Guest Blogger Kicks Ass

I won't see "Kick Ass". I choose not to give this production my money. I dislike Nicholas Cage as an actor intensely. I don't believe it's ok to allow a film character who is 11 years old to perform acts of ultra-violence on others and to have acts of violence done to her. I don't believe that you should hold up as a superhero an eleven year old girl who uses language like the c-word with abandon. And as I have said before in this blog, I am not a comic book geek. But I will not blog about this because it is unfair to criticize a film I haven't seen. Others in my blogosphere have seen this film and liked it. So today I have invited a guest blogger to talk about this film. So John DeFelice, take it away......

Kick Ass
Did you ever wonder what kind of movie John Hughes and Quentin Tarantino would make if they ever collaborated? Well Kick Ass is that movie. The question is do people want to see this kind of schizophrenic movie? During the first half I wasn’t sure what kind of movie director Mathew Vaughn wanted to make. There’s the story Dave, the likable kid who hangs out with his geek friends. Dave, a comic book fan, wonders why there are no real life super heros and then decides he’s the man for the job. He's busy fighting crime and trying to get the girl of his dreams to notice him. Then there’s the in your face violence which includes a man exploding in a giant microwave and finally there’s Nicolas Cage doing a variation of Batman. And not the Dark Knight Batman but the Batman of the campy 60’s series. All of these different elements make the first half feel a little unfocused and disjointed. I thought Vaughn had a similar problem with Stardust, a movie with so many different styles I was never able to buy into the world he was trying to create. But I did end up believing the world of Kick Ass.

At a certain point, the movie becomes more focused and all the elements that preceded it suddenly gel together in a rather exciting second half. The script does have moments of wit but the true credit goes to the cast. Love him or hate him, Nicolas Cage knows how to make a role uniquely his own, Aaron Johnson perfectly captures the sweet, gawky kid searching for his inner hero and Christopher Mintz-Plasse who just as he did in Superbad and Role Models has the ability make the loner/geek kid believable. And then there’s Chloe Moretz as Hit Girl. Yes, there are lots of people who do not want to see a 13 year old variation of The Bride in Kill Bill. I admit in the beginning it was a bit jarring to hear the language, including the C word, coming out of her mouth or to see her standing there as her father teaches her how to take a bullet but by the movies end it was the character, not the actress I was seeing. Does that justify having a character like this? This will be an ongoing debate but this won’t be the last we’ll see of characters like this. Think back to 13 year old Jodie Foster playing a prostitute in Taxi Driver. For better or worse, the arts will continue to push the envelope. Controversy aside, Moretz is a true find. Some people may remember her from "(500) Days of Summer", where she was also a stand out as Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s little sister. With a role in the upcoming remake of "Let the Right One In", I think we are going to be seeing much more of Moretz.

This movie is not going to be for everyone. I have never read the comic that it was based on but if it has a similar style I credit the filmmakers for sticking to their creative guns. This movie could have easily been toned down in hopes of attracting more of a mainstream audience but if they chose to stay true to the source material I applauded that. With a sequel in the works the question is will they stay the course or will Hit Girl be downgraded to a PG-13? ----John DeFelice