors.) The romcom subplot, meanwhile, feels limp, while too much Apatow-esque improv has been allowed – Smith is usually renowned for insisting on actors sticking to the script – meaning that several scenes slide away into nothing. Poor.
Five all-male casts (like Glengarry Glen Ross? Like that?) out of 10

Cop Out (2010)

Smith’s only gig as a director for hire, working with someone else’s script, is a dispiritingly empty comedy thriller. It’s like if Lethal Weapon were remade by a particularly poor Saturday Night Live line-up: the staples are there – the sarcastic cops who bend the rules, the outlandish humour, the absurd violence – but everything feels like it’s been thrown together with barely a thought. There’s no class, no finesse, no wit, no oomph. The leads are actors with good track records – Bruce Willis, who is obviously (and at one point explicitly) trading on his Die Hard persona, and Tracy Morgan, who was then one of the stars of sitcom 30 Rock. A few years earlier, Kevin Smith had made two approaches to Willis when he wanted him for a cameo in Jersey Girl – and Willis had ignored him both times. Yet after the pair enjoyed working together on Die Hard 4.0, in which Smith took an acting role, a collaboration on Cop Out seemed a good idea. Things did not go well. Willis was unhappy about Smith’s habit of smoking pot on set and Smith later publicly harangued the star for being difficult and moody. (To his credit, Smith apologised years later when Willis revealed he was suffering from dementia.) But whatever the backstage ructions, on screen Willis is lazy, lethargic and boring, showing none of that stellar spark that lit up his best movies. Tracy Morgan tries gamely to make the scenes between lead cops Monroe and Hodges fly, though he’s got nothing to work with; Rashida Jones and Smith regular Jason Lee are also half-decent in secondary roles. But this is an horrifically flippant and charmless movie – there’s no heart or pizzazz at all.
Three knock-knock jokes out of 10

Red State (2011)

Smith’s career was now in a drift, his reputation damaged by a box-office bombs and bad reviews. Loyal fans remained, but the wider world was starting to define him as the guy who never topped Clerks. He needed a radical about-turn – and the welcome jolt came from this enjoyably grimy, grungy, grindhouse-flavoured horror film. It feels like a director flexing muscles he’d previously ignored. As with a lot of American horror, Red State is wrapped up with sexuality – the plot is kicked off when three horny teenage boys seek out a MILF they’ve seen advertised online. Their quest into the backwoods, however, leads to them being captured by an extreme Christian cult who punish them for their seedy urges. The cult is led by Pastor Abin Cooper (Michael Parks, absolutely mesmerising), a Westboro Baptist Church-inspired hate preacher, and this isolated, family-based community are violently homophobic and puritanically regressive. But Red State is also, as Smith once said, a ‘weird parlour trick of a movie’: the story then evolves into a shooty-shooty action thriller when a Waco-style siege begins. Using lots of handheld and shaky camerawork to keep everyone on edge – and an absence of any Hollywood glamour – Smith creates a terrific tone and maintains it throughout. The director is less surefooted when experienced actors such as John Goodman, Kevin Pollak and Stephen Root need attention as law-enforcement officers and he can’t find a satisfying ending, resorting instead to oddball humour. But for good or bad, this is a film with drive and energy and an authorial voice, which certainly couldn’t be said about Cop Out.
Six single-note trumpet blasts they pulled off the Internet out of 10

Tusk (2014)

Next, Smith surprised cinema fans by making another horror film – although Tusk has a much more absurdist slant than Red State. The idea for the movie was improvised by Smith and his long-time friend and producer Scott Mosier during an episode of their podcast. They had been tickled by a British newspaper advert offering a room to let for free if the tenant was willing to periodically dress up as a walrus. (The ad was later revealed to be a prank.) Enthused by the Blue Velvet-ish perversion, Smith quickly wrote the notion up into a twisted horror script and was filming within six months. Justin Long plays a mean-spirited podcaster, Wallace, who heads off to track down a Canadian nerd who accidentally sliced off his own leg with a Kill Bill sword. Getting sidetracked, Wallace then meets an old sailor (Red State’s Michael Parks bringing his unique brand of studied lugubriousness to another Kevin Smith flick) who has a treasure chest of spooky stories to spill. But the old man soon reveals a macabre and terrifying plan… With Wallace missing, his girlfriend (Genesis Rodriguez) and pal Teddy (Haley Joel Osment) fly up to Canada to look for him. So far, so good – we won’t specify it here, but what’s happening to Wallace is gleefully surreal, while Parks and Long commit to their scenes brilliantly. Then, sadly, after an hour, Johnny Depp crops up as a French Canadian detective on a serial killer’s trail… His desultory, self-centred, sketch-show performance – dodgy accent, wig and beret – is so out of step with the established tone that he almost completely derails the movie. (The role was written for Kill Bill director Quentin Tarantino, a pal of Smith’s, but he got confused and thought he was being offered Long’s part so turned the project down.) Away from Depp, Tusk – with its central plot like something from a kooky episode of The X Files – is an entertainingly weird body-horror flick, and the bizarre storyline is played with admirable conviction. The movie is also a world away from the point-the-camera-at-the-actors cinematography of Smith’s early films. Tusk tells its story via visuals, blocking, edits and music (yes, the titular Fleetwood Mac song does appear) just as much as dialogue. Good fun. Apart from Johnny Depp.
Seven eons of oceanic adventure out of 10

Yoga Hosers (2016)

While technically a spin-off from Tusk, watching this film is closer to sitting through a stranger’s home movie of a family Christmas – you get the sense that the people involved all had a marvellous time, but why the rest of us should be interested is a mystery. Two minor, unlikeable characters in Tusk were a pair of 15-year-olds working in a convenience store. Both were called Colleen, and they were played by Harley Quinn Smith and Lily-Rose Depp, respectively the daughters of Kevin Smith and Johnny Depp. Precisely no one outside the Smith household was asking for an entire movie to built around them, yet here we are… The setting obviously echoes Clerks (Colleen McKenzie even quotes Clerks’ Dante at one point: ‘I’m not even supposed to be here today!’) but rather than nihilist Gen-X-ers, these characters are Generation Zs who spend half their time on their phones and the other half rehearsing their earnestly awful music group. Along the way, there are fragments of a plot about Canadian Nazis, Satanists, sausage monsters and the joys of hating critics, but none of it lands. Neither does any of the intended comedy, which largely consists of mocking Canadian accents. (Characters saying ‘aboot’ rather than ‘about’ is the level.) Alongside the Colleens, Johnny Depp returns as his Tusk character, mispronouncing random words like he’s Peter Sellers in a Pink Panther film and being just as intensely irritating as before. A few other Tusk alumni return in new roles (Justin Long, Genesis Rodriguez, Haley Joel Osment), while future Elvis star Austin Butler and Lily-Rose Depp’s mother, Vanessa Paradis, appear too. Kevin Smith presumably meant Yoga Hosers to be a showcase for his daughter and her best friend – who, admittedly, have some chemistry – but the film is instead a phenomenally underwhelming, tediously undisciplined and wholly pointless endeavour. The most embarrassing and deplorable entry on Smith’s CV.
One douche out of 10

Jay and Silent Bob Reboot (2019)

Kevin Smith’s health was never the best. Weight came and went – he fluctuated up to 28 stone at one point – and he was a smoker until 2008. Then in February 2018, at the age of 47, the director suffered a heart attack after performing a stand-up comedy show. The news sent a shiver through those of us old enough to have loved Clerks first time round. Thankfully, Smith recovered and, now on a vegan diet, lost a vast amount of weight. The incident also gave him a desire to revisit his past. It had been more than a decade since his last View Askewniverse picture, more than a decade since he and pal Jason Mewes had played Jay and Silent Bob… More or less a remake of 2001’s Jay and Silent Strike Back, this film follows the characters as they head across country to stop a movie based on them being completed. But this intensely vague plot gets forgotten about for long stretches in favour of “comedic” diversions. Everything is just as idiotic and navel-gazing as in Strike Back, though now there are also facile jokes about the intellectual vacuity of reboots. The meta-twaddle even extends to Kevin Smith playing himself (the guy who made “that walrus shit”) because in this story he’s directing the new movie about Jay and Silent Bob. As their usual characters, Smith and Mewes gurn and eye-pop their way through a succession of laugh-free scenes, while there’s a conveyor belt of View Askewniverse characters, View Askewniverse actors playing new characters, View Askewniverse actors playing themselves (the film’s best gag: the cast of Clerks appear in black and white), Justin Long reprising his Zack and Miri character (retroactively defining that film as part of the View Askewniverse), Matt Damon back as his Dogma character (who jokingly claims he’s really Jason Bourne), Ben Affleck referencing lots of his own films, and Smith’s daughter Harley Quinn as Jay’s daughter Millennium ‘Milly’ Faulken, who like her dad is a gobby prick with a mute mate. Yet, despite the film’s relentless lack of hilarity, Reboot actually betters Strike Back. The first film had been utterly charmless, vain and smug. But this remake has a nostalgic bent that is at least understandable, while every now and again an actual emotion peeks through the foggy haze of weed jokes.
Five multi-movie universes that breed brand-loyal customers from cradle to grave out of 10

Clerks III (2022)

And we end where we began, with a visit to the Quick Stop convenience store and clerks Dante and Randal. The way in which Kevin Smith has periodically dropped in on this pair has been unquestionably the highlight of his filmography; the characters have been his ‘control’, the heart around which all the other chaos can swirl. Over nearly 30 years Brian O’Halloran and Jeff Anderson’s creations have become modern-day versions of Vladimir and Estragon, but rather than waiting for Godot, these guys are killing time while they wait for their lives to get going… Tragedy has struck since 2006’s Clerks II, while both men are still working in the same shop as in 1994. Jay and Silent Bob have taken over the old video store next door and now run a legal marijuana business, while old colleague Elias is dabbling in NFTs. But all their lives are shaken when Randal – who’s approaching 50 – suffers a heart attack. (The storyline was obviously inspired by Smith’s experiences.) Realising that he needs to seize the day, a recovering Randal then decides to make a movie about his life. Dante feels pressured into helping his best friend, while Silent Bob takes on the task of being a one-man film crew. Of course, you soon realise that the script Randal has written is essentially the original Clerks. We therefore (again) enter some *very* metatextual material as classic scenes are restaged shot for shot and self-aware jokes are cracked about the virtues of using black-and-white film stock. But do you know what? Despite being roughly the 17th movie in which Kevin Smith has recycled his own career, Clerks III handles all this in an endearing and character-specific way. The storyline makes perfect sense, speaking to that strain of nostalgia and the yearning for youthful happiness that strikes many men in their 40s. After the young-adult ennui seen in film one, and the existential panic of hitting your 30s that powered the first sequel, Clerks III is a midlife-crisis movie – and specifically a male midlife-crisis movie. Dante and Randal are looking back to former glories because they don’t see many new ones on the horizon, and that’s a deeply affecting basis for a comedy drama. As a celebration of characters I’ve known for 30 years, as well as a moving, melancholic study of middle-age concerns – loss, regret, friendship, hope – Clerks III might very well be Smith’s best work yet.
Ten kites out of 10

Agree with these scores? Disagree? Let me know in the comments below…

Voyage (2021)

Of all the unlikely musical reunions there have been over recent years, ABBA was perhaps the most unlikely. The group had parted ways in 1983 after a triumphant decade of joyful music, successful albums and global tours, leaving an indelible and classy legacy. The four members remained on good terms personally; the two songwriters collaborated on various projects; and they all benefitted financially from a smash-hit stage show and movie based on their music. Yet while outrageous sums of money were offered for tours and new recordings – more than $1 billion has been cited – Benny Anderson, Agnetha Fältskog, Anni-Frid ‘Frida’ Lyngstad and Björn Ulvaeus seemed content to leave ABBA in the past.

However, in June 2016, the four sang and played together at a private gala in Stockholm held to mark the 50th anniversary of Benny and Björn’s friendship. Frida and Agnetha began to sing the 1980 song Me and I, then the lads joined in – ABBA’s first performance in 33 years. ‘It was absolutely amazing,’ said Frida afterwards. ‘A lot of emotions. We’ve made this journey throughout our history. Benny and Björn in particular. It’s been very nostalgic.’

The feeling began to grow that the quartet could – maybe, should – do something again… Over the next few months Benny and Björn assembled some material and then recording sessions were carried out in secret, while plans were also made for a reunion TV special. When the world was initially informed of the developments, in April 2018, we were told of just two new songs. Soon after, the TV special was ditched in favour of an elaborate stage show featuring digitally created avatars of the band. News started to filter out about more tracks, but the innovative ‘ABBA-tars’ project was hit by Covid delays. Then, in September 2021, the official word came of a brand-new album to be released in November and a stage show from May 2022…

Cover: The solar eclipse on the album’s artwork suggests a new dawn – or maybe even a celestial visit from an all-powerful deity, sent to brighten and enrich our lives. As well as being a natty piece of design intended to attract listeners on streaming services like Spotify, the moody, autumnal, one-colour-and-black palette ties in with the iconography of ABBA’s 2022 stage show. ABBA Voyage, which features CGI recreations of Benny, Agnetha, Frida and Björn wearing Tron-like jumpsuits, is still running at a purpose-built venue in London’s Olympic Park.

Best song: Don’t Shut Me Down stands alongside the very best of ABBA’s music. This energetic, polished and thoroughly infectious banger was the first new material to be publicly released from the LP – as a double-A-side single with I Still Have Faith in You, dropped on the day of the album’s announcement – and instantly became one of the greatest songs of the 2020s. A gorgeous production is full of compelling chord progressions, subtle strings and a groovy bottom end. Agnetha’s immaculate lead vocal, meanwhile, is the latest in her series of powerful, characterful performances where an entire life beyond the lyric is implied through acting and emotion (see also SOS, The Winner Takes It All, The Day Before You Came). Don’t Shut Me Down is a dramatic tale of both newfound self-confidence (‘And now you see another me, I’ve been reloaded, yeah/I’m fired up, don’t shut me down’) peppered with themes of regret, guilt, reconciliation and poignant hope. There are also three key changes. Sensational stuff.

Honourable mentions:

* The subdued album opener is I Still Have Faith in You, one of several tracks on Voyage that sound like they come from the world of musical theatre. (After ABBA’s 1980s break-up, Benny and Björn had dabbled in the genre – most notably with Chess, their Cold War-themed collaboration with lyricist Tim Rice.) The song was recorded early in this new phase of ABBA-tivity (in June 2017), though parts of the melody were recycled by Benny from an instrumental he wrote for the 2015 Swedish film The Circle. When he showed the rough idea to Björn, his writing partner knew instantly that the song was about the band’s reunion. Frida sings the uncomplicated lyric of quiet defiance, then in the second half the track becomes rousing and the vocals become multilayered, which saves things just as they start to drift towards boring.

* When You Danced With Me has a faux-folksy mood – emphasised by a lyric about a country girl left behind when her fella goes to the big city, with mentions of the Irish town of Kilkenny, village fairs and the simple joys of dancing. In less-talented hands, the track would be a disaster. As it is, the band’s charm is still there.

* Just a Notion, which features elements of rock’n’roll and boogie-woogie, was another single, issued soon before the album in October 2021. It’s actually a reheated track that was worked on during the sessions for Voulez-Vous in 1978 then discarded – Agnetha and Frida’s original vocals were retained, but they’re now complemented by new backing music. The result is an up-tempo tune difficult to dislike – and a cute way of short-circuiting ABBA’s career, linking this 21st-century coda with the main canon.

* There’s a sci-fi edge to the enjoyable Keep an Eye on Dan, as ABBA dial up the electro-pop for an icy-cold song about a mother dropping her son off at his dad’s. Synthesiser beats, pulses and noodles provide a base for Agnetha’s emotion-soaked vocals, while the top melody is occasionally picked out by what sounds like a stylophone.

* Frida takes the lead on the high-energy and catchy No Doubt About It. Another ABBA lyric about relationship regrets (‘Hissing like a wild cat when I should have been purring’), the words tumble through the choruses while the backing track is densely packed.

Worst song: The final single released from the album, Little Things, is a schmaltzy and hollow Christmas song with twinkly production, backing vocals from a Stockholm children’s choir and the mood of a snowy singalong from a kids’ TV show. In another hint that Benny and Björn’s inspiration perhaps wasn’t striking enough for a fully original album, the outro is partly based on Godnattvisa, an instrumental track recorded by Benny’s sideline project, Benny Anderssons Orkester, in 2007.

Best video: The release of I Still Have Faith in You was accompanied by a montage promo. Celebrating the group’s original run of success, we see backstage footage, shots of the group with adoring fans, clips from classic videos and candid photos, all cleverly cut together as if they’re moving images on a noticeboard. Then, towards the end, the ABBA-tars take over – the uncanny-valley digital recreations of the foursome that fans would see for a full performance once the spin-off stage show began. Presumably ABBA Voyage will be the first of many instances of technology de-ageing (or even resurrecting) music stars for new live shows. How long until we can go and see Elvis at Wembley Stadium?

Review: Released 40 years to the month since the band’s previous ‘final’ album, Voyage became an instant smash hit – topping charts, shifting units, receiving warm reviews. A huge part of this success was probably due to some people being curious about a great band reuniting after so long and others being so excited they were always going to like the new music. But there were two other factors at play.

One was timing. Initiated before Covid-19 struck, the Voyage album was partly recorded during the face-mask era and then released 18 months into a global pandemic. As well as the countless deaths and the unprecedented upheaval in society caused by coronavirus, the world was facing tragedy and disaster from other sources too – the repellant Donald Trump had dominated world news for several years, the UK was dogged by Brexit and Boris Johnson and freak weather, Afghanistan had fallen to the Taliban, several entertainment figures were being found guilty of reprehensible crimes… The return of ABBA and their music – and all the associated positivity and joy – was, for many, a bright spot just when bright spots seemed depressingly rare.

And the other reason for Voyage’s high sales/streams and good critical reaction was that the music itself is so strikingly *ABBA*. Stylistically, Voyage fits into the group’s established discography perfectly – perhaps better than any other instance of a reunion album after a lengthy break. A guest super-producer like Mark Ronson might have felt the need to update, tweak, evolve, spice up or ‘make relevant’; essentially use the songwriting and voices of ABBA in a new aural context. But Benny, Agnetha, Frida, Björn and their team did not reinvent their brand; they revived it wholesale. So while we can swoon over classic-sounding new ABBA tracks like Don’t Shut Me Down, we must also concede that – like on most ABBA albums – Voyage has its share of unmemorable filler too.

Seven bittersweet songs in the memories we share out of 10