——

This morning I got an important phone call. It was a job offer from Razorfish — arguably the pre-imminent company in my field. It’s something that’s been in the works for a few months, but was never any kind of sure thing. When my wife and I were first considering Chicago, it was because this opportunity, among others, was in play. While it was ultimately a job for The Mrs at another world class agency that brought us here to the windy city, I came knowing that I’d have an interview waiting for me when I arrived. I didn’t know what to expect, but was very pleased with the outcome.

That is, I was pleased until I started passing along the good news to my friends — my friends back in Minneapolis and St. Paul. Through this whole process of packing up, saying my goodbyes and hauling out to Chicago, the whole thing felt very gung ho. It was an adventure and I was glad to be on it. I still am, but it’s on the bitter side of bittersweet as I type this. I sent text messages to a handful of friends back (I almost typed “back home” right there) in Minneapolis, and with each one, it hit me harder and harder. I miss the Twin Cities. Well, I miss my friends in the Twin Cities. I didn’t before, at least not this painfully. It hadn’t hit me yet, but now it just aches. This downtown apartment feels very dark, a little cold, and really, really empty. The triumph of getting called up to the big leagues is tempered heavily with the solemn sadness of homesickness.

It will pass. Chicago has been a great experience so far and I haven’t even gotten to do any motorcycle riding yet. But right now, on this triumphal day when my career is likely to take off in a really big way, a big part of me is wishing I was back in Minnesota. I’m feeling homesick. I don’t actually want to go back, but somehow, I wish I was back.

Thing is though, that phone call this morning is why I’m here. It’s the choice I made: to take a chance and catalyze my career. I don’t regret it, but right now, it feels like I made that choice at the expense of something really really good. Better? Time will tell. Definitely good, though. Definitely good.

——

I’ve since started at Razorfish, and so far, it’s been fantastic. Hands down the best job I’ve ever had. I love doing meaningful, interesting work surrounded by smart, talented people.

Robb projected his question over the growl of The Mrs’ Honda CM400 as I pulled up to the open door at BlueCat Motors. Out front was my green Honda CB750. That was the bike in question. It’d been a few days since I’d seen the old boy. When last we’d met, I’d just finished cleaning and installing the carbs, rebuilt the front brakes and installed a brand new battery. But for all my efforts, the thing still didn’t run. I’d hit my limit, but thankfully, I wasn’t on my own. I was in good hands at BCM. My bike had been handed off to Robb and with it, my hopes to actually get some riding in this season.

Autumn in Minnesota is unpredictable. You might be able to ride into Christmas, or it might blizzard on Halloween. So I was glad to leave the CB750 in the hands of a professional. I knew I’d actually get to ride it before things got too cold and uncomfortable.

Robb had accomplished in a couple days what would have likely taken me weeks. More than that, he’d been over the bike from wheel to wheel. He’d flushed and bled the brakes. He’d inspected and adjusted my charging system. He’d re-aimed my headlight. The carbs were synced and Robb had taken the bike out himself to make sure it was running and riding like it should. “Both Rumpal and I rode it and the thing really comes alive at 4000 rpms. You’re going to have a blast.” Beyond the running, Robb had adjusted the suspension as well. “It’s got the most air it will take up front and it’s on full stiff on the rear shocks. It’s a bit harsh for both me and Rump, so it ought to be perfect for you.” He was right on both counts.

I stowed the CM400 inside (I’d be trading it back for the GL in a few days) and met Robb at the CB750. A little bit of choke, key on, and with a deliberate press of the starter button the 750 fired to life. It hummed happily and revved easily. For all their faults, there’s something special about an inline four cylinder that’s freshly synced. They’re so smooth, so howlingly eager. Robb made a couple final adjustments to the idle speed as the bike hummed and growled through its four chrome exhaust pipes. When he was satisfied, Robb gave me one final instruction. “I want you to ride the hell out of this thing. Seriously. Work it hard for a while and burn all the crud out of the cylinders. It’s been sitting for so long, some good, angry riding is exactly what it needs.”

Yes sir.

I threw a leg over the 750 and felt the machine growling under me for the first time. It seemed anxious — an iron horse spitting and whinnying — aching to gallop and shake off half a decade’s worth of boredom. I walked the bike forward off its center stand and we were ready to go. It’s a tall, top-heavy thing, just like every CB750. Clutch in, I tamped down into first gear. Giving it some throttle, I searched for the clutch engagement point to set off. Thanks to a down-geared front sprocket, this 750 took off eagerly and easily, unlike its stock siblings. I reached the end of the BCM lot and pulled onto Prior Avenue, headed toward I-94 and opening the taps for the first time on this proto-superbike, unleashing its 77 hp onto the streets of St. Paul. Within a moment, I was at the I-94 onramp and it was time to see what the 750 was capable of in its second lease on life.

Robb was absolutely right. Above 4000 rpm, the CB750 started pulling really, really hard. The down-geared sprocket meant keeping the bike in the sweet spot of its power band was effortless. What’s more, fifth gear was suitable for speeds of 50 mph and up — making this a one gear bike on the freeway. Open up the carbs and fresh gas is turned into lots of noise and speed, no downshifting required. It was a Friday afternoon, just after rush hour, so there was plenty of traffic on I-94, but it was all moving well. Robb had gotten the suspension adjustment just right for someone my size. The bike was stiff, but not uncomfortable. It was sporting, and perfectly balanced front to back. The 750 begged for aggressive riding. I obliged.

I’m not any kind of hooligan rider, and really, the CB750 isn’t a hooligan bike. More than anything, the aggressive, effective brakes together with the power and the adjustable suspension made this old CB750 a sport bike disguised as an old cruiser. The teardrop tank on this pre-Nighthawk Honda looks like it could have come off a Triumph. But give it the beans and the CB750 will outrun damn near anything trying to catch it. More importantly, it’s got the suspension and brakes under it to help keep you out of trouble at such speeds. As I shot down I-94, I was threading through traffic with no effort at all. The howl of four cylinders and four pipes made the CB750 sound more like an old Italian sports car than a modern motorcycle. It lacked the childish scream of many sport bikes. Most of all, I liked how unexpected it is. It’s a good looking motorcycle, but it’s not a bike the untrained eye would give a second look. It’s a sleeper. It doesn’t look fast, but it is. Not fast by contemporary superbike standards, but fast enough for me. Fast enough to be scary. Fast enough to be really, really fun.

More than anything though, the CB750 was forgiving. It was tight enough to be precise, but civilized enough to simply be ridden. There was no tending it — no having to stay ahead of it to make sure it didn’t reach up and bite me. I didn’t have to dodge every little bump and frost cleave on the highway. It was a bike I could simply sit on and enjoy. It was grown up. It was fast. It was confident. It was fun. Best of all, it was mine. I finally had a bike of my own. After a full season of false starts, mechanical difficulties, and stealing my wife’s motorcycle for a ride, there would finally be a bike for me in the garage. The Mrs and I could finally ride motorcycles together, something we hadn’t gotten to do all season. My rebuilding year would at least end with an autumn of good riding.

After a handful of spirited runs up and down I-94, I circled back to BlueCat Motors with a big grin on my face. I gave Robb a report on the bike’s performance and thanked him not just for his quick work, but for all his attention to detail. He’d found and sorted things with the bike I didn’t even know were wrong with it. While writing for the BCM blog, I’ve seen how Robb works on bikes. Any machine that makes its way onto his lift won’t leave the shop until it’s right — even if that means fixing something the customer didn’t bring the bike in for. He takes his responsibility as a mechanic very, very seriously. If I wasn’t going to sort this bike out myself, I’m glad it was Robb. Not only did I end up with a bike that runs, I ended up with a motorcycle I knew I could trust. That’s what made it a real bike.

I rode home, taking more of the highway than I usually do on The Mrs’ smaller CM400. There’s one particular part of I-35E South that I wanted to push the CB750 through. It’s the interchange where 35E meets 494. North of the interchange, the speed limit is 55 mph or 60 mph depending on what road you’re on. The southbound leg of 35E takes a sweeping right turn and immediately changes up to a 70 mph speed limit and widens to four lanes. What I love to do here is slingshot around the corner and put on some speed. I’d taken Robb’s advice about the 750 to heart and this was the perfect place to put it into practice. “Ride it hard,” he’d said. When that big sweeping turn came up, I opened the throttle all the way.

A quick lane change had me blasting around the sunset traffic. It’s two exits to Yankee Doodle, where I usually turn off to go home, but I kept hurtling down the highway. I left the taps open and poured on as much speed as I dared. The tires on this old machine had sat as long as the rest of the bike. While not cracked or obviously weather checked, I still didn’t trust them fully. So while I didn’t bury the speedometer completely, I made the old boy work for his hay and oats. The harder I pushed it, the smoother and sweeter the engine seemed to get. The old bike was now fully back to life, and it seemed like the old machine’s soul was grateful for another chance. The old horse was thrilled to gallop once again.

From a mechanic’s point of view, a Goldwing is kind of a nightmare. They’re brilliant machines — absolute triumphs of engineering, but they’re a motherfucker to work on. Everything is half again as complicated as it would be on a normal motorcycle, and takes at least twice as long to access and reassemble. That’s what happens when you put what is essentially a small car engine into a motorcycle. It’s a brilliant powerplant, but it’s the heart of a difficult beast. Because of that engine, the carb setup is more complex than normal 4-cylinder moto motors. Normally accessible items such as the clutch are nearly impossible to get to on the GL without pulling the whole motor or taking the entire back end apart. You have to pull the shocks to remove the rear wheel. There are linked brakes and convoluted anti-dive systems in each fork. The list goes on and on. These things are tricky enough on a regular bike. On the Goldwing, you’re in for it.

This is why Jeff, my mechanic mentor down at BlueCat Motors, flatly refuses to work on them. I’ve watched him turn them away at the door over and over. “No Goldwings. No. I don’t care. No.” He has good reasons. Goldwing customers are rarely willing to pay for the time needed to actually service these monsters. He can’t make any money on them and past experience with Goldwing service has given him a definite anti-GL bias. They’re trouble. Most of their owners are overly particular and obnoxiously spend thrifty to boot. I get it. To his credit though, when I got interested in a GL1100, Jeff agreed to help me with mine — provided I did all the work. I’d get a pass and my GL would be the one and only Goldwing allowed in the shop. A privilege indeed.

The machine I acquired needed some love. This 1983 Honda GL1100 had 48,000 miles, worn tires, and at least a season’s worth of dirt and muck all over it. What’s worse, the OEM headlight and blinkers were gone. In their place, a hideous bodge job of three Harley Davidson headlights and a pair of awful handlebar blinkers. The front wheel was off the wrong Honda. The grips were rotten and molting. At least it ran though. The bike started well, pulled like a dragon and except for a rough shift between 1st and 2nd gear (which I blame on a worn clutch), the bones of the machine were solid. Most importantly, this particular GL1100 had a pair of ultra-rare body side covers sculpted into the engine’s opposing jugs. Truth be told, I bought this otherwise inferior GL just to acquire those side covers. I’m not afraid of a little wrench work though. I regret nothing!

The first order of business was getting the front wheel sorted out. The guy I’d bought the bike from had another big Honda in pieces. This wheel had a better tire on it than the GL’s 11-spoke rim, so rather than changing the tire, he just changed the wheel and kept riding the bike. I’d insisted on taking the correct wheel with the bike, because these 11-spoke mag rims are one of the key reasons I bought the harder-to-find 1983 model over more plentiful GL1100s from 1981 or ’82. The gearing is higher too, but that’s another story.

Just a couple days old, I delivered my new GL to BlueCat Motors to swap the presumably good tire on the incorrect wheel onto the rim that belonged on the bike. In the days between when the bike arrived and my moto dojo appointment, the rear tire actually went flat while the bike sat. Turned out the rim was leaking at the bead. By the time we got the old boy on the lift (which struggled noticeably to hoist the GL’s 640 pounds), I was ready to get my hands dirty. I first pulled the rear wheel. Being a GL, this was complicated, of course. I had to pull the rear shocks in order to clear the rear axle over the exhaust pipes. Even with the wheel loose, I had to further jack up the bike on the lift to get out from under the fender. This first task set the stage for all the work to come. It wasn’t impossible, but it took much longer than expected.

With the wheel off, Jeff unmounted the tire for me on their tire machine and I then spent an awkward few moments bellying the rim up against the wire wheel to remove the old, leaking rim sealant. Fresh, black goop was applied to the bead and once we got the tire back on, it was finally holding air. I wrestled the rear wheel back into place, but even reassembly wasn’t easy. What had I gotten myself into here?

The front wheel would prove no less complicated. The ’83 GL’s front forks have a brake-activated anti-dive mechanism built into the bottom of both front forks. The brake calipers bolt half to the fork, half to a cantilevered mechanism trailing behind the fork. That mechanism actuates a small piston and spring that essentially pre-loads the front suspension as you put on the front brakes — keeping the nose from diving. What it means for removing the front wheel is that in addition to disconnecting the speedometer cable, you’ve got to disassemble the anti-dive connections in order to remove the brake calipers. None of it’s that hard, it’s just one thing after another. It’s twelve steps instead of two. I was starting to see the pattern — starting to understand what Jeff was talking about.

With the wrong wheel finally off the bike, we were about to swap the good tire to the correct wheel. Of course no sooner did we have the wheel off the bike, Ryan took a closer look at the supposedly “good” tire. While it had plenty of tread left and no visible weather cracking, the tire was a cheap chinese brand that Ryan recognized for having a bad reputation. “Apparently they’ll just blow out the sidewalls at random.”

Shit. We didn’t even bother to swap the tire at that point. I wasn’t going to keep it. So the correct rim went on, worn out old white wall tire and all. At least now the bike had most of its original parts back.

Ryan checked the rear tire and same thing — same crappy brand of disposable tire. This wouldn’t do at all. What’s more, while removing the wheels, I had a chance to inspect the brakes front and rear. All three sets of pads were either chewed to hell from incorrect, novice screwdriver prying, or were paper thin. The rear rotor was badly grooved. Half the hardware in the anti-dive mechanism that ties into the front brakes was improvised with stacks of washers offsetting bolts that were too long. Rubber boots were missing. Pivot pins were rusted and scored. There was no caliper lube on any of the brake components. Not good. The bike was much less road worthy than previously thought. Not unsafe, just not healthy. Instead of buttoning up the bike and getting ready to ride it, our moto dojo session ended with a clipboard, a pen and a parts sheet. Not quite what I originally had in mind.

All in all, my GL wouldn’t need that many parts, and nothing too exotic. Tires, brake pads, caliper and master cylinder rebuild kits, carb kits, grips and a few other odds and ends would have me sorted. I’d be out a few hundred dollars, but that’s the beauty of old Japanese motorcycles. I didn’t have much money in the old sled to begin with. It was the start of a waiting game for parts, but more importantly, it was my first taste of what it’s like to work on an old Goldwing. Jeff wasn’t kidding. Even the simplest things are a real undertaking. The question at that point was simple. Would the big Honda live up to all its hassle once I finally got it back on the road? Had I made a good choice in the naked Goldwing, or was it a fool’s chariot?

It seems like with most things, I never know it’s the last time until long after. Today I knew it. I knew today was my last blog visit to BCM. Sure, I’ll be back in the spring to get my Honda CB450. I’m planning to ride in for Bearded Lady in July. It’s not the last time I’m going to see this place ever, but it’s still the end of something really special to me. Writing the BlueCat blog wasn’t just throwing together a few hundred word each week. It meant being around — being involved in their business and plugged into the lives of the people who worked there. It meant learning more about bikes and more about the quirks of vintage machines. On the other side of my writing bargain, Jeff and Robb have made a mechanic out of me. Apprenticing under their misanthropic instruction has been as entertaining as it’s been informative.

When I arrived today, I was sad to see that both Robb and Ryan were out of the shop. Robb’s apparently been ill and Ryan is gods-know-where. It was just Jeff and Jeff (aka Rumpal) doing their normal Saturday thing. Rump was putting in two new shaft seals on a Honda CB350. Jeff was handling business stuff and researching oil certifications. So for the last time, I did my normal Saturday thing. I took photos. I asked questions. “What’s the story on this bike?” I must have asked that question 200 times this year. “What’s going on?” being the other one. Finding 52 stories to tell wasn’t hard. Staying interested in the comings and goings of the shop wasn’t hard either. There’s always something fun on the lift or something interesting happening around the shop.

Truth be told, I didn’t actually need to be there today, but I couldn’t not go. I wanted to be there. It was my last chance. Next weekend is Christmas, and two days on we’ll have moved to Chicago. This was my last chance to stand in the middle of the shop with a camera as part of this year-long thing I’ve been doing. I wanted to be able to have one last look around — take the opportunity to try to soak in the feeling of that place as much as I can. It was my chance to say a proper farewell to the guys. To somehow, even in that manly, side-staring, let’s not actually talk about it sort of way, try to express how much this year at BlueCat Motors has meant to me. To learn what I now know — to have experienced the naked livelihood of these people who became my friends — it’s an experience I’ll carry with me for a long, long time.

As closing time approached, I started walking around the shop trying to soak it in somehow. It had finally hit me that this was my last chance to really see this place — to take it all in and try to remember it. Memory is like the after-image of a really bright light. Close your eyes and you can still see it. I wanted this place burned into my brain. So I looked. I looked hard at the place that’d become so familiar — my garage away from home. I wanted to remember every smell, every shelf, every tool. I wanted the savor the feel of cold steel on my fingertips and the smell of carb cleaner on my hands. It was sad, but sad in that good, deep way. Sad because it’d been something good. Sad because this is a place worth missing. Sad because these are people worth missing.

There is simply no good way to end these things. There are no grand speeches to make. No hallmark moments to create. There is only the ending itself. It comes whether I want it to or not. I took my last looks. Jeff and I shook hands. That was that. That part of my life is now over. It’s an end, and it’s also a beginning. It’s the beginning of whatever’s next. It’s the start of a new life in a new city with a new motorcycle community. It’s the adventure of the unknown, and it’s escaping the peril of the familiar. But for all the things it is, it’s sad above all else. I’m going to miss this place.

_{Photo credit: Trey Ratcliff. Original here}

First we needed to set the CB450′s valve clearance. In most 4-stroke engines, the valves that let gasses into and out of the engine are shaped kind of like the stem and base of a wine glass, with the base essentially plugging a hole that matches the contour of the valve. They’re held shut (up) by springs, and then the oval shape of the cam lobes push against those springs to basically un-plug the hole. Most of the time, this is accomplished through a rocker arm, sometimes called a cam follower or tappet. (Fun side note: when Tom and Ray on NPR’s Car Talk refer to themselves as “The Tappet Brothers”, they’re referring to this engine component.) The cam lobe pushes on the follower, and the follower pushes down via cantilever on the valve, against the valve springs, and opens the port (the hole) to either let air and fuel in, or let exhaust gasses out. The space between the top of the valve and the cam follower or tappet that pushes on it is referred to as valve clearance. Too much gap and the engine will make a clattering noise and you’ll lose some amount of power and efficiency. Too little gap and the valve may not close all the way, and explosions of combustion can literally “burn” the valve, coat it with soot and even cause it to stick. The problem is that most motorcycle engines tend to get “tighter” as you put on the miles. So if you ignore your valve clearance service intervals, you’ll end up burning up the valves.

This critical distance? About .003″-.007″ of gap. That’s it. A sheet of plain paper is .004″ thick, to give you an idea.

On the CB450, the valve adjustment is especially critical given the nature of its design*. Rather than a more traditional lock nut adjuster built into the top of the valve spring assembly, the CB450 uses what’s called a torsion bar. And instead of setting the gap between the follower and the top of the valve, you set the gap between the other end of the follower and the cam lobe itself. The torsion bar adjustment mechanism is like a smaller, additional cam for each of cam followers. With the cylinder at top dead center, you loosen a locking nut at the end of each cam cover, then use a screwdriver to turn the cam to the desired clearance and retighten the locking nut. It’s a bit of an art, because on the CB450, you’re looking for a valve clearance of .0013″-.0015″, or about one-third the thickness of a human hair. It’s what’s referred to as a “zero tolerance” engine. And since valve clearance tends to tighten over time, checking the gap is a critical step in maintaining one of these high strung little twins.

The obvious question is, Why? Why build the motor to such tight tolerances? The über nerd engineer’s answer is that it’s to prevent “valve float.” But at the heart of it, Honda was a bit overambitious with this engine. The CB450 mill is essentially a racing engine made available for street use. That’s a big part of the continued appeal of these motorcycles, though. Right out of the box, you’ve got a small racing bike. But like any racing engine, you’re riding the razor’s edge between performance and disaster if you don’t take proper care of it. Jeff has a slightly different take on the CB450, which he’ll freely admit is one of his least favorite engines to work on. “Honda was showing off,” he likes to say. He’s not wrong. This little bastard is complex.

So with an impossibly thin little .0015″ feeler gauge, I started jabbing at the cam lobes feeling for the gap between them and the follower. The exhaust side on cylinder #1 came into spec pretty easily. Jabbing then at the intake side, I turned the adjusting cam feeling for tightness. No joy. At no point in the torsion arm’s rotation did the cam follower pinch my feeler gauge. Jeff and I investigated — shining a small light onto the sliding surface of the cam follower.

“Shit.”

There was a flat spot on the cam follower about a quarter of an inch wide. The engine had been left too tight for too long and worn down the follower. Better the follower than the cam, but that still meant we needed to replace that follower. Trouble is, they don’t exactly remanufacture cam followers for 40-year-old motorcycles. Thankfully, Jeff had a couple of junk CB450 motors, one of which had good cam parts in it still. It always surprises me how generous Jeff is with stuff lying around the shop. He’s never daunted. If the right part is on the shelf or in a pile, it finds its way onto my bike before I even have a chance to object. We mixed and matched cam parts until we had a top end that was as close to spec as an old motor is going to get.

Rechecking the cam timing for the third time, it looked like we finally had an engine that might run. Progress had come slow, as it had all along, but I was still very encouraged by the old machine. We called it a night, but we were getting closer. By this point, I’d rebuilt the carbs as completely as I could (that’s another story) but was still waiting on new gaskets to come in. This would take about six weeks as apparently the whole country decided to rebuild their CB450 the same time I did. Carb kits were hard to come by. In the meantime, I kept looking at the calendar and watching the season slowly roll by. With my GL1100 waiting on its own crop of parts to come in, I had nothing of my own to ride. First world problem, right? Still, there was something quietly frustrating about spending a lot of time and effort working on my bikes, yet not being able to drink the sweet wine of riding them. Little did I know, this would be the story of my entire season. Well, almost.

_{*I know this, because Jeff knows this. I am not some sort of engine encyclopedia.}

I came to appreciate Kevin Smith for his film Chasing Amy. Like all of his early movies, Chasing Amy works because it’s well cast and well written, but not necessarily because it’s well directed. It’s not, but Kevin Smith will be the first to admit that he’s not really a directer. He’s a writer. However, once I saw Red State, I have to disagree with him. Smith has said over and over that after Red State he’s “got one more movie in him” — his hockey epic, Hit Somebody. This is an utter tragedy because after watching Red State, I’m of the opinion that Kevin Smith has finally learned to make movies as well as he writes them.

Enough preamble though, here’s why Red State is worth your dollars to own, and your time to watch.

A unique, relevant and compelling story
What’s important to understand from the outset is that Red State is a religio-political horror movie. It’s not a comedy, though it is funny. It’s not a thriller, although it is thrilling. Kevin Smith’s synopsis on his podcasts has been “Three boys go into the woods to find sex. Instead, they find God.” The story centers around the Five Points Church, an extreme right wing religious group based in part on Fred Phelps’ Westboro Baptist Church group (the “God hates fags” people who love to protest military funerals and anything else they can show up to) and one part on the Branch Davidians (the group involved in the ATF’s infamous Waco, TX incident). Although they are also protesting funerals with an anti-LGBT message, Red State‘s Five Points Church is not intended to be a stand-in for either group. In fact, Fred Phelps is mentioned by name in the film as someone other than Five Points’ Abin Cooper, played by Michael Parks.

The story starts in typical Kevin Smith style, with plenty of raunchy talk and snappy dialogue. The plot gets rolling when the three boys we meet in the beginning of the movie make their way up to the town of Cooper’s Dell for an internet sex hookup. We quickly learn that aside from their funeral protests, the Five Points Church is (SPOILER ALERT) trapping people with sex, then executing them inside their church compound because it’s “what the book says.” That book is, of course, the Bible. The first person we see Abin Cooper and his “family” execute is a homosexual teenager. This, as the three boys we met in the beginning of the film look on in horror, knowing that they’re probably next. The sequence is riveting and you realize that the horror in this horror movie is not in the violence, but the religious extremism of the Five Points Church congregation. Act one ends with the boys getting loose, and through a series of mishaps, the true nature of Five Points Church’s activities comes to the attention of the authorities — mostly through gunfire.

Act two introduces us to ATF agent Joseph Keenan, played by John Goodman. Keenan is awoken by a phone call from his superiors and inevitably has to go deal with the Five Points Church situation. Once there, he’s joined by the ever wise-cracking Kevin Pollak, who is simultaneously hilarious and credible as a jaded ATF agent. I won’t spoil the climax or the denouement, but I will say that how Goodman and Park’s characters finally meet face to face is one of the most brilliant bits of plot writing in recent memory. It’s surprising, mysterious and had me sold hook, line and sinker. It was especially satisfying given my own religious upbringing, as I instantly knew which part of the Christian doomsday mythos Smith was referencing.

The third act of Red State is almost entirely Kevin Smith doing what Kevin Smith does best: telling a story in dialogue. John Goodman is giving a debriefing deposition to two gentlemen from the Department of Homeland Security regarding the incident at Cooper’s Dell. Pay special attention to Agent Hammond, played by Mad Men alum Patrick Fischler. He delivers the essential morale of the story, which I won’t spoil for you here. I will say that it’s a bit of preaching that the movie earns. In a single sentence, Hammond delivers a poignant commentary on religious extremism that lands like an anvil from a cliff top.

Immaculate casting, cinematography and dare I say it, directing
Red State is as well cast as it is well written. It’s a very “tight” little movie and the cast of actors bring it to life could not be better matched to their task. Michael Parks is downright haunting as Abin Cooper. Melissa Leo as the manic Five Points matriarch, Sara Cooper, is as frightening as any knife-weilding slasher I’ve ever seen in her desperate, frantic fanaticism. John Goodman’s performance as the tired, conflicted Agent Joseph Keenan commands the screen whenever he’s on camera. I was charmed to see Buffy the Vampire Slayer alum Marc Blucas in a smallish role as an ATF sniper. Stephen Root is brilliant as the closeted local Sheriff. And of course, Kevin Pollak is delightfully himself as Goodman’s ATF partner. The whole ensemble cast simply works.

Watching Red State, I also couldn’t help but notice how good looking it was. The Kevin Smith movies I know and love were schlocky-looking at best, but it didn’t matter because we weren’t there for the visual arts. Red State is gorgeous. It’s so well shot and I couldn’t help but lovingly think “he finally learned how to make a movie. Good for him!” Knowing that Kevin Smith also edited the film himself, he really does deserve full credit for how well made this movie is. I didn’t think he had it in him. I knew the guy could write, but knowing that Red State is his penultimate film, I’m actually kinda bummed that he’s getting out of directing. It’s that little bit of outrage. “This!? This is what you were capable of all along? And now you’re quitting?”

Will you enjoy this movie?
Tastes vary widely, obviously, but let me take a stab. The obligatory preamble about language and adult situations applies. This is an R rated movie, after all. However, you don’t need to be a fan of the horror genre to enjoy this movie. I’m not. You don’t need to be a die-hard Jay & Bob fan. There are no “snoochy booches” inside jokes. You don’t need to be a hard core liberal or an anti-religion subscriber to Richard Dawkins and the like. The message of Red State is relevant to us all, regardless of our faith or our political leanings. However, I think that if you are a fan of Quentin Tarantino’s movies, you owe it to yourself to see Red State. If you appreciate writing over star power, explosions and tits, then you’ll likely appreciate what Kevin Smith has done here. Most of all though, Red State is a movie that needs to be seen. It was a movie made almost entirely outside “the system” of corporate Hollywood. It’s the kind of movie that gets made when a talented artist has something worth saying — has an actual point of view worth sharing.

So stream it. Buy it. Do whatever you have to do, but watch Red State if you can. It will never be more relevant than it is right now, both to our culture and to the industry of movie making. It’s the halo work of art — the siren song to independent storytellers everywhere that, as Kevin Smith himself puts it, “If this monkey can make a movie this good, you can too!”