Comparison of Clerks and The Avengers

Comparison of Clerks and The Avengers

In this essay I will be writing about the difference between an indie film, 1994's Clerks, and a mainstream film, 2012's The Avengers, (also known as Avengers Assemble in the United Kingdom.)

Clerks is an independently financed film written and directed by Kevin Smith. Its budget was $27, 575 and grossed $3,151, 130 at the worldwide box office. To invest in the film Smith sold many of his beloved comics, maxed out eight credit cars and spent some of his college fund. The film was a running time of 90 minutes and is rated as an 18. The film was critically successful and is now considered a cult classic.

The Avengers is a superhero film financed by Walt Disney Studios and was written and directed by Joss Whedon. This is different to Clerks as the film was not financed by any studio. Its budget was $220 million and it grossed $1,518,594,910, making it one of the top earning films of all time. The film has a running time of 142 minutes and is rated a 12A. Like Clerks, Avengers was critically lauded.  

Visually the films are nothing alike when compared. Clerks is filmed in black and white with basic equipment. It looks totally unpolished against the sleek and glossiness of The Avengers. The Avenger's colour scheme is bright and loud, emphasising the hues of the superheroes' costumes. Everything is shiny in comparison to Clerk's matte appearance. Additionally with Clerks you can definitely see it was filmed on a modest budget. The sets are simple and unrefined, minuscule in scale when compared to The Avenger's lustrous scenery.

Another comparison between the two films are the cast. The Avengers boasts huge stars such as Robert Downey, Jr,  Scarlett Johansson and Samuel L. Jackson. Clerk's cast features mainly unknown people, who are all connected to Kevin Smith in some way. This also shows the small budget of Clerks as Smith cast mostly his friends and family to further cut down costs. Clerks pushes the 'everyman/woman' trope as the actors he chose to portray their roles would be deemed average looking. This is in likeliness to the extremely attractive ensemble in The Avengers. This further adds to Clerk's truthfulness to reality.  

The plotline and ideologies of the films are starkly contrasted. Clerks has an utterly realistic view compared to The Avengers with their Norse gods and robotic flying men. Clerks is also darker and uses dark humour to its advantage. This is probably why it has a much higher rating than The Avengers as it explicitly uses strong language and freely speaks about sex and drugs. This attempt to depict a gritty real life creates social realism. In comparison, The Avengers could be seen as an escapist film with its surreal. The acting is also very different when compared between the two films. It is obvious Avengers has a solid script but with Clerks the dialogue flows more loosely. What the actors say is more true to real life than some lines spoken in Avengers.