I also saw Dogma. Prior to seeing it I had a marked dislike for Kevin Smith ever since I saw his "breakout" self-financed picture "Clerks" and could not muster a chuckle. Then, I saw "Chasing Amy" and was disappointed to learn that along with the fact that Smith is a lame writer and charmless auter, he can't direct actors, preferring to let them exfoliate, flatulate and otherwise bleed all over his print. I was happy for the guy, an up-from-the-heels wunderkind from New Jersey, but his movies sucked.
Dogma kind of sucks too, but there are innumerable pleasures in the sucking, because Smith has written a hit-and-miss lampoon on the perversities of Catholicism. And where he hits, he knocks it out of the park, as he plays fast and loose with the Bible in an effort to tell his modern fable (fallen angels trying to get back into Heaven; other angels, muses, apostles and assorted characters tryng to stop them), take some well-deserved shots at the Pope, and offers a heartfelt tribute to true faith, all in the zany format of "The Russians are Coming, The Russians are Coming . . ."
Smith still does not direct actors, so Chris Rock and Salma Hayek look like they are on home movies, and Linda Fiorentino manages an entire film with a smirk and rolled eyes. But his laissez-faire approach is made less ruinous by crafty renderings of four angels (Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Jason Lee and Alan Rickman) and the best performance to-date by Smith regular, stoner Jason Mewes.
The movie is silly, and to put a truly heretical cap on it, Alanis Morrisette shows up as God.
Thankfully, Smith gives her no lines.
