I agree with you on many of your points there, Rattlehead. I agree that many of Smith's movies are mismarketed. Chasing Amy wasn't meant to be blatant comedy. I've spoken with Kevin and he said so (he came to my University some years ago for a Q&A soon after CA came out). Mallrats is truer in spirit to Clerks, but to expect Chasing Amy to be that way, too, is to deny a filmmaker the right to evolve. And that's what CA is, KS's coming to terms with his life and mistakes he has made in his past. It was an apology of sorts that was completely mishandled by Miramax brass in terms of marketing. If they had given it a chance and tried to market it as a bit more of a dramedy, then the pubklic would have been a bit more well prepared when Jersey Girl came along and was completely disparate from all of his previous works.

Yes, Dogma was a bit preachy. But it was a voice that hadn't really been heard before. How many times in the past have you heard a filmmaker say that denominations and belief systems have ruined religion? Never. And it needed to be said. Unfortunately, it was heard in the form of a comedy, but it still got word out albeit to a much smaller audience than a Ben Hur or a Passion of the Christ.

All filmmakers have an agenda. It's something we've just gotta live with. Even Clerks and Mallrats had agendas (to expose the hell of working in retail hell and shopping in retail hell, respectively). I've learned to deal with it. That's all you can do. Either take it with a grain of salt (my preferred method of attack especially with documentarians) or avoid the film altogether.