10 Recent Movies NOBODY Expected To Be Good

Even Kevin Smith's biggest fans will struggle to deny that the Clerks filmmaker's later-stage career has been a massively mixed bag at best, from the boldness of horror-comedy Tusk, to the execrable Yoga Hosers, and the so-so victory lap sequels Jay and Silent Bob Reboot and Clerks III.

So it wasn't easy to be particularly enthused about The 4:30 Movie - a coming-of-age comedy loosely based on Smith's own formative years, because the man apparently hasn't mined enough of his own life for his cinematic oeuvre.

But credit where it's due - The 4:30 Movie isn't great by any means, but it is a shockingly solid piece of work. 

Ditching the filmmaker's signature vulgarity for a more sweet-natured drama that basically feels like a low-budget riff on Steven Spielberg's The Fabelmans, this is the sort of movie it really didn't seem like Smith had in him at this point in his career.

If nothing else, it suggests that Smith would do well to deviate from his bread-and-butter "Askewniverse" movies a little more often and just focus on telling simple, human stories.