Kick-Ass

[angstbunny]

It seems to be a trend lately, where all the movies I see are enjoyable and yet weirdly dissatisfying at the same time. A part of my brain is like WHOO-HOO, that easily sated, reveling in violence and mindlessness part. But another part, the critical part, is always rubbing its chin and going "hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm."

Kick-Ass is enjoyable and

Comments

[redfiona99]

I've not seen it or read the comic but londonkds said that it was probably palatable only because Matthew Vaughan had re-written it from scratch, because apparently the comic is very not.

[angstbunny]

I can believe it. I read a plot summary of the comics and it sounds way more nihilistic and morally bankrupt, more in lines of what Wanted was. Kick-Ass the movie actually has some heart. I'm sure the comic itself doesn't have any.

[kuteki]

It's worse then Wanted? :( Hm. I have been meaning to see it, but that isn't a good sign.

But my point being, where is my mainstream smuck girl winning the hot guy movie?
Haha, there are a ton of teen movies that supposedly do that, only the girl gets a makeover and is always super hot. This makes me angry, then again Aaron Johnson is also super hot.

(also, hi! Where have you been? Hope you are good ♥)

[angstbunny]

No, no, it's not worse than Wanted. Like, I enjoyed Wanted, but I also recognize that it's a totally morally bankrupt piece of white male teenage wank fantasy. Kick-Ass is nowhere near that horrible. It actually has a bit of a good message in it, confused and mixed though it may be, definitely improved upon its source material by miles (perhaps I shouldn't say that, considering I haven't read the source comic, but from what I know about what happens, the movie is a zillion times less nihilistic and fucked-up and generally morally disgusting). Kick-Ass tries. It just suffers from having two disparate storylines not meshing well together.

Yeah exactly. The girl always gets a makeover. The smuck guy NEVER does. Yeah yeah, he gains some special insight, but he doesn't undergo the kind of physical transformation that a smuck girl does.

I've missed you!!! I've been swamped with RL hence I haven't been around as much. :( I hope you're doing good! <3

[kuteki]

Okay then, I'll probably end up seeing it. As for Wanted, it was entertaining me until about the half way point, where it suddenly broke through my suspension of disbelief and became too ridiculous to handle.

I really hate the trend of pairing unattractive men with beautiful girls, which wouldn't even look at them in rl. It is ridiculously prevalent recently, and I just can't bring myself to watch such movies. :(

I've missed you too! Hope rl is good-busy and not bad-busy! I am doing all right, very much enjoying my shiny new fandom love.

[angstbunny]

I mostly watched Wanted for Thomas Kretschmann, who wasn't in the movie nearly as much as I'd like. And yeah, it was totally ridic, but I kinda like its total ridic. Sometimes I find that I'm fairly able to buy into ridic concepts as long as the movie in question presents it in a totally ballsy, unreservedly manner, which Wanted did, for me.

I CAN'T STAND LOSER GUYS PAIRED WITH HOT CHICKS. It drives me CRAZY. Most filmmakers are men, and you can just FEEL the vindication oozing from movies like that, which is gross and URGH.

It's been both kinds of busy. @__@ But it's all heading toward something good, so there's that. I've noticed the new fandom love! I'm so glad you're enjoying yourself. <3

[one_more_cherry]

Adding to what RF said above - apparently the movie was written before the book was done and they had to go back and change it after it was finished. The joy of selling rights :p

I liked the movie, but I'm weirdly divided on the violence. It was used to purpose, to establish how serious the consquences are, but I kept getting the feeling that the movie would've been just as good without it on some level(well, at least the Kick-Ass segment of the proceedings; I agree that the Big Daddy/Hit Girl section of the movie should've been a whole sepparate story). There was actually a terrific article on Jezebel that agrees with your point and is about how Hit-Girl and Big Daddy ort of occupy a different realm than Kick-Ass - it's a whole different universe.

IDK - It's not as raveworthy as I was led to believe, but it was decent.

[angstbunny]

Yeah, I'm torn about the violence, too. On one hand, it seemed to be srs bizness about it: trying to be a hero? Not as easy as you think it will be. You will get jacked up. That scene where Dave gets stabbed? HO. LEE. SHIT. When he gets beaten up by the gang members while he's trying to save that one guy? Also demonstrative. But the moment Big Daddy and Hit Girl enter the scene, the violence becomes absurd and comedic. It loses its impact. All of a sudden, we're in a video game. Which robbed Dave's story of its dramatic value. The collision of the two stories did not enhance each other, but instead took something away. I wish they had been two different movies.

Agreed on it not being as OMG as it could've been, but certainly not a disappointment by far.

[one_more_cherry]

Oh GOD, when Dave got stabbed I WINCED. And I sort of liked the story they were telling with him - about how the reality of fighting crime's so different from the way it would be fighting it NOT in a comic book and within the real world.

Yeah, Hit-Girl, in that hallway - braveau action direction but really, whole different story.

I keep wondering if the Hit-Girl/Big Daddy part of the story comes from a different arc? IDK.

[angstbunny]

Exactly. It was brutal and painful and startling. That stabbing scene, just. God. But then you introduce the cartoonish violence of Hit-Girl, and BAM, all that poignancy exits stage left.

I think the movie injected a lot more heart and gumption into Dave's storyline than there was in the original comic. IDK? I'm speculating based solely on what I've read. But the comic seems much more nihilistic and fanboy wank fantasy and violence for the sake of violence. So they kinda "fixed up" one arc extensively without fixing up the other, and hence the disparate tone. I think.