KICK-ASS

 

 

 

Kick-Ass is about a "geeky" boy who decides to turn himself into a superhero named--you guessed it!--Kick-Ass. However, he soon discovers that being said superhero is not nearly as glamorous as he envisioned; like, for instance, during his first outing as Kick-Ass, as he attempts to stop a car-jacking, he gets stabbed and then run over by a car. After getting metal pins and other medical implants put into his body ala Wolverine, he continues on as Kick-Ass and allies himself with two other superheroes, an 11-year-old who calls herself Hit Girl (played by promising young actress Chloe Grace Moretz) and her father who calls himself Big Daddy (played by noted eccentric actor Nic Cage who, for some reason, didn't get top billing in the film). Big Daddy was a former cop who was framed after he refused to be on the "take" for a notorious drug kingpin whom is on BD's hit list for framing him. Although BD may dress like Batman, he is anything BUT Bats as he goes through a warehouse and slaughters all the bad guys and he winds up getting set on fire when he and Kick-Ass are captured after being set up by another supposed superhero named The Red Mist who is actually the son of said notorious drug kingpin. Hit Girl also follows in her father's footsteps as she rescues Kick-Ass from some baddies by slicing & dicing them all to pieces. This film, understandably, drew criticism from certain critics who blasted the film for its excessive violence and crass language, especially coming from 11-year-old Hit Girl, among them celebrated film critic--and this site's namesake--Roger Ebert who pointed out how inappropriate it was for a movie like this to be released during a time when you hear about kids killing each other in the news all the time. While i can certainly see Mr. Ebert's point, and while I agree this movie at times can be pretty brutal, the kids-committing-violence plot has been mined before in films, e.g. in the late John Wayne's film The Cowboys where a bunch of young cowpokes--some of whom were even younger than the Hit Girl character--avenge The Duke's death by gunning down all the bad guys responsible for The Duke's death. Plus you can pretty much see about the same level of violence in prime-time TV nowadays. Roger Ebert also pointed out in his review of this film how the average-person-becoming-a-superhero plot has likewise been mined before in previous films, e.g. the late John Ritter's 1980 flick Hero At Large comes to mind. Going back to the film, Kick-Ass teams up with Hit Girl to avenge her father's death. Are they successful? Well, they are, at the time of this writing, planning a sequel, if that should tell you something! In any case, while Kick-Ass might not be for every moviegoer, especially ones who prefer their superheroes NOT to be cold-blooded foul-mouthed murdering vigilantes (The Punisher, anyone?) and who are in fact disturbed by watching little girls commit cold-blooded acts of murder (even if those acts are committed against the bad guys), it's an especially good film to watch for those who get tired of seeing the typical superhero flick (like, of course, yours truly!).