by BRUCE KIRKLAND (Toronto Sun)

Filmmaker Kevin Smith has just one plea: Will all those fire-and-brimstone critics of his film Dogma just relax?

"This movie is about as controversial as The Flying Nun," Smith says about his profane yet devout comedy about religion, and especially the Roman Catholic faith.

In the movie, there's a giant 'poop' monster, a distant relative of Jesus who works in an abortion clinic, Ben Affleck and Matt Damon playing 'cute' but angry avenging angels who casually mass-murder the wicked, a celestial muse and stripper played by Salma Hayek, a 13th Apostle played by Chris Rock and singer Alanis Morissette as God.

Dogma will make its North American debut as a special presentation in the Toronto International Film Festival.

If anyone wants to say that the movie is tasteless, Smith, a life-long Catholic, couldn't care less. "That's subjective," he says with a shrug. "But to say that either the movie or myself is anti-Catholic is just downright f...ing insulting! If anything, I think I'm pro-Catholic and I think the movie proves that."

Disney officials were not as confident. The Walt Disney corporation is the majority owner of Miramax Films, which financed Dogma. Disney officials, worried about another right-wing religious backlash against its films and theme parks, strong-armed Miramax into jettisoning the film. A new independent deal to distribute the film in the U.S. and Canada is expected to be announced today.

"I'm going to tell you something," says Hayek, with a mischievous grin. "The truth is -- but you can't tell anybody -- that we made it up. There is no controversy. We made it up so that everybody would be really excited about seeing this forbidden film."

"I don't think it warrants all this," Affleck says of the controversy, adding that he agrees that they need the fuss to generate interest. "It's hard to get attention these days."

No one should get worked up, Affleck adds. "You'd have to have the sense of humour of the Ayatollah to take this movie all that seriously. It's clearly a comedy. It's clearly farcical. It's clearly light-hearted and warm-hearted. So it's not actually something that's going to ruffle a lot of feathers."

Smith says he made the film to explore a crisis of faith that overcame him on his regular visits to church.

"I was sick of going to church and not feeling any inspiration of any sort. At church, I had to say: 'Wait a minute! If this is a celebration of our faith, why does it feel like a f...ing funeral dirge?' Nobody seems to have much passion for what is going on in there."

Writing Dogma helped Smith focus and renew his faith. The movie let him present his version of faith with a sense of drama, albeit in a comic book fashion.

"People write stuff," Smith says of his critics. "They kind of dismiss the work as comic book. I always feel very proud of that. It's not a slam, thank you very much."

As for being tasteless, Smith says, "I think the fart joke factor is something that you never leave behind. It's always a part of you no matter how old you get. You can always get a good chuckle out of stuff like that -- lowbrow humour."

Even when it's about religion. Back to Dogma Press...