Kick-Ass

Kick-Ass (2010)

78% on Rotten Tomatoes (out of 197 reviews)

Runtime: 117 minutes

Directed by: Matthew Vaughn

Starring: Aaron Johnson, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Chloe Moritz, Lyndsy Fonseca, Nicolas Cage

From: Lionsgate/Marv Films

Finally, I saw a movie released in 2010. This will be the first one I’ll review here too. Now, this is a film that I heard about even before it was made. Back then I heard about the comic book (even though I have not read any of it as hey, I am definitely NOT a comic book fan at all) and how some people wanted it made into a movie, but the studios were gun-shy about it, as it’s about teenagers-and people even younger-who apparently do some pretty shocking things, and that’s bound to get controversy if it’s made in that way to a movie. Instead of changing it to be more mainstream, those people made the film themselves and it ended up getting released-at least in the U.S.-by Lionsgate. None other than Brad Pitt ended up being one of the producers. So, even though people like Roger Ebert were not happy with seeing various things done and said by a girl who plays an 11 year old in the movie, it was still released without much concessions and hey, the official figures now say that it squeaked out a number one spot in the box office.

So, after seeing it, I have to say… I do not understand the hype. But, I’ll get to that in a moment.

To explain the setup, the film is about a young kid, Dave (Johnson) who is clearly an average nerdy guy who lives in an insular world with a single father and he hangs out with two equally nerdy guys (Clark Duke and Evan Peters; both were amusing in those roles, especially Duke). He and Peters ends up getting mugged-again-and a person in a nearby apartment sees it but does nothing. So, he decides that there should be a real life superhero that would help out people, and he should be that person, despite his pals laughing at the suggestion. He finds a suit online and becomes the title character. He tries to help someone, but he runs into trouble right away… meanwhile, there is a more renowned (but lesser-known in New York City, as unlike Kick-Ass, they don’t brag about themselves on MySpace) father-daughter duo who fight crime (Cage, Moritz), and the daughter is only 11! Then, there’s a father (Mark Strong) who is a big criminal and not only does he have a pack of thugs, but also a teenage son (Mintz-Plasse) who ends up getting treated second-rate by old dad. Not only do those people all interact with each other, but Dave also has a young lady in school that he has a crush on (Fonseca).

Here is a film that many are going gaga for, especially nerdy movie messageboard types. However, I don’t feel the same way. Maybe it’s that this film is apparently supposed to be a satire on superhero films or the fact that I am not a comic book fan AT ALL, but the strong love this is getting in some circles I just don’t quite get. Sure, the actors all do fine with their roles (and Moritz did a great job with her character, which is a foulmouthed lady that ends up doing some rather improbable things) so I’m not hating on them. Personally, I thought that Lyndsy wasn’t too bad to look at either. The story, though… tonal changes the entire time, and it was either hyper-realistic or utterly fantastical, with little middle ground. I’m not even quite sure what it was, but I lost interest in it early (on one board, even a fan of the film admitted the first twenty minutes weren’t all that great) and Lord knows I wanted to like it, as hey I’ve been wanting to see it for the past few months now, but despite attempts for me to turn the corner on it, it ultimately wasn’t to be. I can’t really explain the problems with the story much further without giving away major spoilers, and I don’t want to do that. Also, I know that the action scenes have gotten a lot of love, but I strongly disagree. It’s yet more of that shakycam BS where you can barely make out what in the hell is going on, and boy, when a strobe light is added… then, I come to find out that the movie manages to lift music for much of it from other, more recent films, such as Sunshine and 28 Days Later, both films I didn’t see. Hearing an obvious song get lifted from For A Few Dollars More, though, I noted, and was all this music lifting an ode to Tarantino? I wish they would have gone with a more traditional score… but Christ, that’s a rather minor complaint when it’s measured against the other things that I noted that I had a problem with.

So, I wish I could see the love that many others have for this; I just don’t, and given that I ended up having high expectations for it and possibly had no idea what I was going to get (as what I ended up with…), talk about a big disappointment for me.

I’ll be back by this time next week, and hopefully the next movie I see I’ll enjoy more.