What did you think of "Dogma"?   Good 27% 562   Bad 66% 1375   Somewhere in between 1% 23   Haven't seen it 6% 117 Total Votes   2077

Verdict: Holy smoke.

Details: Starring Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and Linda Fiorentino. Written and directed by Kevin Smith. Rated R for strong profanity, including sex-related dialogue, violence, crude humor and some drug content. 2 hours, 5 minutes.

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Review: You've got to hand it to "Dogma," a controversial religious spoof from the creator of the rollicking 1994 anti-establishment comedy "Clerks." It sure knows how to deliver a sermon in as dull a manner as you'll ever hear from any pulpit in the land.

As if God can't take a joke, "Dogma" has already been lambasted by a Catholic anti-defamation group and dumped by its original studio, Miramax (the independent studio Lions Gate picked it up).

While the film pulls no punches in roasting organized religion, it does so with such minimal spunk and spare inventiveness that you have to wonder what all the fuss was about.

"Dogma" is packed with stars: Ben Affleck and gum-smacking Matt Damon as renegade fallen angels; Alan Rickman as a sour angelic messenger; bikini-clad Salma Hayek as a muse; Chris Rock as a 14th apostle; and Linda Fiorentino as an abortion clinic worker and "chosen" human. Janeane Garofalo shows up. So does George Carlin. Not to mention a trio of in-line-skating teenage hellions wielding killer hockey sticks.

Then there's Jay (Jason Mewes) and Silent Bob (Kevin Smith, the film's writer-director), a millennial Bill and Ted. They always show up in Smith's movies, be it "Clerks," "Chasing Amy" or "Mall Rats."

As the characters pile on, "Dogma" becomes a convoluted tale bloated with endless expositions, often mind-numbing logic and plenty of just plain old blah blah blah. Thankfully, sometimes it's also funny.

The movie kicks off with a wicked charge. Carlin, in full Catholic regalia, stands in front of a New Jersey church espousing a newfangled PR campaign to counter the bleak image instilled by your standard-issue crucifix. It's "Catholicism Wow!" and includes the unveiling of the "Buddy Christ," a peppy image of a smiling, winking Jesus, his right thumb perkily pointed up. "Doesn't it pop?" Carlin cracks.

As banished angels, Affleck and Damon concoct a way to re-enter heaven. But it comes with a price. Like snuffing out life as we know it.

Most of the other characters team up to stop them. Which leads to a lot of sex jokes, scatalogical gross-outs, bashings of teendom filmmaker John Hughes ("Sixteen Candles," "The Breakfast Club"), a few amusing revelations about organized religion and some blunt verbal assaults on Catholicism. (Characters flatly remind the audience of the church's inaction on both slavery and the Holocaust.)

Affleck and Damon do the best job of delivering Smith's wordy material; they're clearly having fun. And when the payoff works — as when Damon's angel talks a nun out of her calling — "Dogma" is sinfully funny. But like the worst seasons of "Saturday Night Live," most of the film's setups go nowhere or just fall flat.

Ultimately, Fiorentino's character becomes weirdly apropos. "I'm confused," she says after another character's umpteenth allocution. "I can't take much more of this."

— Bob Longino, Cox News Service

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