'Clerks' is a return to form for Smith

Set in a suburban New Jersey Quick Stop Mart, the filthily hilarious indie film was about a pair of 20-something slackers with time to kill and customers to ignore. Now, Dante (Brian O’Halloran) and Randal (Jeff Anderson), the titular clerks from the first film, are back, older, seemingly not the least bit wiser, with more time to kill and more customers to ignore.

“Clerks II” opens as disaster strikes the Quick Stop: the mini-mart has burned down. (Randal left the coffeepot on. Again.) The boys, now well into their 30s, find employment at a fast-food joint called “Mooby’s”; cow motif and all (one dessert option is the “Cow Pie”). Like “Clerks,” the sequel unfolds over a period of one day in and around their place of employment.

This is Dante’s last day on the job as he is about to split with his fiancée for Florida where a brand new, all-grown up job working for his soon-to-be-father-in-law awaits. Dante will escape being a slacker, Jay and Silent Bob, and New Jersey all in one fell swoop. Except he is conflicted and we don’t understand why until the Mooby’s manager, the beautiful Becky (Rosario Dawson) arrives. As is obvious and unspoken the minute she walks in, Dante is flat on his back in love with her.

Smith is famous, or infamous depending on your opinion of the writer-director, for his ravenously dirty dialogue exploding from his characters’ mouths. There certainly is no lack of that in “Clerks II.” As his films are simply, almost amateurishly shot, art is probably not the first thing that comes to mind when watching a Kevin Smith movie.

But as here, and as in his other films, especially “Chasing Amy,” there is a true heart beating underneath all the crass, but funny, jokes that trumps any pretensions of art.

A show-stopping rooftop dance sequence to the beat of the Jackson 5’s “ABC” proves that — as does the awkwardly sincere, very funny, declarations of love and friendship that passes between Dante and Randal near the film’s end.

“Clerks II” starts slow but builds to a satisfying and believable conclusion. It probably won’t change anyone’s entrenched opinion of the Smith oeuvre. Yes, Smith’s “Mallrats” fits into an oeuvre. So, if you are looking for funny, this is more comedy from a writer-director who successfully blends plenty of heart with outlandish dirty jokes and a donkey from Tijuana (don’t ask).

BOB HARRIS has been hooked on movies since he was 13 when his brother got a job in a multi-plex and Bob saw all the movies he wanted for free.