It's not that Zack and Miri Make a Porno is a bad film, it's just that it's a bad Kevin Smith film, the third in the line now that exhibits no turns, no rethinking of the idea. It's a dead-straight romantic comedy between two white American leads (to even call them "disenfranchised" like his previous main characters would be giving them too much credit). In this case the rom-com just happens to take place during the production of an amateur porno which is what I'm sure Smith thinks lends the film its indie badass street cred, but a MacGuffin is a MacGuffin, no matter how many anal toys are involved.

Smith was there in person, though, as was Mewes, as was Mosier, as was Harvey motherfuckin' Weinstein which was relatively cool. I don't usually do the geek-out for celebs, but this one was reasonably meaningful for me. I mean, they showed us Clerks in my first week of film school. The guy's sorta been with me through the whole curve. I wish he'd go back to making Kevin Smith movies - I'd trade all the cinematographic niceties in the world for one more look at a cliche story where the cliches have been all turned around on themselves.

And it wasn't that Not Quite Hollywood was bad, far from it; I'd like to own that flick on DVD and cull from its list of Australian exploitation flicks to add to my library. But at 1 a.m. it's all played at too unmodulated a tone - the "AHHHHHHHHH!!!!" tone - that I was just fighting it too hard. I went home at 1:30, and got what sleep I could.