In the 'Arts and Leisure' section of Sunday's New York Times, Caryn James profiled director (and comic book writer) Kevin Smith, whose career will have come full circle with the release of Clerks II on July 21st.  Smith got his career off to a rousing start with the surprise indy hit Clerks, which took the Sundance festival by storm in 1994.  In the intervening years Smith has managed to flesh out the world of his singular C-store characters in a series of 'cult films' and maintain a fairly high public profile with features for the Tonight Show and occasional forays into making mainstream films such as Jersey Girl, which starred Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck.  But Smith has retreated somewhat in recent years, giving up a chance to direct a big budget Green Hornet movie to go back and make the kind of films that got him to Hollywood in the first place.  Ms. James labels his decision to make a sequel to Clerks as 'a shrewd career move.'

For pop culture retailers Clerks II, which received an extended standing ovation when it was shown at the Cannes Film Festival, could be a sleeper hit in a summer filled with blockbusters that may benefit mass market retailers far more than pop culture stores.  Smith has fostered close ties, not just with the comic book industry where he led the ever-increasing parade of creators from other media writing comics, but in particular with Graphitti Designs, a company with a long history of producing high quality t-shirts and licensed comic-book merchandise.  Graphitti has the original Jay and Silent Bob Action Figure Set (MSRP $39.95), which includes fully articulated figures and even some inarticulate catch-phrase mutterings from Jay (Silent Bob remains true to his name), along with all sorts of non-articulated--Graphitti calls them 'inaction'--figures from Clerks and the subsequent Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, as well as from other classic Kevin Smith films including Dogma, Mallrats and Chasing Amy.