History Film / Clerks

The ultimate low-budget success story that created the behemoth that is Creator/KevinSmith (both figuratively and [[BigFun formerly literally]] speaking). However, Mr. Smith has lost a considerable amount of weight since he nearly [[https://www.today.com/health/kevin-smith-having-heart-attack-was-best-thing-ever-happened-t127518 died of a heart attack,]] so how about we stop fat shaming him?

Would you like some making fork, BER-SER-KER!

* BlatantLies: When Dante claims he was working "all day." Of course this backfires ''horribly.''

''Clerks'' was shot in the [[SarcasmMode scenic]] [=QuickStop=] 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 [[Film/{{TheViewAskewniverse}} several more films with some of the same characters and settings]].

The ultimate low-budget success story that created the behemoth that is Creator/KevinSmith (both figuratively and [[BigFun literally]] speaking).

* FreezeFrameBonus: For the most part, despite its vulgarity, the movie is relatively clean from a visual standpoint - that is, until Randal shows the offended customer the magazine he's reading. Viewers who look closely can easily see full spread of a woman's privates being, erm, explored.

* ContinuityNod: A few subtle ones.

* EstablishingCharacterMoment: The very first image of the movie is Dante's dog sitting up on his bed, shortly before Dante sleepily tumbles out of his closet, having apparently slept the previous night on a pile of dirty clothes. It establishes right away that not only is he a slacker but such a [[ExtremeDoormat pushover]] that he won't even shoo his ''dog'' off his bed to sleep comfortable.

Filmed in 1993, but not theatrically released until 1994, it 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.

* LongList: Randal confirms a list of ordered video titles as a mother approaches the counter with her young son. He reels off a very long list of porn titles as the customers wait in impatient consternation.

--->'''Veronica''': You men make me feel sick. You'll sleep with anything that says yes.
--->'''Dante''': Animal, mineral or vegetable.
--->'''Veronica''': Vegetable, meaning paraplegic.
--->'''Dante''': They put up the least amount of struggle.

---> '''Dante''': How many times have I told you not to be dealing in front of the store?
---> '''Jay''': I'm not dealin', man. What you talkin' about?
---> '''Burner''': Hey, you got anything, man?
---> '''Jay''': Yeah, what you want?

-->'''Randal Graves''': Which did you like better? ''[[Film/ReturnOfTheJedi Jedi]]'' or ''[[Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack Empire Strikes Back]]''\\
'''Dante Hicks''': ''Empire''.\\
'''Randal''': Blasphemy.\\
'''Dante''': ''Empire'' had the better ending. I mean, Luke gets his hand cut off, finds out Vader's his father, Han gets frozen and taken away by Boba Fett. It ends on such a down note. I mean, that's what life is, a series of [[DownerEnding down endings]]. All ''Jedi'' had was a bunch of {{Muppet}}s.

-->'''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.

-->"Beautiful chicks with dicks that put mine to shame."

-->My love for you is like a truck, BER-SER-KER!
-->Would you like some making fork, BER-SER-KER!,

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

-->'''Customer:''' Excuse me, have you seen my keys?\\

-->'''Sanford''': Responsibility? What responsibility? You're closing the fucking store to play hockey!
-->'''Randal''': He may be blunt, but he's got a point.

-->'''Randal Graves''': If title dictated my behavior, as a clerk serving the public, I wouldn't be allowed to spit water at that guy. But I did. So, my point is that people dictate their own behavior. Even though I work in a video store, I choose to go rent movies at Big Choice. Agreed?

-->'''Dante''': What an embarrassing way to die.\\
'''Randal''': That's nothing compared to how my cousin Walter died.\\
'''Dante''': How did he die?\\
'''Randal''': He broke his neck.\\
'''Dante''': That's embarrassing?\\
'''Randal''': He broke his neck trying to suck his own dick!

-->'''Randal''': She cheated on you how many times?\\
'''Dante''': Eight and a half.\\
'''Randal''': Eight and a half?\\
'''Dante''': Party at John Kay's senior year. I get blitzed and pass out in this bedroom. Caitlin comes in and jumps all over me.\\
'''Randal''': So that's cheating?\\
'''Dante''': No, in the middle of it she called me Brad.\\
'''Randal''': She called you Brad?\\
'''Dante''': Called me Brad.\\
'''Randal''': Eh, that's not cheating. People say crazy shit during sex. One time I called this girl "mom."

* BlandNameProduct: Zigzagged. Some brands have been covered up, like "Dave's Fruit Pies" instead of Hostess. And sometimes real brands are used, like Gatorade. During the conversation about the egg guy, the female customer briefly mentions "Food City", presumably the in-universe equivalent to real NYC-area grocery co-op chain Foodtown (which had a lot more stores then compared to now- an accounting scandal closed one franchise, and another franchise eventually became part of Stop and Shop).

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 Creator/RogerEbert and Creator/LeonardMaltin. The film's success helped jump start the modern independent film industry (which actually began with Jim Jarmmusch's ''Stranger than Paradise'', 1984 and Spike Lee's ''She's Gotta Have It'', 1986, but was given a big kick by ''Film/SexLiesAndVideotape'' and ''Film/{{Slacker}}'', the latter of which Smith claimed was his direct inspiration for this film) and turned [[Creator/MiramaxFilms Miramax]] into a major distributor for said independent films, rivaled only by Polygram Filmed Entertainment and Fox Searchlight.

* AbsurdlyHighStakesGame: The film itself. Creator/KevinSmith financed the movie by hocking valuable comic books and buying supplies on his credit card. Had the movie flopped or not been picked up by a major studio, he'd have been left with tens of thousands in high-interest debt with no real job prospects.

* AndNinteyNineCents: Dante remarks that all prices end in 0.99. And yet in the background, all the prices end with the number five.

* AddictionDisplacement: Subverted -- it's being encouraged as a stealth marketing stunt for a gum company.

* ArcNumber: 37 gets bandied around rather a lot. [[spoiler:It's the number of dicks Dante's girlfriend Veronica has sucked, including Dante (though not in a row)]]

* BaguetteBeatdown: During the fight scene.
* BedTrick: Two unintentional examples:
** Dante mentions that Caitlin once had sex with him believing him to be someone else, unbeknownst to Dante, which foreshadows...
** [[spoiler:Caitlin has sex with someone she believes to be Dante in the Quick Stop bathroom. It is, in fact, a dead body.]]
* BettyAndVeronica: Veronica is, ironically, the Betty. Caitlin is more of a Veronica.

* DamnedByAFoolsPraise / AttentionDeficitOohShiny: "Ooh, ''Navy SEALS''!"

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

* HaveIMentionedIAmHeterosexualToday: Jay.

** The jerk-off customer, whose keys was thrown away by Dante in retaliation.

* JerkassHasAPoint: Randal may be an asshole but he makes some good points.

* JustFollowingOrders: The gum salesman at the beginning of the film accuses Dante of this, immediately before comparing him to a [[GodwinsLaw Nazi]]. [[note]]This is a pretty notable flawed simile given that Nazi Germany had strict anti-smoking laws.[[/note]]

* MeaningfulName: [[Literature/TheDivineComedy Dante.]]

* NoodleIncident: Julie Dwyer's wake, at least originally.

* RunningGag: "What smells like shoe polish?"

* SliceOfLife

* TheUnfairSex: Veronica slaps Dante and calls him for a pig for having sex with 12 women, while she's only ever slept with 3 guys. Dante however is wrong to be angry to learn of the ''36'' other guys she performed ''[[LoopholeAbuse oral]]'' sex on and failed to mention. Granted, Dante's reaction is overblown and he quickly crosses the line, but given that she gave a rather vivid description of what "''snowballing''" is, you can see ''why'' he's so furious.
** [[OverlyLongGag In a row?]]
** Dante leaves the higher ground pretty swiftly when he explains that it's a different question how many sex partners Veronica has had compared to how many sex partners he has had because in Veronica's case this is ''important''.

** The jerk-off customer, whose keys was thrown away by Dante.
-->"Fucking kids."

*** Mostly towards Dante and Randall who they think don't seem to be taking their assumingly simple jobs seriously.

* KarmaHoudini: Randal sells cigarettes to a little girl and Dante ends up getting saddled with the fine. And unlike everything else in the film, he doesn't even get properly [[WhatTheHellHero called out on it]].

* AnythingThatMoves: "I'll Fuck Anything That MOOOOOVES!" We know, Jay, thank you.

* ArtisticLicenseFilmProduction: Randal comes into the convenience store telling Dante he just had a revelation watching Film/ReturnOfTheJedi, however none of the sound effects are from it.

* ConceptVideo: The video for [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=esE-XvZicxE Soul Asylum's "Can't Even Tell"]] was directed by Kevin Smith, and includes all the characters from the film playing roof hockey with the band while Jay lip synchs the song by singing into a hockey stick.

** Dante's claim that ''Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack'' is the superior Star Wars film because "it ends on such a down note".

* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Randall. He may show his heart of gold more in ClerksII but even in this film he shows he does still care deeply about his best friend, Dante.

* ShoutOut

* TookALevelInJerkass: If we're to take this scene in the context of the rest of the movie, Randal, who's otherwise difficult by not a complete asshole, seems particularly mean to Dante during this whole ordeal, especially when he introduces Dante to Julie's parents after Dante explicitly told him that they did not want to see each other.

* SoulSuckingRetailJob: A convenience store sized version but nonetheless, one of the best on screen examples of the miserable retail work.

* MoodSwinger: The jolly guy who reads the tabloids gets extremely pissed when Randal spits his drink at him to shut up.

* NiceGuy: Dante for the most part. He has his remarks but he is a well-meaning, mature, thoughtful guy.

* CatchPhrase: "I'm not even supposed to be here today!"