History Film / Clerks

* MythologyGag: The first use of "37", later a recurring number throughout Smith's movies.

* [[AnythingThatMoves I'll Fuck Anything That MOOOOOVES!]]

->"This job would be great if it wasn't for the fucking customers."
-->--'''Randal Graves'''

->"I'm not even supposed to be here today!"
-->--'''Dante Hicks'''

''Clerks'' was shot in the same convenience store where Smith worked at the time and featured a cast made up of Smith's friends (such as Jeff Anderson, Jason Mewes and Scott Mosier) and family (in various small roles), Smith himself and a few local actors (such as Brian O'Halloran, who plays the lead role of Dante Hicks). When released, the film made its budget back several times over. Its success enabled Smith to make [[{{Mallrats}} several]] [[ChasingAmy more]] [[{{Dogma}} films]] [[JayAndSilentBobStrikeBack with some of the same characters]] [[ClerksII and settings]].

The incident that happened at Julie Dwyer's wake was actually never filmed but what happened was finally revealed in an animated short on the tenth anniversary DVD set. Brian O'Halloran and Jeff Anderson reprised their roles and Joey Lauren Adams made a cameo as her character Alyssa from ''ChasingAmy''.

* ContinuityNod: A nice subtle one - in ''ChasingAmy'' Alyssa mentions a fling with Caitlin Bree; after Dante complains about 'Caitlin and her secrets' Alyssa (who is clearly friends with Dante), not unkindly, tells him he "just has no idea sometimes", either as a subtle hint that Dante would be better off without Caitlin or as a tacit admission of guilt because Caitlin cheated on him with her.

* DeadBabyComedy: The whole film qualifies, but especially the ending, which features [[spoiler: Caitlin accidentally having sex with a dead guy and having a mental breakdown over it]].
** According to Randal, how his cousin Walter died.

Surprisingly for a film with profanity and vulgar references, it manages to stay quite intelligent and upon release, it was well received by critics such as RogerEbert and Leonard Maltin. The film's success helped jump start the modern independent film industry (which actually began with ''Sex Lies & Videotape'') and turned Miramax into a major distributor for said independent films, rivaled only by Polygram Filmed Entertainment and Fox Searchlight.

Later on, Dante closes up shop, because he had a game to play that day. They play on the roof, but after a annoyed customer comes up, joins the game, and loses the puck, they have to stop and get back to work. They also go to a funeral, meet up with Dante's ex-girlfriend, who goes through some trauma, and get in a fight. In the end, they stop arguing and close up for the day.

* DoesNotGetTheGirl: Dante [[spoiler: breaks up with Veronica midway and never rekindles his romance with Caitlin due to the restroom incident.]]

* ExecutiveMeddling: One of the good examples. The original Downer Ending had [[spoiler: Dante being murdered by a holdup man.]]
** The change was motivated by film guru John Pierson and Brian O'Halloran (who plays Dante), not any execs, though.

* DownerEnding: In the original cut, [[spoiler: an armed robber enters the store right after closing, shoots Dante dead and empties the cash register.]] The protests of the film's agent John Pierson, as well as those of damn near everyone else involved (most prominently supporter Bob Hawk and star Brian O'Halloran), led to Smith cutting the ending short, and he professes to liking the final version better.

** The guy who was ''supposed'' to be working. Turns out, he's not sick, he isn't coming in later, he instead ran off to ''Vermont''.

* [[ChekhovsGunman Chekhov's Gunman]]: [[spoiler: The elderly, bathroom-using customer (see below) and a little girl to whom Dante (unknowingly) sells cigarettes.]]

** According to Randall, how his cousin Walter died.

* {{Foil}}: Two-person example. The Jay/Silent Bob duo is a {{Foil}} for the Dante/Randall one. Both of them are pairs of VitriolicBestBuds, with a cocky, fair-haired RedOni and a more cool-headed, dark-haired BlueOni with a goatee. The difference is that (as Randall points out at the end) Jay and Silent Bob actually ''choose'' their bottom-rung jobs and freely embrace their status as hopeless lowlives, while Dante and Randall are still riddled with angst about theirs.

* HeterosexualLifePartners: Jay and Silent Bob. Also Dante and Randal. Which leads to...

* OneSceneWonder: Silent Bob
-->"You know, there's a million fine-looking women in the world, dude. But they don't all bring you lasagna at work. Most of 'em just cheat on you."

* ToxicFriendInfluence: While Randall [[JerkassHasAPoint has a point]] that a lot of Dante's problems are his own fault, he doesn't exactly offer much in the way of help or support for Dante either.

''Clerks'' was shot in the same convenience store where Smith worked at the time and featured a cast made up of Smith's friends (such as Jeff Anderson, Jason Mewes and Scott Mosier) and family (in various small roles) and a few local actors (such as Brian O'Halloran, who plays the lead role of Dante Hicks). When released, the film made its budget back several times over. Its success enabled Smith to make [[{{Mallrats}} several]] [[ChasingAmy more]] [[{{Dogma}} films]] [[JayAndSilentBobStrikeBack with some of the same characters]] [[ClerksII and settings]].

The ultimate low-budget success story that created the behemoth that is Creator/KevinSmith ([[{{Cracked}} figuratively speaking of course]]).

Filmed in 1993, but not theatrically released until 1994, is cost $27,000 to make, roughly the same price as a new car at the time. The film's final cost was $230,000 after the rights to the film's grunge and punk oriented soundtrack is added in, making it one of the few films in history where the rights to the soundtrack actually cost more than the film.

An independent comedy film that was finished in 1993, but not theatrically released until 1994. It was written and directed by Creator/KevinSmith and is his first film. ''Clerks'' cost $27,000 to make, roughly the same price as a new car at the time. The film's final cost was $230,000 after the rights to the film's grunge and punk oriented soundtrack is added in, making it one of the few films in history where the rights to the soundtrack actually cost more than the film.

* [[ChekhovsGunman Chekhov's Gunman]]: [[spoiler: The elderly, bathroom-using customer (see below) and a little girl to whom Randal sells cigarettes.]]

** So much so that the MPAA was originally going to rate the movie NC-17 ''solely'' for the language.

* ShoutOut: Caitlin's name is a reference to Caitlin Ryan from ''DegrassiHigh''.