Kick-Ass

[wolven7]

So I just read Roger Ebert's immensely wrong-headed review of the film adaptation of Mark Millar's Kick-Ass. http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100414/REVIEWS/100419986

Go read it. I'll wait.

Done? Good. Now, I haven't seen the film, yet, but I have to say that I have read the comic, and I know the source material, a bit. It's not simply satire, any more than Watchmen is simply satire. I'm not placing the work on the same scope and scale as Moore's opus, but I am saying they had the same purpose: To make you think about the superhero genre of comics. Two things to consider, at the outset: 1) Kick-Ass is not for children. Not the book and not the movie. 2) It is supposed to be dark. It is supposed to be a statement that life is not comic books, that "being a superhero" isn't funny or cool, that it would take a sociopath-- or at least an extremely naive individual-- to even attempt it, let alone to think that everything would work out perfectly, when you did.

To say it simply: Some comics are complex, darkly humourous works, meant for adults & so are their adaptations. I can say that the previews presented did a little too much marketing to a much lower age-range than it should have, but that is the fault of the studio, not the material. This story is about serious shit.

The relationship between Hit-Girl and Big Daddy, is the Robin/Batman relationship mapped onto the "real world," which is to say, "An emotionally-crippled sociopath projects his personal damage outward, through which he moulds and grooms his 'young ward' into a remorseless killing machine." To say that this relationship or the things that happen, because of it, are "too dark" is to miss the entire message of the picture, in front of you. That message is: "Fuck, Dark? It's an absolutely HORRIFYING Concept. Now THINK about superheroes, and what they do to children, adults, cultures."

Think. Think about the good and the bad, the funny, the heart-breaking, the terrifying, the life-threatening. Think about the show "Who Wants To Be A Superhero" and that group of folks out in Minneapolis, I think it was. Think about what it means to take an 11-year old child and train her to beat someone until they stop resisting. Map superhero tactics on to "real world" situations, and see if what comes out isn't violent, deadly, edifying, horrifying, brutal, visceral, and deeply sad.

This isn't a light-hearted comedy. If this is a comedy, at all, then t's a seriously dark-hearted one.

Just think.

Comments

[raoin.livejournal.com]

yeah, but you heard the man:
"You inhabit a world I am so very not interested in."

i'm not siding with his criticism, i'm simply pointing out that he is actively trying to avoid THINKING about these things.

at least you should give him credit for acknowledging that he doesnt want to be aware of it, much less think of it.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

Nah, I don't think so. That's just cutting off the conversation, and refusing to see that this served a purpose.

He keeps talking about how he doesn't think it's funny to watch an 11-year old get beaten. He's refusing to see the point that he's not supposed to think it's "Funny," it's sad and terrible, as is everything that brought her to that situation, in the first place.

[raoin.livejournal.com]

true but there's a difference between refusing to understand that what you are seeing is not supposed to be funny (except in a dark way) and refusing to actively belong to a world where such things exist.

it is cutting off the conversation, and he does it right up front. he doesnt want to have this conversation with you. he doesnt actually want to have a conversation at all. he wants to tell you whats wrong with this film, as he sees it, and not deal at all with large issues or points of view which differ from his normative status.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

And, for a "review," that's incredibly wrongheaded. Hence, my speaking against it.

[raoin.livejournal.com]

i dont disagree with your speaking against it. wasnt my objective to do that at all. was my objective to agree with you but draw attention to the difference in conversation going on between you and him.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

Fair enough, and true.

[renatus.livejournal.com]

I saw the trailer for Kick-Ass when I went to see Sherlock Holmes, and boggled at it; here was this shiny, candy-coated thing that begins with a delusional hopeful taking a header off a skyscraper and crumpling harder than the car he lands on. That was the most clue in the trailer that it's not a happy funtimes movie, especially as here they don't put ratings onto trailers. Stupid move on the part of the studio, for sure.

That it's rated R and based off a not-silly comic book explains a lot. I agree that Ebert rather monumentally missed the point. It doesn't seem to be a genre/subgenre he's particularly interested in, so he's not asking interesting questions about it, he's just fussing that he went into it expecting Mystery Men and got something more along the lines of Watchmen. Which, wah. A shame, he's usually better than that.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

A shame, he's usually better than that.

Yeah, that's why I was really disappointed.

And I fully agree that the studio did a terrible job of marketing this as the super-dark comedy it should have been.

[not-hothead-yet.livejournal.com]

Best treatment of the phenomenon you are talking about is Puckett/Scott's Batgirl 2000-06


Its probably my second favorite comic of all time.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

Good to know. I'll have to go back and read that one.

[momentai.livejournal.com]

For one thing, you seem to be projecting in the same way Bruce Wayne does. You feel a certain way about a comic book and want others to feel the same way b/c you are quite certain that is the way it should be. And Ebert does the same thing, but with a movie.

Whatever you saw in the comic is not relevant to the movie and Ebert only cares about the movie. He is a film a critic, and one with a narrow view of what film "should" be, so it is doubly irelevant to his reviews what a comic or novel should be. He doesn't even care about the adapting part, just the finished product.

All he is saying is that for a film, Kick-Ass does things wrong and he doesn't agree with how it presents the alleged points and arguments about what anyone feels is in the comic. he's not necessarily missing any point, but saying that if there was a point to this story, it is overshadowed by and wasted on the gratuitous violence and the age of the people involved in the violence. He thinks the justapostion is too great to accomplish anything good.

So, while you think the movie isn't for children, he correctly beleives otherwise and is pointing out that the presentation of the script is doing a diservice to the movie as a whole and will be possibly damaging to kids who go to see it because it will fuel a certain kind of fantasy and detached view of reality in a very negative way.

He isn't cutting off the ocnversation, he's having a different one than you want. And based on that, it seems partly b/c of what Jeanelle mentioned and partly because he thinks the movie goes about making any point it could have in a very wrong way.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

It's not the way I feel about it. It was, as far as I've heard, the creator's intent, and it's pretty universally agreed that he achieved it.

The relevance is that it's the source material. It's like saying that if people call Heston's Ten Commandments overly moralistic, gaudy, and preachy then it has nothing to do with the Christian Bible.

He doesn't talk about the film, or what it does "wrong." He talks about the "morally reprehensible" nature of the events IN the film, and the lack of a moral compass. Which is to say, he misses the entire point.

To say that "he correctly believes" that this movie is for children, is utterly foolish. This is an ultra-violent, extremely dark satire on the entirety of the superhero genre. What about that says, "Bring the kids!"? It is engineered specifically to show the Folly of that detached fantasy.

Still, I've not yet seen it, so I can't judge the content, only the Intent, but Ebert seems to completely miss the fact that there even WAS an intent.

[momentai.livejournal.com]

The way you feel is what causes you to miss his point. He clearly talks about a film and that's all he does. As jeanelle already pointed out, he clearly states in the beginning of the article that he has no interest or appreciation for what the comic was nor what was attempted by adapting it. His main point is that this is a movie he is not impressed with and one that fails to be any type of allegory or teach any kind of lesson.

It simply glorifies violence and does so poorly at that. He doesn't think most people are going to see beyond the violent action film nor will most people really care, too. And if they, do, he doesn't think the movie did a good job of getting any grand ideas across b/c the kids, and how they act and are treated, get in the way.

So, he seems to get the point you got from the comic book, and

1: disagrees with it
2. thinks the point is poorly translated to film given the nature of film in general, and the nature of the this particular film's script.

Beyond that, yes, source material is important, but in a very limited way. Movies are not made to honor source material, they mare made to cash in off it. And regardless of it that is agreed upon or not, the source material has nothing to do with critquing the film itself. They are two separate entities with two separate goals and two separate ways of telling a story.

That's just how it is across the board. Ebert, and no one else, is going to review this, or any other adaptation, on it's merit as an adaptation. They only get paid to talk about the movie itself. The source material may be mentioned in passing, or in depth, depending on the reviewer, but bottomline is that the movie is the thing.

You and I might care about HOW something is adapted if we are familiar with the source, but that is not relevant here or in Jurassic Park or X-Men or anywhere else. The move has to be judged on its own merits.

And yes, the movie is not for kids, but that means nothing either. The movie is aimed at kids like many other rated R movies. You may not like that, and I am sure lots of people, me included, dislike that, but that's how Hollywood works. Again, what you say and feel about the comic maight be true, or at least a general consenus among fans, but that has nothing to do with the film.

It is being advertised as a fun, silly, action movie with kids in it. That is how it is beinng sold and how it looks and even if it weren't, kids love action movies. Children and teens, I mean, and these are the people who are going to see this movie just like some of them probably read the comic, and many other comics that are just as violent and "deep".

Everything you said makes sense, from the point of view of a comic reader. You are arguing a position held about a comic book and how you hope it gets adapted. Roger Ebert is arguing a position about a movie he finds distaseful and doesn't care that it was based on a comic.

That in itself is a separate discussion as is the discussion about the morality and symbolism in the comic and whether he read the comic or not.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

And, again, I blame the studio for the advertising, not the film, not the comic, not the director. When it becomes clear that you're in a Different Kind Of Movie, put your head somewhere else.

[momentai.livejournal.com]

I can't say I disagree with that, but I am willing to cut them some slack in this case.

To use your example, Watchmen was a brilliant adaptation, but by choosing to allow that adaptation to be brilliant, Warner Bros lost a lot of money. So,when it comes time to produce another movie with similar ideas, or any movie centered around a story that requires rapt attention, a studio is going to side with making money over making a thought provoking film.

I would love braver executives, but when your job is balanaced on your ability to turn a profit for the studio, I can't always blame the guys for making the "wrong" choice.

And I do blame the director for some things. He allowed the costumes, the lighting, the script, and the actors, or he at least did not fight them. This is problematic b/c I saw that trailer and it never once crossed my mind that this was something other than a Disney Channel movie.

So, yes, the studio positions the ads and carefully markets to a younger crowd, but the director could have spoken up and teamed with a production designer who could have made the movie look more like you are saying the comic is. And maybe the director agrees with you and was shouted down, I don't know, but yeah, someone somewhere should have put there head somewhere else.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

Chances are, no one will ever know the full process of the marketing decisions. I just think it was poorly done.