Clerks III (2022) review

In what's hopefully Smith's last attempt to mine his 1994 black and white feature debut for content, convenience store employee Randal (Jeff Anderson) has an "epiphany" after surviving a heart attack and decides, with much needed assistance from his long-time friend Dante (Brian O'Halloran), to direct a movie about his own life, which essentially means 'remaking' the very first Clerks (under a different title: Inconvenience).  There are a few decent jokes at the front end of it (Amy Sedaris is a highlight), but most attempts at "humor" are thwarted by the rank sentimentality running through it: there are hospital visits, conversations with a dead lover (Rosario Dawson, whose character was killed by a drunk driver), "meditations" on existence ... and it concludes with one of its main characters floating off into a Wawa in the sky.  I recognize Smith, currently in his early 50's, is having some kind of midlife crisis (he had a health scare in 2018) ... but it would be nice if next time he wrote a movie for an actual audience instead of just himself.