Walt Disney Pictures has finally released the first official trailer for their upcoming sci-fi, action-adventure film John Carter (film was originally titled John Carter of Mars). The film is based on the Edgar Rice Burroughs novel, A Princess of Mars, which would go one to become the first in Burroughs’ Barsoom series.
The film will star Taylor Kitsch (last seen in X-Men Origins: Wolverine as Gambit) in the title role and Lynn Collins (also from Wolverine as Silver Fox) as the aforementioned princess from the original novel. John Carter looks to be a mixture of live-action and fully-realized CGI characters who make up some of the inhabitants of Mars.
It will be interesting how Disney will market this film with little to no big stars and with a director more known for directing Pixar animated films like Finding Nemo and Wall-E in Andrew Stanton.
John Carter is set to have a March 9, 2012 release date.
So, earlier tonight, I was sitting in a dark theater watching the latest super hero film, Green Lantern. Now, Green Lantern is getting some terrible reviews right now and having seen it, I can understand why. That said, Green Lantern is not an offensively terrible movie in the way that Priest, The Beaver, or The Conspirator were terrible films. Instead, Green Lantern’s main problem is that it’s just so freaking forgettable. To be honest, I found myself forgetting about it while I was watching it. So, this isn’t going to be an easy review to write.
(This is also why this is a quickie review. I mean, I’ll make some noise for a few minutes and I’ll try to come up with something halfway neat for the end of it but don’t ask me if I really felt anything.)
Since I realized I was forgetting about the movie even as I was watching it, I decided to use social media to help me out. Blatantly ignoring the rules (but that’s why you love me, baby), I spent most of the film texting and tweeting. I’m pretty sure I heard the people sitting behind me whining about it but who cares? I did what I had to do.
Anyway, checking my texts, I find the following conversation:
Text from LMB (that’s me) to ENB (that’s my sister, Erin): Hey bitch where you at?
ENB to LMB: WTF, bitch? I’m sitting next to you in the theater.
LMB to ENB: Hi, Erin! lol. : )
Okay, so that’s not much help but it does tell you just how engaging this film is. I had the choice of either watching Green Lantern or sending text messages to my sister who was sitting right next to me and I chose to send text messages.
I also resorted to posting a few cryptic messages to twitter, with the hope that they would serve to remind me of what I was watching. Here they are:
Tweet #3: We need a super hero named Red Herring — I sent this tweet just 15 minutes into the film but it shows that I had already picked up on the main problem with this film. There’s a lot going on but it all feels like it’s just been spit out by some script-o-matic sitting hidden behind the Hollywood sign. It just doesn’t ever really add up to anything beyond a sinking feeling of been there, done that.
Ryan Reynolds is haunted by flashbacks of his father dying. Why? Because Scriptwriting 101 says that the hero has to have some sort of self-doubt to overcome.
When we first see Ryan Reynolds, he’s lying in bed with a naked blonde. Who is she? What happens to her? Why does Reynolds, at no other point in the film, seem to be the type who would have a one night stand with some anonymous blonde?
Reynolds joins the Green Lantern Corp. when he gets a glowing green ring. All the other members of the Corp. doubt him because he’s human but then they say that the ring never makes a mistake. Okay, so if the ring is incapable of making a mistake and the ring chose Reynolds than why is everyone so convinced that Reynolds can’t cut it as the Green Lantern?
Seriously, it’s as if someone just wrote out a list of plot points and some anonymous script doctor just went down the list, checking off everything as he tossed it into the mix.
Plus, I think Red Herring would be a cool super hero. He could have the power of creating mass distraction and he could be the sidekick of my super heroine alter ego, Lady Verbose.
Tweet #4: Lol, cockpit is a funny word — I believe the exact line that inspired this tweet was something like: “And I still get into a cockpit occasionally.” It just made me laugh because cockpit is a funny word, largely because it’s a combination of cock and pit. Anyway, that is honestly the only line of dialogue that I actually remember from the film. As action and comic book movies tend to live and die on the basis of the quotable one-liner, that’s not a good sign.
Tweet #5: Green Lantern kinda bleh but Ryan Reynolds is mancandy — And you know what? He is. Green Lantern may have been forgettable but Ryan Reynolds made a likable hero and he brought some much-needed humor to the role. To be honest, as I look back at the various Green super hero movies, I can’t help but wonder how much better Green Hornet would have been if it had starred Ryan Reynolds as opposed to Seth Rogen. (I love you, Seth, but the super hero thing just isn’t for you.)
Also, Peter Sarsgaard did a pretty good job playing a surprisingly sympathetic villain. Both he and Reynolds deserved a better film.
Other than Sarsgaard and Reynolds, the cast was pretty forgettable but then again, it’s not like they really had much to work with. I have to be honest, though, that I am now officially bored with Tim Robbins. He shows up here playing yet another insensitive rich white guy. As usual, you don’t really buy him as the character because he’s just too obviously Tim Robbins.
Tweet 6: Lets not go to Camelot. Its a silly place. — I think this was inspired by all the scenes that were set on the home planet of the Green Lantern Corps. (That’s the group that Reynolds becomes a member of.) These scenes were obviously meant to inspire awe but they just felt silly. In the film’s defense, some of the special effects — particularly the evil entity known as Parallax — are impressive but, for almost every impressive special effect, there was another that just fell flat (which is never a good thing for a 3-D film).
Tweet #7: Sinestro is a silly name. — Sinestro, played by Mark Strong, is the leader of the Green Lantern Corp. And Sinestro is a really silly name.
What can I say about this game other than….GODDAMN!!
Yes, I am beyond super-excited about THQ and Relic Entertainment’s latest Warhammer 40K title. The two have been doing a great job with the RTS Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War franchise so this third-person action game is a nice change of pace and quite a gamble.
Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine looks to be similar in tone to Epic Games’ Gears of War series except for two major differences: 1. this game won’t be using any cover game mechanics and 2. the game’s color palette looks to go beyond browns, grays, red and black. The trailers shown at this year’s E3 by THQ look to be using in-game graphics and little pre-rendered animations. Always a good sign when the trailers shows graphics of how the game will actually look when being played.
I’ve known about this game since it was first announced at last year’s E3 and have kept up with all new info that Relic and THQ have released since then. One piece of news that was quite a surprise but also awesome to learn is that British actor Mark Strong (Sherlock Holmes, Kick-Ass, Green Lantern) will voice the main playable character.
Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine has a release date of somtime around September 2011.
PS: For those who have no idea what the Warhammer 40,000 fictional universe is all about the video below gives a quick idea of what some of it is.
The WonderCon 2011 exclusive trailer and footage was a major step in creating major buzz and hype for Warner Brothers’ and DC Entertainment upcoming superhero film Green Lantern. With just a little over a month left before the film premieres the second (most likely the final trailer for the film) trailer has been released and whatever doubts early marketing and ads the film seemed to give rise to have gone away with this final release.
Green Lantern is sort of the Iron Man of the DC Comics pantheon in that he’s one of the more powerful characters in that universe, but he never got to the level of iconic status as Superman and Batman. There’s a reason why the only DC comic characters to have sustained any sort of film franchise have been Superman and Batman. The Green Lantern character was never about fighting evil on Earth. His fight was always on a much more cosmic-scale and this trailer shows that the danger in the Green Lantern is cosmic in scale even. The last superhero to attempt such a concept story-wise was the Fantastic Four sequel with Silver Surfer and Galactus. That didn’t turn out as well as many hoped it would. Here’s to hoping that Green Lantern will succeed where the Fantastic Four sequel failed.
Green Lantern is set for a June 17, 2011 release. It will come out in both 2D and 3D (RealD and IMAX 3D).
I posted just recently that Warner Brothers and DC Entertainment had been dropping the ball when it came to promoting their upcoming superhero action-adventure film slated for this summer blockbuster season. Green Lantern had its first teaser released around November of 2010 and the reception to that trailer was lukewarm at best and dismissal of the film at it’s most vocal.
It’s been almost 4 months since that disastrous attempt at promoting what would be Warner Brothers’ biggest film of the 2011. It looks like Warner Brothers and those in charge of promoting their films may have just learned a valuable lesson in releasing promotion materials when footage needed to spice it up for the target audience is not ready.
WonderCon 2011 at San Francisco has become Green Lantern central as the studios in charge of the film have released not just a kickass official theatrical poster for the film, but a 9-minute sizzle reel for those lucky enough to get a seat in the film’s panel at the Esplanade Ballroom at Moscone Center South. For those who weren’t able to see that 9-min footage the people at Warner Brothers have been gracious enough to release an abridged 4min and 3 second version into the interwebs for everyone to witness.
Even just looking at this abridged version of the WonderCon-exclusive footage has helped in dispelling much of my apprehension towards the success and workability of this film as a live-action blockbuster. The footage goes a long way in setting the tone of the film. Green Lantern has always been part of the cosmic tapestry of the overall DC Universe and the filmmakers seem to have found a way to show that epic cosmic side of the character and do it without making it look cheesy (though some of the CGI effects on the non-human members of the Green Lantern Corps could still use much tuning up).
Except for the part where Jordan is trying to figure out the Green Lantern oath in his living room the footage seems very serious in tone with little comedic beats like the teaser. I would hope that the film does have some comedic beats to it since this is Ryan Reynolds and early Hal Jordan wasn’t always the serious, gloomy gus he turned out later on in his Green Lantern run.
Green Lantern is slated for a June 17, 2011 release.
DC Entertainment and Warner Brothers have been criticized these last few months for their handling of the ad/media blitz for their upcoming summer tentpole film: Green Lantern.
People have been quite underwhelmed with the teaser trailer shown a couple months ago then with releases of concept art for the film. It’s true that the character of Green Lantern is not as iconic as Batman or Superman, but who are outside of Spider-Man and the X-Men. Still it’s been quite perplexing how little hype Warner Brothers has been working on giving this film (starring Ryan Reynolds in the role of Hal Jordan as Green Lantern). One would think that both WB and DC Entertainment would make a massive push for this film not just to try and set it up as another DC film franchise the way Marvel has been creating their very own film universe with their properties.
One thing that may be a sign that Warner Brothers and DC Entertainment are ready to unleash a major advert and media blitz for Green Lantern is the panel at this year’s WonderCon at San Francisco where the cast were available for roundtables and a con exclusive poster of the film was released. The poster will be one of the few things from WonderCon that non-attendees will be able to see and examine.
The poster goes a long way in helping dispel my feelings about this film. While I still haven’t fully bought into this project I do get a sense of the cosmic nature of this film which other superhero films of the past decade haven’t been able to convey. If WB and DC are able to build on the positives that this new poster is giving this film then maybe Green Lantern may just become a must-see for this summer.
Green Lantern is set for a July17, 2011 release date.
To make things clear, this movie is not really about Robin Hood. It’s about a common archer named Robin Longstride who fights in the Crusades, comes back to England, assumes another man’s identity, is adopted by a blind nobleman, ends fighting the French, and who discovers that his late father apparently wrote out the first draft of what will become the Magna Carta. Finally, at the end of the movie, Robin Longstride is declared an outlaw (or as Oscar Isaac, who plays King John, puts it, “AN OUTLAWWWWWWWWWW!) and it’s mentioned that he goes by the alias of “Robin of Hood.”
So, if you’re expecting a movie about Robin Hood or anything that is usually associated with Robin Hood — green tights, archery competitions, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor, that sort of thing — you’re pretty much out of luck.
On the face of it, this certainly isn’t an unwelcome idea. To be honest, I’ve always found whole idea of Robin Hood and his “merry men” to be a bit silly and rather dull. When it comes to English folklore, I’ve always preferred to read about King Arthur self-destructing. Add to that, it’s hard for me think about Robin Hood without thinking about the Dennis Moore episode of Monty Python’s Flying Circus.
(Remember Dennis Moore’s theme song — “Dennis Moore…Dennis Moore…He steals from the poor and gives to the rich…stupid bitch…”)
So, I really can’t complain about the way that the movie jettisons most of what one would traditionally expect from a film called Robin Hood. However, once the movie abandons tradition, it fails to come up with anything compelling to replace it with.
The movie opens with commoner Robin Longstride taking part in the Crusades. He’s a bitter, disillusioned archer who has grown weary of killing. So far so good. If nothing else, Ridley Scott has proven that he knows how to direct action and the early battle scenes are very well done. Robin is played by Russell Crowe and, even though he’s a bit too old for the role, Crowe has always been convincing playing men of action. Of course, this is largely because Crowe is himself a man of action but no matter. Crowe is believable in these scenes in ways that a more universally acclaimed actor like Leonardo DiCaprio never could be. It’s important that the movie convince on from the start that Robin is a master archer and both Scott and Crowe manage to do that. In fact, if the entire movie was just about an archer trying to survive of the chaos of the Crusades, it would have been a good deal better than Robin Hood.
(Speaking of archers, I’m actually quite a bit more skilled at with a bow than you probably think. Just three years ago, while visiting a city known as The Crossing, I used one shortbow and a quiver of 12 arrows to kills over 100 rats at Barana’s Shipyard. Of course, I should probably add that I was playing Dragonrealms at the time. I was a red-haired, Elven moon mage and my name was Cinzia, in honor of the Italian actress Cinzia Monreale. Sad to say, Cinzia was eventually killed by some sort of swamp monster but, while she lived, she was pretty good with a bow and arrow. But back to the movie…)
The movie starts to fall apart once Robin returns to England. In a set of circumstances that are way too tedious to go into now, Robin ends up assuming the identity of Sir Robert of Loxley and returning the crown of the dead King Richard the Lionhearted to London where it is promptly placed on the head of the new King John (Oscar Isaac).
Robin then departs on a personal mission of his own. He goes up to Nottingham to return the dead Sir Robert’s sword to his father, the blind Sir Walter of Loxley (Max Von Sydow, going overboard). In Nottingham, Robin meets Robert’s widow, the maid Marian. Marian is played by Cate Blanchett who, for some odd reason, appears to be recreating his award-winning role as Katharine Hepburn in the aviator for most of her performance. Robin, to his credit, does not pretend to be “Sir Robert” when he first arrives in Nottingham. However, Walter promptly asks him to do so and in return, Walter will tell Robin all about Robin’s father. And so, again, Robin agrees to pretend to be Sir Robert.
Meanwhile, Robin has been accompanied by three friends. One of them — Little John — is played by the same guy who played Martin Keamy on Lost. These three friends — along with Friar Tuck who assures us that he’s “not a churchy-type friar” — will eventually become Robin Hood’s band of merry men though not in this movie. In this movie, they’re just four red herrings that have little to do.
King John, it would seem, is something of a neurotic tyrant so he is easily manipulated by his good friend Sir Godfrey (Mark Strong) into allowing Godfrey and his private army to roam the English countryside and “collect taxes.” What John doesn’t realize, of course, is that Godfrey is actually half-French and all of Godfrey’s soldiers actually are French. How this escape John’s attention is hard to determine as all of Godfrey’s soldiers either speak French or English with a heavy French accent.
(Actually, Sir Godfrey reminded me of another life I experimented with in Dragonrealms, a Gor’Tog Barbarian named Ironcrotch. The less said about Ironcrotch, the better.)
Anyway, Godfrey’s real mission is to be so tyrannical while collecting taxes that the English people will rise up against their king and the whole country will plunge into civil war. While this is going on, the French will then invade England and easily conquer it. As long as it took me to type all of that up and for you to read, it feels even longer when you’re sitting in a theater watching it.
On paper, at least, Ridley Scott would look like the perfect director for this movie but, other than the early battle scenes, his direction here is often rather uninspired. He seems to be bored with the movie and, for that matter, so does Russell Crowe. Crowe gives a surprisingly dull performance. You believe him as a soldier but you never believe him as a leader and that’s unfortunate because, for this movie to work, you have to believe Crowe as a man so charismatic that he could become a beloved criminal. When you consider just how talented Crowe has proven himself to be over the years, his performance here becomes even more distressing and, finally, somewhat infuriating. Once could accept a less-than-brilliant performance from someone like Jason Stathan. But this is Russell-freaking-Crowe, for the love of God!
In fact, the only actor who really seems to truly invested in his role is Oscar Isaac and he’s actually the best thing in the entire film. For over a month, I’ve been mocking the way he’s seen shouting “OUTLAWWWWW!” in the trailer for Robin Hood. Divorced from the rest of his performance, it just seems like a ludicrously over-the-top moment. However, when seen in the context of the character that he creates over the course of the film, it makes perfect sense that King John would randomly shout such things. Isaac makes plays the monarch as a spoiled brat, a hedonist given to cowardice, insecurity, and histrionics. Wisely, he never plays John as evil and, in some scenes, he almost manages to make this historically reviled man into an almost sympathetic figure, While the rest of the movie merely goes through all of the expected paces, Isaac always manages to bring something unexpected to every scene he is in. If there is any redemption to be found in Robin Hood, it is in his performance.
I should also add that, as critical as I’ve been of Robin Hood, I still enjoyed listening to all the anti-taxation, anti-government rhetoric. I only wish the movie had gone even further with the whole idea of Robin Hood as a 12th century libertarian.
In the end, what can you really say about a movie like Robin Hood? It is what it is. It’s a summer movie that’s obviously designed to serve as the launching pad for a bigger film franchise. To criticize it is to almost invite some stranger to accuse you of being a spoilsport. Summer movies are meant to be big and loud and borderline obnoxious. They’re meant to be a collection of trailer-ready scenes that can entice you into paying way too much to sit through them. Summer movies are made to make money and ultimately, the only judgment that carries any weight is the verdict of the box office.
Interestingly enough, the theater where I saw Robin Hood was deserted except for me and my friend. A lot of this, of course, is due to us attending a matinée showing but still, even a matinée will usually manage to bring in a handful of retirees who want to spend their twilight years complaining about how difficult is to hear movies nowadays. But no, on this day, it was just me and my friend.
(This worked out nicely, to be honest, because it allowed me and him to…uhmm…well, yeah, anyway. Back to the review…)
To me, that nearly deserted theater pretty much sums up Robin Hood. It’s the movie that everyone wants to see but that nobody’s going to want to watch twice. It’s the type of movie that you forget even while you’re watching it. Considering all of the talent that was involved in the making of this movie, I think the viewer is justified in expecting something just a little more.
Comic books which have been adapted for the big-screen have had an uneven track record. For every excellent film-incarnations like Spider-Man 2, X-Men 2, The Dark Knight and Iron-Man we get dregs like Elektra, Ghost Rider and Daredevil. The last couple years filmmakers have gravitated towards the deconstruction side of comic book superheroes. Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight was as much an action-thriller as it was a meditation on the superhero psyche and mythmaking. Then there was 2009’s Watchmen which tried admirably (though failed in the end) to adapt Alan Moore’s epic deconstruction of the superhero archetypes.
It’s now 2010 and we get the first comic book film of the year. The film is an adaptation of Mark Millar (writer) and John Romita, Jr.’s (artist) ultraviolent comic book title from Marvel’s Icon Comics (their creator-owned publishing line). Kick-Ass was optioned and adapted by British-director Matthew Vaughn and screenwriter Jane Goldman. Unlike most comic book films of the past decade, Vaughn’s Kick-Ass was independently-financed (with help from Brad Pitt and his Plan B Studio) and made which was the best thing that could’ve happened to this project. With a free rein to make the film he wanted without corporate studio meddling, Matthew Vaughn was able to craft a fun and violent romp of a film mashup that collides superhero archetypes and conventions with “real world” grounding.
The story and premise for Kick-Ass is actually quite simple enough to follow. We have high-schooler and avid comic book fan Dave Lizewski asking his best friends and fellow comic book fans why no one has actually tried to be a superhero. The answer he gets from his like-minded friends doesn’t instill hope in his dream. While they are huge fans of superheroes and comic books they stop at actually trying to be one in real-life. Dave, on the other hand, knows that it’s possible for one to try and be a superhero even without powers. He believes that determination, conviction and the need to help those in need would be all that someone requires to become a superhero. With these criteria in mind he sets off to do the very thing he had asked his friends about. He accomplishes this by ordering (for the amount of $99.99) a green and yellow wet-suit and head cover plus a pair of batons and a taser gun. His first attempt at superherodom fails spectacularly as he’s stabbed and violently run over in the street. This near-fatal introduction to the world of superheroes doesn’t deter Dave when deep down even he knows that he’ll get killed if he continues on his quest to become the next Spider-Man.
The story moves on to Dave finally getting his superhero fame by stopping a beatdown of a stranger and having this event caught on a bystander’s camera phone and uploaded said video on Youtube. With this amateur video on Youtube getting millions of hits and views, plus Dave’s own creation of a MySpace page for his alter-ego the world finally gets it’s real-life superhero in the form of Kick-Ass. A name that spurs not just tens of thousands of fans on Kick-Ass’ MySpace page but also a boom in sudden Kick-Ass merchandise in Dave’s local comic book shop. Through it all Dave revels in the attention his alter-ego has been getting even the unexpected attention of the girl of his dreams, Katie Deauxma (played by the lovely Lyndsy Fonseca). An attention born out of a misunderstanding where Katie believes Dave to be gay because of circumstances revolving around his near-death experience of his very first attempt at crimefighting.
On the sidelines of all this we get introduced to the film’s real “superheroes” in the form of Big Daddy (played by Nicolas Cage) and his sidekick and 11-year old daughter, Hit-Girl (Chloe Moretz). We see early on that both Big Daddy and Hit-Girl are the real thing though calling them superheroes would be a stretch since they seem to be more vigilantes who happen to wear costumes and with no compunction at all about killing the criminals. These two are definitely not Batman and Robin (one of many easter egg-like references to comic book characters and storylines). Their story parallels that of Kick-Ass’ but where Dave seems to enjoy just playing at being a superhero and the adoration such role-playing gives him both Big Daddy and Hit-Girl actually have a focus and mission in their own attempts. These are two individuals who believe in the superhero roles they’ve taken on themselves and have prepared and trained themselves well for the violent consequences and ramifications of their mission.
The rest of the film takes the audience on a peculiar coming-of-age journey for one Kick-Ass. As stated earlier he’s pretty much all talk with a rose-tinted view of a superhero’s life. What he has read in his comic books doesn’t prepare him for the reality of actually trying to act and become a true superhero. While writer Mark Millar takes a dim and cynical view of what Kick-Ass is trying to figure out and accomplish (most of the comic’s morality ends up being that bad things happen to good people with the best of intentions), director Matthew Vaughn and screenwriter Jane Goldman take a more hero’s journey approach (sprinkled liberally with foul language and bloody violence). While Dave Lizewski’s attempts to live up to his hero persona of Kick-Ass range from succeeding through luck to failing miserably and at times fatally, by the end of the film circumstances (which have spiralled out of his own control) forces him to finally face up to the fact that if he really wanted to be a superhero he needed to finally do more than just talk and pretend to be one and actually act and perform like one.
This is in contrast to Hit-Girl’s own journey which doesn’t start her off as clumsy and unsure of herself. Instead we see in Hit-Girl the type of individual Kick-Ass wants to be but is unable to through most of the film. Where Kick-Ass suddenly realizes that he’s way over his head once the bodies start dropping in bloody ways, Hit-Girl doesn’t lack in confidence but is in control of every situation she’s confronted with. Whether it’s rescuing Kick-Ass from death (more than once) or finally launching the climactic assault on her and Big Daddy’s focus and reason for being. Hit-Girl is the true superhero with Big Daddy really her sidekick. Everyone else, from Kick-Ass to Red Mist (Christopher Mintz-Plasse), just pretend and play at being costumed superheroes. Hit-Girl is the personification of the female antihero of the recent comics, but unlike most female characters in comic books she’s not the fringe character or the one in need to help. She’s the one who rescues everyone and willing to sacrifice her very life to live up to the ideals (however twisted they may be to the audience) she has set for herself.
Kick-Ass may have been an post-modern exercise in trying to deconstruct and then acknowledge the superhero archetype and themes, but first and foremost it is a very fun and exhilarating rollercoaster ride of an action film. Vaughn and Goldman were able to capture the exciting and fun side of the original comic despite leaving behind some of the meanspiritedness of Millar’s writing. Goldman definitely has an ear for inserting comedy beats into the film to keep the story from becoming too serious and thus slowing down the film. In fact, I would say that Kick-Ass was a very fast-paced two-hour film that would alternate between comedy and action with a tender moment spliced in at the last third of the film. Much of the comedy in Kick-Ass come at the expense of Kick-Ass himself as he stumbles his way through most of the film either out of his league or just pantshitting scared of what he’s gotten himself into. Nicolas Cage’s characterization of Big Daddy also drew some major laughs as he alternated from a twisted version of Mr. Rogers as Damon MacReady to channeling Adam West’s “Batman” when dressed up as Big Daddy.
One thing which Matthew Vaughn has shown with is third feature-length film was the ability to create and shoot some very good action sequences. He even made an interesting stylistic choice to film his action sequences differently depending on whether it was Kick-Ass who was the focal point in the fight or whether it was Hit-Girl or Big Daddy doing the mayhem. Vaughn chose to shoot Kick-Ass’ fight sequences with comedy in mind as the character clumsily fought his way through his opponents. Even when he finally finds his inner superhero in the final fight with his newly discovered nemesis Kick-Ass still fought more on instinct and blindly swinging away instead of actually fighting like an expert. The same couldn’t be said about when Hit-Girl or Big Daddy were the main focus in the action scenes. These two characters were trained killers pure and simple. Their fight choreography was the exact opposite of Kick-Ass’. Hit-Girl’s was especially well-choreographed to show just how honed a fighter and killer Big Daddy’s 11-year old daughter really was even when confronted by over a dozen heavily-armed gangsters and drug dealers. It’s the Hit-Girl action scenes which drew the biggest positive reactions from the audience and rightfully so. Chloe Moretz truly sold the idea of an 11-year old costumed vigilante killer and the film was better for it.
Chloe Moretz star-making performance brings us to the overall performances of the film’s cast. While pretty much everyone who sees this film will agree that Chloe Moretz as Hit-Girl pretty much steals every scene she’s in Aaron Johnson as Dave Lizewski/Kick-Ass also does a very good job in his performance. He anchors the film as the everyman, or everyboy for this film, the audience will gravitate towards. He’s believable as the stumbling and naive teen whose dream of becoming a superhero turns his life upside-down and rightside-up. We can sympathize with his teen need to be accepted and, ultimately, find his identity. It just happens that he find it in the midst of playing at being his dream girl’s fake gay BFF and then as the superhero he finally became in the end. Nicolas Cage, Clark Duke and Lyndsy Fonseca were good at their “sidekick” roles. On the other side of the superhero spectrum we have Mark Strong as mob boss Frank Dimico doing a wonderful job. Christopher Mintz-Plasse as Chris Dimico/Red mist makes for a great counterpoint and mirror to Dave Lizewski/Kick-Ass. But where Dave finally learns to be a hero and take the role seriously, Mintz-Plasse’s Chris never learns the true meaning of what a hero is and just continues to be the wannabe that Dave started off as but finally shed in the end.
Kick-Ass does a better job at deconstructing the superhero world of comic books than Zack Snyder’s Watchmen of 2009. While the comic book version of Kick-Ass will never be in the same league and level as Alan Moore’s Watchmen the film version flip-flop and shows that sometime the simpler story makes for a better film. Vaughn and Goldman did a great job in adapting the darker and more nihilistic writing of Millar. But while changes were made to allow the story to be more accesible to the general public, the film still manages to keep the spirit of the original source material intact but minus the cuckolding the story’s intrepid hero gets hit with twice to end the story.
Even with the controversy over the Hit-Girl character and of Chloe Moretz protrayal of this blood-soaked and foul-mouthed killer it shouldn’t diminish the fact that Kick-Ass set out to be both thought-provoking, fun and entertaining and succeeds in accomplishing all three. While the film has flaws they’re not so glaring or even distracting that they take away from one’s enjoyment of the film. Even for an “origins” tale Kick-Ass manages to escape being too overly reliant on dialogue to explain everything that’s going on to the audience. The fact that a sequel was already being talked about even before the film’s release shows confidence in both Millar and Vaughn that there’s further adventures and stories to show and tell about Kick-Ass and Hit-Girl. I, for one, will be there to see what they will be up to next.
Through the Shattered Lens 