“This one time, my cousin Walter got this cat stuck in his ass. True story.”
These are the iconic opening lines of dialogue from Mallrats, the second film in what would become writer-director Kevin Smith’s seven-part New Jersey Trilogy. While crude, this opening monologue perfectly sets the tone for the next hour and a half of 90’s cinema gold that the viewer is about to experience.
Earlier this year Mallrats celebrated its 25th Anniversary, so we thought it was the perfect time to take a look back on this box office flop turned cult classic and talk about exactly what has given it such longevity with its fans.
Mallrats is the story of two twenty-something slackers circa 1995, Brodie Bruce and T.S. Quint (played by Jason Lee and Jeremy London), who have just been simultaneously dumped by their respective girlfriends (Rene and Brandi; played by Shannen Doherty and Claire Forlani). One was dumped for having no real ambition in life, and the other for being “kind of an ass” when his girlfriend is trying to clean up a mess that he himself had a hand in creating. So how, pray tell, do our protagonists handle their breakups? They do what any other mid-90’s man-child slacker would do; They go to the mall.
As the title suggests, the majority of the film takes place in the aforementioned mall, with our heroes getting themselves into a number of misadventures along the way while trying to win back the hearts of their girlfriends. The mall is packed to the brim with a number of colorful characters like Willam Black (who stares at a magic-eye poster all day to see the 3D image), Trish Jones (the fifteen-year-old girl writing a novel on the sexual habits of men in mid-90’s America), Ivannah (the topless psychic) and of course Kevin Smith’s staple stoner duo, Jay and Silent Bob. There is rarely a dull moment to be found throughout the course of the film as Smith’s writing keeps things moving along at a hefty pace.
The film concludes with T.S. and Brodie sneaking their way onto the set of a dating game show that is being broadcast live on national television from the mall in order to try and get their girlfriends back. I’d hate to spoil the movie for you (and seeing as it’s been available for home viewing for about twenty-five years, I think it’s fair to give away the ending), but in the end, our heroes get more than they could have hoped for, the bad guys get their well-deserved comeuppance, and Jay & Silent Bob walk off into the sunset with Suzanne the orangutan (although THAT is another story entirely).
While the story itself is a bit hammy at times, the plot works well. Kevin Smith’s strongly written dialogue gives the audience a fun experience that was well ahead of its time and would set a precedence for the slacker genre for years to come. When it was first released, the film was a critical and financial disaster, with Smith himself saying he thought his career was over after Mallrats. Thankfully over the years it has gone on to find its audience once it was released on home video (and later on DVD, ect).
This film may have been marketed mainly at teens when it first hit the market, but it quickly became a cult classic amongst comic book fans, and it isn’t hard to see why! Mallrats is jam-packed with comic book and movie references, which while a common thing now, was not something that we often saw in movies when Mallrats was first released. The opening credits are accompanied by the lead characters done up as classic comic book covers, and there are quite a few scenes where our protagonists discuss how things work in comic books (“Lois could never have Superman’s baby, if she gets a tan it could kick right through her stomach!”). Mallrats even features one of the first ever cinematic cameos by Stan Lee!
Outside of the writing, the film has its ups and downs. Of the three original parts of the New Jersey Trilogy, this was the only film where it was really obvious that a studio was heavily involved with production. Things look a little too well-produced and clean-cut compared to Kevin Smith’s other films like Clerks and Chasing Amy, which detract from it feeling like real living world. The gag store names are fun and provide a slight chuckle here and there, but never feel like real mall locations.
Our protagonist Brodie is shown to be a comic book nerd of the highest caliber; giving comic book fans the movie hero we never knew we were looking for, but the movie hero we deserved none-the-less. What always struck me about Brodie is that he’s likable, but very much a deeply flawed character that knows his own strength and tries to use them to counterbalance his weaknesses. He is far from perfect, but his heart is generally in the right place where it counts.
While we had definitive performances from Jason Lee (who went on to a fairly successful film career but is best known for starring in the sitcom My Name Is Earl) in his breakout role as the original man-child slacker Brodie Bruce (you’re welcome, Judd Apatow) and Shannen Doherty in one of her most enjoyable roles as Rene, we also had both Jeremy London and Claire Forlani’s T.S. and Brandi who both feel a bit flat. Much of their dialogue feels clumsy, but a lot of that can be attributed to post filming re-dubs after a subplot was completely cut from the film. Aside from one or two unfamiliar faces (like Guardians of the Galaxy‘s Michael Rooker as Brandi’s father), the rest of the cast is primarily made up of future Kevin Smith regulars like Ethan Suplee, Joey Lauren Adams, Jason Mewes, Brian O’Halloran, and a very young Ben Affleck; all of whom hit the marks you would expect them to.
Another piece of the puzzle that makes Mallrats really work is its strong mid-90’s alt/punk soundtrack. Populated with tracks from favorites like Bush, Silverchair, Sublime, Squirtgun, Elastica, The Goops, and even some early Weezer, the soundtrack is an absolute blast! Every track manages to contribute to the overall fun and the ‘feel’ of the Mallrats experience and the film wouldn’t be the same without them.
Twenty-five years on, Mallrats holds up masterfully. It’s a movie that was made for comic book fans, by comic book fans, before that was a thing that was happening in the film industry. While it was ignored and forgotten upon its initial release, Mallrats went on to practically redefine the slacker archetype for an entire generation.
If you liked this Rewind Review, be sure to check out the whole series as we take a look back at some of our favorite corners of popular culture from years past!