Kick-Ass

Creating a world that completely adheres to every wish of its creator is a silly prospect. When comic-book films like THE DARK KNIGHT or SPIDER-MAN come out, there's always some ridiculous outcry from devoted fans of the comics who say that the film has forgotten some major aspect of the character. But in viewing a film like THE DARK KNIGHT, it would be ridiculous to try and adhere to every wish of the fans, because then the film would be just for the fans of the comics and for nobody else. This is what has happened in KICK-ASS. Every detail of the film has been over-scrutinyzed for the sake of the original graphic novel's fans. This film has everything I hate about comic book films: the nerdy geek who gets the really hot girl, the rock music placed at fight scenes, and the obligatory super-weapon that fucks up whoever you run into. In KICK-ASS, the beginning of the film is promising, where we are introduced to a nerdy high-schooler (Aaron Johnson) who, while contradicting himself in narration, wonders why no one has actually decided to dress up as a superhero and fight crime. When he tries this, his ass is inevitably kicked. But the real superheros are Nicholas Cage as Big Daddy and Chloe Moretz as his daughter, Hit Girl. Big Daddy is one hell of a fighter, and his scenes are the most satisfying in the film. But he has been training Moretz in an african-child-soldier fashion, and she is a brutal killer who only makes her audience wince when she says: cunt, or fuck in every other sentence. This 11-year-old killing machine is anything but empowering and seems just gratuitous to some misplaced moral idea within the heads of a comic book geek. Sure, this film is fantasy, but when your fantasy is cringe inducing and idea implanting, the fantasy becomes the reality. Besides that quibble, for Hit Girl is only a good third of the film, which would allow for the film to get a decent 2 1/2 stars, every other aspect of the film is gratuitously swayed to its fans. Consider rock music playing to slicing and dicing, killing people who surrender to you, killing someone who pissed off your girlfriend, the geek getting the girl, a bad script that is Bond-esque in its goofiness, and a slow middle. Not a good film
Kick-Ass: ★1/2