Sunday, June 13, 2010

THEY'RE 'KIDDING' ME!


DIRECTED BY MATTHEW VAUGHN
STARRING: AARON JOHNSON, CHLOE MORETZ, MARK STRONG, CHRISTOPHER MINTZ-PLASSE, LYNDSY FONSECA AND NICOLAS CAGE

A sense of evolution apparent, I’ve observed that superheroes got younger as time progressed, not to mention the debate surrounding the necessity of superpowers in order to be one. If ‘Superman’ flew and did all such things and ‘Batman’ defied that cliché, it was up to ‘Spiderman’ to even break through the aspect of mental-determination and need for change by inflicting personal intentions as base motive. Now, I’ve no mind at all to touch upon the ethics of it already, but what was College in the case of Peter Parker turns to school for Dave Lizewski a.k.a ‘Kick-Ass’. He is (most probably) 17 years old, but he isn’t a superhero. But ‘Hit-Girl’ (Chloe Moretz) is: And she is (again, most likely to be) eleven.

I needn’t say how outrageous it all is, the film speaks for itself. ‘Big Daddy’ (Nicolas Cage) is hailed towards the end by his very own daughter ‘Hit-Girl’ that he’s the best father in the whole world. To inspire vendetta is one thing, but it is certainly not in the same league to be living just for that. In that context, I’d actually like to question the whole set-up, the backdrop, the city involved, the government. Gotham functioned in its own regard, save for the slightest of mentions of the USA. The city in ‘Kick-Ass’ is ambient of it, and I was outraged (yes) to see a cop being introduced just for the purpose of him foster-fathering ‘Hit-Girl’ in a post-climactic epilogue. We’re to assume that the superheroes almost entirely operate underground, which I find hard to believe considering there’ve been films like ‘Eagle Eye’ lately, which show that it’s pretty damn hard even for a machinery of the tiniest level to function without governmental knowledge. I thought it ought to be pretty much established that drug-lords thrive only because they’re let to me, not because the system is ignorant about them, but it seems that no one in this vicinity other than Daddy and his little girl seem to know of such shady deals. I’m not assuming things over here, I’m merely playing by the idea that policemen in ‘Kick-Ass’ city do nothing but drop their superheroes at school.

What surprises me most is the thought that I could actually substantiate even a positive review of this film, because it’s fast, often wacky and so insensitive that it’s actually the most contemporary of superhero movies, better than ‘Hancock’ in terms of lethargy and an overall laid-back nature. Bodies are walked-on and the film is outrageously funny even in the direst of situations, consequential injuries even, and I think that’s something awfully wrong. If I was rolling with laughter when Kick-Ass got stabbed the first time, it was because I was supposed to be and that’s what makes the film questionable. Hit-Girl inspires awe in sequences, pounding dozens of fully-built men to the ground, affected in no way whatsoever by blood unless in an inspirational way, and Chloe Moretz (the big mouth in ‘(500) Days of Summer’) only makes us forget that she’s probably not even pubescent yet. Surely deserves a mention, this kid, who masters fight sequences in ways that could render the likes of Milla Jovovich and Angelina Jolie speechless. What she would also deserve is some grounding for a lifetime and also some quality time in military school as any ‘normal’ parent would agree.

That was how ‘Kick-Ass’ went for me. Each moment was a rush, a rage but I was constantly nagged by this voice that asked me to keep my eyes open, to know what was actually happening instead of what was being shown. Perhaps an older Hit-Girl would have kicked Katie Deauxma (Lyndsy Fonseca) off the plot, but I still liked the brother-sister kind of bond between the wannabe and the overgrown kid. I’ve got nothing on Chloe, though. Loved her, all through.

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