Dogma: A Screenplay

One of the major hits of the 1999 Cannes Film Festival, a film that proved too hot for Disney to handle, Kevin Smith's ribald, revolutionary new film Dogma is a comic theological fantasy that is sure to be one of this fall's most provocative offerings. Two fallen angels (Matt Damon and Ben Affleck), sentenced to eternal exile in Wisconsin, are trying to get back into heaven. A renegade cardinal in New Jersey (George Carlin), as part of his "Catholicism Wow!" campaign, has opened a loophole in Catholic doctrine that would give them their opportunity-and, in proving God's judgment wrong, destroy the universe. An abortion clinic counselor (Linda Fiorentino) who may or may not be of holy bloodlines is tapped as the very reluctant savior-and, accompanied by the thirteenth apostle (Chris Rock), a wayward muse (Salma Hayek), and two very questionable prophets (Jason Mewes and Kevin Smith, AKA Jay and Silent Bob), she sets off on a mission to save the world.

One of the major hits of the 1999 Cannes Film Festival, a film that proved too hot for Disney to handle, Kevin Smith's ribald, revolutionary new film Dogma is a comic theological fantasy that is sure to be one of this fall's most provocative offerings. Two fallen angels (Matt Damon and Ben Affleck), sentenced to eternal exile in Wisconsin, are trying to get back into heaven. A renegade cardinal in New Jersey (George Carlin), as part of his "Catholicism Wow!" campaign, has opened a loophole in Catholic doctrine that would give them their opportunity-and, in proving God's judgment wrong, destroy the universe. An abortion clinic counselor (Linda Fiorentino) who may or may not be of holy bloodlines is tapped as the very reluctant savior-and, accompanied by the thirteenth apostle (Chris Rock), a wayward muse (Salma Hayek), and two very questionable prophets (Jason Mewes and Kevin Smith, AKA Jay and Silent Bob), she sets off on a mission to save the world.

Salon - Charles Taylor

To echo the above words of the Rev. Richard Penniman, if Dogma can move an old agnostic like me, it can move anybody. Condemned sight unseen by the Catholic League, nervously dropped by Miramax's parent company, Disney, Kevin Smith's comic-religious fantasy turns out to be the sweetest hot-potato movie imaginable.

Kevin Smith sold his comic book collection to fund the movie Clerks, and after it became a huge cult hit he was able to buy them back. One of the most successful and critically acclaimed independent film-makers of recent years, Smith was the producer of the Oscar-winning Good Will Hunting and has also written and directed Mallrats, Chasing Amy, Dogma, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, Jersey Girl and Clerks II. He is an actor, having appeared in the new Die Hard movie and the Friends spin-off, Joey, among others.