Review: Kick-Ass

Kick-Ass is a movie disinterested in its own premise. It starts by repeatedly asking the question, "What would happen if someone tried to become a comic book superhero in real life?" The great disappointment of the movie is that it isn't half an hour before the film completely abandons that intriguing question to deliver another cartoon fantasy.

The story involves Dave, your standard issue high school loser, played by Aaron Johnson, who one day decides to stop merely reading about costumed crime fighters and become one. After modifying some scuba gear ordered off the internet into a disguise, he heads out into the world to thwart criminals as Kick-Ass. He is grievously injured by car thieves immediately. Of course.

So far so good. But after our hero is released from the hospital the film quickly loses focus of the material and starts departing into Marvel fantasy land, albeit with more violence and less wit. Dave finds unlikely success fighting off some muggers and predictably becomes an internet sensation, and it's here the material starts to flatline. Nothing we've been shown about Dave suggested he should be anything but a disaster as Kick-Ass and watching him do well isn't clever or ironic. It misses the point. Kick-Ass's incompetence is the heart of the comedy and glossing over it is like having Steve Carell's character in The 40 Year Old Virgin suddenly get really smooth with the ladies. Why are you telling this story again?

In a parallel story that never touches a toe down in reality, a disgraced former cop, played by Nicolas Cage, plots revenge against the mob boss who ruined his life. He too decides to go the super hero route and enlists his ten year old daughter Mindy as Robin to his Batman, or in this case, Hit Girl to his Big Daddy. He teaches Mindy to be an ultra-violent killing machine, training her to play with switchblades and automatic weapons the way most girls play with Barbie's Dream House. They are memorably introduced with Daddy shooting daughter point blank into her bullet-proof vest so she can get used to being shot.

I can't for the life of me decide what the filmmaker's think they're satirizing with these characters. They are just two more comic book creations with no more connection to reality than the Green Lantern and the script doesn't even scratch the surface of what should be an incredibly disturbing pair. It isn't long before the film is merely putting them through the motions of your standard comic book action scenes with Hit Girl laying waste to countless henchmen. Beyond the novelty of seeing a cute little moppet cursing like a Mamet character while committing mass murder this is nothing we haven't seen a hundred times. There's a fine line between spoofing action movie cliches and exploiting them and Kick-Ass ends up on the wrong side of it.


So why didn't the filmmakers follow through with such a killer idea? Maybe they had pressure to deliver the slam-bang action goods to a teenage audience and it overwhelmed any attempts at parody. It's possible they concluded, "Hey, you know what? Superheroes wouldn't work at all in real life," and just fell back on the usual comic action tropes, albeit with an amped up level of violence. Some will no doubt argue that the Kick-Ass is just being faithful to the well-regarded graphic novel by Mark Millar, but fidelity to source material is no excuse.

So Kick-Ass doesn't work as the movie it set out to be, what about the movie it is? Sorry to say that's pretty much a dud too. Kick-Ass is neither clever enough to be a satire of the comic book superhero nor exciting enough to merely be a decent example of one. With its premise out the window all were left with is some very forgettable characters and no real story to speak of. A few kids and an ex-cop puts on costumes and shoots some mobsters - The End. Aaron Johnson as the title character is all too convincing as a zero, not particular likable as Dave or fun as Kick-Ass. Just because you're playing a high school loser doesn't mean you need to have your personality removed. He lacks Tobey Maguires pluck as Peter Parker or the desperate humor of the Superbad guys. Jonah Hill and Michael Cera, now there's a pair I'd enjoy seeing suit up to fight crime.

The supporting cast fares better, scoring some funny moments when the film takes a break from the action. Mark Strong and Superbad alum Christopher Mintz-Plasse are amusing as an inept team of father and son villains, and Cage is reliably goofy as Big Daddy, actually providing the film with something approaching humanity in his relationship with his daughter.

As for Hit Girl, Chloe Moretz steals the show completely. She's far and away the best reason to see Kick-Ass and raises the film up a level every time she shows up on screen. The film relies way too much on the supposedly shocking image of a small girl as sociopathic killing machine, but damned if Moretz doesn't sell the living hell of it. She is the real deal, with presence and star power enough to equal a dozen boring Kick-Asses. As disappointed as I was with this flick, if they made a sequel named Hit Girl I'd be sorely tempted to go.

Much fuss has been made about the level of violence involving Hit Girl, an eleven year old child. A lot of these complaints miss the point, I think, objecting to the very idea of a child in a violent scenario. I'm of the opinion there is pretty much nothing you can't show in a movie if you get the tone right. A Fish Called Wanda involved the murder of three dogs and damned if I still don't chuckle at the thought of it. Unfortunatley Kick-Ass director Matthew Vaugh has no such light touch, thoroughly losing his grip on the material early on, so by the time Hit Girl is being pummeled in the face by a full grown man we are cringing when we should be having fun.

Hilarious, I Swear

Tone is a slippery thing to get a handle on - Cross it and the audience will sit through comedy with stony faces and yawn through drama. But make a friend of it and you can get away with damn near anything. Want to do a comedy about a nuclear holocaust? How about a farce about vicious racism? Get the tone right and you've got Dr. Strangelove and Blazing Saddles - and I defy you to find two funnier films. If director Matthew Vaughn had done Strangelove I imagine we'd get lingering close-ups of Russian peasants burned alive in a nuclear hellfire. When audiences winced and turned away Vaughn would cry "What's the problem? I'm being ironic!" You can't stand back and say you don't mean it when you spent the first 40 minutes of your own movie telling me the opposite.

Verdict: With their ponderous solemnity side by side with their boundless silliness has there ever been a subject more ripe for parody than the Superhero movie? Still Kick-Ass lets them off the hook, and misses the barn-sized target hoping that violent children and timely references to Facebook and YouTube will fill the void left by the lack of real satire. Still, it's not a complete waste. That Moretz is gonna be big I tell ya. For her, and for some scattered entertaining moments, I'll bump it up a grade. 4 out of 10

Review: The Ghost Writer

There is a body, that much we know for sure.

A disgraced former British Prime Minister is in exile in Martha's Vineyard and his aide has just washed up on shore, drowned under suspicious circumstances, and for a long time in Roman Polanski's engrossing mystery The Ghost Writer that is the only concrete clue we have that something sinister is going on beneath the surface. A lot of mysteries these days serve up clues like a children's TV show, circled and underlined and with Ian McKellan giving a Powerpoint presentation. Not here, where we find ourselves leaning in closer to pick up on any leads we may be missing. We are carried along by Polanksi's confidence. Even if we can't see how all the pieces fit together we trust Polanski does. He did make Chinatown, after all.

The Ghost Writer is the kind of film I don't realize how much I want until I get one. It is a mystery by adults for adults, atmospheric and quiet where most films are noisy and crammed full of clunky exposition and unnecessary action. When was the last one of these we got? The Constant Gardener? Zodiac? Watching the film I felt gratitude that they put in the effort. It shows.

Like many classic mysteries, including Chinatown, The Ghost Writer uses the device of the spreading stain, starting with a single crime and following its connections until it encompasses greater crimes, often crossing into unconscionable transgressions against society. The dead man in question was ghost writing a political memoir for Adam Lang, former British PM who was drummed out of office for his unpopular involvement in a war in the Middle East. To say that Lang recalls Tony Blair is to suggest that it is left open to ambiguity, which it isn't. Polanski and writer Robert Harris are not interested in being coy.

A replacement writer is rustled up with great haste. He is a pro played by Ewan McGregor with seemingly zero interest in politics (his last job was ghost writing a bestseller for a famous magician) His job is to take the work in progress and make it marketable by injecting heart and readability. His dawning realization as to the scope of the awfulness of the book he's been brought on to save makes for some winning comic relief.

The ghost writer (he is given no other name) is quickly absorbed into the isolated world of Lang. The former PM is taking fire from all sides and they are in full-on defense mode, made clear by the ever-present mob of protesters at the end of the street. No sooner does the ghost arrive than the International Criminal Court announces they are going to bring Lang up on war crimes charges. Also, in the air at Lang's compound is the icy relationship between Lang and his wife Ruth. She is a steely-eyed realist and active player in the career of her husband, who can be a bit scatter-brained. Yet tough as she is not above being being stung by the way her husband no longer even bothers to hide his affair with the bombshell aide played by Kim Catrall.

The performances of Olivia Williams and Pierce Brosnan as the Langs are the heart of this movie, and are both worthy of supporting Oscar consideration. Williams is fantastic at playing both Ruth's toughness and her flashes of vulnerability and resentment at their current situation. We spend most of the movie wondering what she's thinking and the more we learn about her character the more we realize just how good Olivia Williams performance is. But as strong as she is the real revelation here is Pierce Brosnan, who I have never seen be so magnetic on screen. He gives us a man of multiple dimensions who can go from charming to blinkered to statesmanlike in the space of a few minutes, believable as both the leader stepping out of the blackened limo and the bewildered guy on the couch in his jogging clothes having aides explain to him the predicament he's in. The movie springs to life when the Langs are on screen.

The great flaw of the film is that the central character lives up to the title all too well. He is a blank slate. The idea that character is never even given a name is a clever conceit but I'm not sure it's a wise one. Over the course of the film we wonder why it is he doing what he's doing since he started the story focused intently on his bank account, blithely indifferent to all matters of politics. When Philip Marlowe would get entangled in a mess like this we sensed the wounded romantic underneath the cynical shell. Here we don't sense much of anything. Is he eager to be considered a real writer? Outraged by the implications of what he finds? Read a few too many Encyclopedia Brown books? The movie doesn't seem to know or care, and it keeps the film firmly on this side of greatness.

Also a letdown is Cattrall's sexpot secretary. She is amusing in the context of Brosnan's character but doesn't really come across as a plausible player in the drama, and she should. Mysteries depend on their eccentric supporting players like Superhero films depend on their crazy villians.

That said, the things The Ghost Writer does right far outweigh the missteps. I particularly like the way Polanksi didn't amp up the thrills to ridiculous action movie levels. He understands that when you actually believe the action in question is taking place it doesn't need any extra pyrotechnics. Horrifying enough to be followed by an ominous black car without having a Bullit style chase. There is a scene where McGregor is cornered on a ferry by some heavies he has every reason to believe will kill him. He escapes by jumping about three feet back to the dock as it floats out to sea, and I swear that jump was more exciting than all of 300 because I believed it was a real guy in real danger making a real jump. Think about it - If any of us ever did that we'd be dining out on that story for the rest of our lives.

Verdict: The Ghost Writer is an honest-to-God professional movie that wants nothing more than too earn two hours of your time with its storytelling ability. Best of all is that Ghost Writer is a film with a payoff which rewards your attention. It's really about something and we exit the theater pondering the implications. One of the best of the first half of 2010 and a worthy addition to Polanksi's filmography. 8 out of 10

A Message to Star Wars Fans

Attention Fanboys and Fangirls. Your big moment is here.

It has been announced that the Star Wars films are getting the Blu-ray treatment, and in the near future all six films will be landing in stores in all their clunky, muppety, CGI-vandalized glory. I know, I'm excited too. I've been waiting for this moment since the high definition revolution. So get ready. Get set. Get up at five in the morning, get dressed up as Boba Fett, get in line at Best Buy and GET SOMETHING ELSE.

Seriously, anything else. I bet Lord of the Rings looks super on Blu-ray, but maybe that's too blatant a betrayal of your childhood Star Wars nostalgia. If you're still in a sci-fi fantasy mood, and who are we kidding - you are, Dark City and Pan's Labyrinth are available on Blu-ray looking sharp as can be. Did you hear they recently restored the original cut of Metropolis, unseen for nearly a century? That's certainly a must-see. Hell, just check out whatever Criterion is up to. That Blu-ray two-pack of Yojimbo and Sanjuro has been calling out to me, and come on, Lucas was just ripping off Kurosawa anyway.

But let's be clear: At this point so much as one penny spent on anything bearing the name Star Wars is utterly inexcusable, and would mark the purchaser as one of the biggest suckers in cinematic history.

I am not going to recap the litany of George Lucas's crimes against the cinema here - they have been detailed elsewhere and exhaustively so. There is even a full length feature documentary making the rounds cataloging the myriad of charges Lucas's fans have leveled against him. Bashing George Lucas has grown to such a beloved pastime it could replace baseball. I've done it too. It's fun and so very, very easy. But to turn around at this point and pony up the dough all over again would amount to a whole new level of pathetic previously unknown to fanboys. Worse than Trekkies, Star Wars fans. Worse than Trekkies. Is that what you want?

It was just barely forgivable to go see Revenge of the Sith, but Lucas had the public over a barrel. The hope of a quality finish to justify our investment was too much to resist, and Lucas has spent the years since pretending our curiosity equaled enjoyment. Your dollars do not have nuance. They have only one message - unequivocal approval. And if you shell out for the Blu-ray - if you say you just need Empire Strikes Back, just need to see the cloud city in High-Def - George will do it over again. He'll plop himself down in front of the first TV camera he can find, smile his smug beardy smile and say "You see? I told you people loved me. They love the CGI bastardization, and the midichlorians, and the sterile computer worlds with the mannequin acting, and the Gungans, and Yoda as Sonic the Hedgehog, and the 'Yippee!' and the 'Nooooo!' and any of my goddamned awful writing you care to mention. They loved it - every minute. How could you argue they didn't? They keep paying for it."

I know that you and George has some good times together back in the day, Star Wars fans. But those days are long gone, and you need to wake up. You are in an abusive relationship and it's not going to stop until you cut off all ties - pack your suitcase, gather up the kids and move on with your life. If you don't, if all that bitching and moaning was just impotent nerd rage, you deserve everything you get.

Try to salvage some digni- Oh. Nevermind.