Nathan Adams of Filmschoolrejects has started a cool new column which pits a film with undeserved love against an unfortunately ignored or ridiculed one. I'm making a similar blog, and by similar I mean the exact same. :)
For the first entry in my Overrated/Underpraised, I hope to shed the light on an overlooked picture from this year as well as tackling one of last year's disappointments that received lots of undeserved praise.
In order to see all the flaws in Kick-Ass, it is imperative to read the comic book first. Written by Mark Millar (who generally does actual super-hero books), it is a very dark but extremely funny look at the psychology of a society as shown through an original take on the vigilante/super-hero tail. With all its in-jokes and unique (and yes, sometimes shocking, subject matter) it was perfect for the comic community, but perhaps not a good fit for a mainstream film audience. Matthew Vaughn (who was then known for Layer Cake) was a die-hard fan of the series, but was obviously too nervous to carry the story all the way through. You see, the overall story of Kick-Ass the book is of a well-meaning (though perhaps self-centered) person who's attempts to inspire justice leads to anarchy and recklessness that leads to countless preventable deaths. The characters in the book are living a fantasy life, and the irony is that they never realize it, taking on the mantle of Batman, Spider-man, and Joker rather then live their boring actual lives. It is rather depressing if you think about it, and Vaughn either chose not to or decided no one else would want to.
The movie plays as a tongue-in-cheek yet at heart straight-forward action tale with "originality" provided by R-rated violence and language. At first it seems like good fun, but on closer inspection one sees glaring inconstancies. The book shows through hear and there, and it doesn't fit the atmosphere of the movie.
In addition to these faults is Vaughn's typical obsession with adding sex and nudity that wasn't in the source material. It is all PG-13 level, but it is gratuitous and unhealthy and a totally unneeded and unwelcome addition to the story. Also, the picture could do without the marijuana use.
Those who enjoyed it were not thinking deeply enough into it, which is lazy and unhealthy. (You should always try to be aware of what a movie telling you, or else you are susceptible to a subliminal message. Also, you get to sound pretentious as you tell everyone about it.) Those who didn't were met with the response by Vaughn and his fans that the adult subject matter wasn't there thing. Vaughn had the nerve to say this to Roger Ebert, except Ebert clearly states in his review that he is disappointed because he liked the book and the movie didn't live up to its source material.
If you try to explain to a fan why the movie isn't all that good, you will definitely here the statement above. However, if you press, you will be told that some of the books elements had to be compromised in order to reach a mainstream audience (the always optimistic Millar said just that).
Enter Super, a film that refuses to compromise anything. Released about a year after Kick-Ass, it was never intended for a large audience. However, with its impressive cast (Rainn Wilson, Ellen Paige, Liv Tyler, Kevin Bacon…) writer/director James Gunn (Slither) must have hoped for a better reaction than he got. The picture made just $324k and received middling reviews. The picture certainly has its flaws, but this tackles the same idea as the renowned Kick-Ass and comes away with something far larger.
Wilson plays a developmentally-challened, mild-mannered man approaching middle age who is heartbroken when a nasty drug dealer (Bacon) reintroduces his wife (Tyler) to drugs and steels her away. After a few weeks sobbing in his bedroom, the person everybody laughed at has garbed a super costume and taken to the streets to bring justice vigilante-style. The picture is a comedy, but it is hard for people to reach it as we see people we genuinely care about suffer humiliating and miserable circumstances. Kick-Ass gives the audience a distance from its story by making it a revenge-fantasy, Super makes us feel the horror as we see our hero lose himself in something entirely relatable but irrevocably violent. We do get to the humor though, and it is in much the vein as Kick-Ass--when the hero, aka the "Crimson Bolt," is approached by a young woman (Paige) wanting to be a sidekick we see how so much of the desire to "protect justice" is more a desire for a more exciting, adrenaline-filled life. The vigilantes begin doing totally unheroic activities, and like Kick-Ass the public takes a macabre glee in it all.
Unlike Kick-Ass, we get a character driven conclusion. I am not going to spoil it, but what we see is a window into why we really dream of super-heroes: A world where good really does win, but also a deep longing for personal connections. It sounds corny here, but the movie makes us feel the message due to our intense connection with the characters. A connection Kick-Ass the book never intended and Kick-Ass the movie tried to tack on but utterly failed at.
Super isn't necessarily a flop. It could hopefully find its footing on DVD. And I assure you it is a far superior, far more poignant tale than Kick-Ass, and due to this is far funnier. So, shut up crime and let it get recognized as the true vigilante-comedy.
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