Dogma: Kevin Smith On 25 Years Of The Controversial Comedy

If you want to feel old, here’s a fun fact for you: Dogma is celebrating its 25^th anniversary. The iconoclastic, controversial religious comedy has been unavailable for the past 25 years due to various issues relating to ownership issues and the fraught situation involving Harvey Weinstein, but it’s now getting a cinematic re-release in select cinemas in the UK.

Perhaps Kevin Smith’s most well-made film, and certainly his most cohesive narrative, Dogma follows two fallen angels (Ben Affleck and Matt Damon) as they try to take advantage of a theistic loophole to allow them re-entry into heaven. Trying to stop them is Bethany (Linda Fiorentino) a counsellor at an abortion clinic, aided and abetted by a group of mismatched religious figures, Rufus (Chris Rock), the 13th disciple, the muse Serendipity (Salma Hayek), the voice of God himself, Metatron (Alan Rickman) and the perennial View Askewniverse mainstays, Jay and Silent Bob (Jason Mewes and Smith himself).

The film is a mix of Smith’s trademark witty, subversive dialogue and real religious ideology, as well as wry observations about the state of Religion, and how it is warped by those who use it to serve their own ends. In one scene, it transpires that Cardinal Glick (George Carlin) blesses his golf clubs to give him the edge. It’s anarchic and incredibly funny, but nuanced and oddly reverent. Watching it today, it’s amazing how well the more theological elements stand up, alongside the jokes, and how pro-religion the film ends up being. Smith takes care to never make religion itself the target of the joke – something that clearly went over the heads of certain groups, who protested the film when it first came out.

We interviewed the iconic Kevin Smith to celebrate this release, the response to the original release, and his own relationship with religion, although it’s fair to say we were essentially just in the room while he talked to us. Smith is such a verbose, talkative presence that we barely got two questions out before the time was up, but even so, he proved just as warm and ebullient as his reputation would have you believe.

Check out the full interview below:

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