DIRECTOR Kevin Smith
PRODUCER Scott Mosier
SCREENPLAY Kevin Smith
PRINCIPAL CAST Ben Affleck, Joey Adams, Jason Lee, Dwight Ewell, Jason Mewes

CHASING AMY is the third and final installment in writer- director Kevin Smith's New Jersey trilogy, following the cult classic CLERKS and Mallrats.

Lifelong best friends Holden McNeil (Ben Affleck) and Banky Edwards (Jason Lee) are enjoying success as the creators of a cult hit comic book. When they meet fellow comic artist Alyssa Jones (Joey Adams), Holden's desire for the beautiful charmer is immediate. Alyssa, however, has set her romantic sights on other women, but decides, nevertheless, to pursue a friendship with Holden. This presents Holden with a dilemma: feeling the way he does, can he merely be friends? Banky, who knows him best, doesn't think so and would rather have Holden to himself.

As the friendship deepens, so do Holden's affections for Alyssa. And curiously, quite effortlessly, so do Alyssa's for him. With their friendship struggling to define itself, Banky grows more and more frustrated at the notion of losing his best friend to emotional adulthood. Through Alyssa's love for Holden, she becomes purified of her kinky past while said past gives rise to Holdens desire for sexual experimentation of his own. It's all quite improbable but you find yourself buying it nevertheless. In the end everyone is alone-- which may be the most lifelike thing about the film.

This film has plenty going against it.: at its heart is the classic male desire/mis perception that lesbians just need the right man to come along to set them straight; Alyssa's promiscuous sexual experiences with men bothering Holden more than her orgies with women; and the characters saying implausably esoteric things at times that sound more like witty scripting than real characters. But the movie has irresistable charms, not the least of which is Joey Laurel Adams... a diamond in the rough. Joey's star will shine deservedly bright. Her smile is unquestionably and delightfully infectious, and i'll be surprised if the entire world won't recognize her voice before long. The scene in a club where she graphically and very humourously describes her past deviant sexual episodes is worth the price of admission.

--AHB