Kick Ass
R
1 hour, 58 minutes
Starring: Aaron Johnson, Chloe Moretz, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Mark Strong, and Nicholas Cage
Kick Ass is the story of a teenager who wonders why no one has ever tried to become a super hero in real life. Consequently he teams up with other would-be superheroes and has to manage the life of a superhero while balancing out teenage angst. This film was previewed as San Diego Comic Con last year. The clips from this movie were some of the most surprising, hilarious, and inspiring previews I have seen in a long time. As a life-time fan of the comic book genre, I had high hopes for this film.
However, instead of “kicking ass” as the title promises, it sort of lets out a weak punch that is so slow you can be easily dodged. That might be a little harsh, but the film was very lacking. This is the sort of film that turns the comic book genre film on it’s head without a truly family friendly moment in the film. It was to be crude, violent, and NOT meant for annoying teenagers. This was supposed to be hardcore and rated R for a reason. Sadly, moments like that are few and are in between. In between the moments of awesome action and “holy sh*t” moments, I found myself bored.
The movie does follow through with great action sequences, crude humor, and laugh-out-loud moments, but that is about 30% of the overall movie. If the film isn’t non-stop action and R-rated humor filled, there needs to be some kind of cohesive story that holds the whole film together. Our hero “Kick-Ass” doesn’t have any sort of strong motivations for why he’s doing any of these things, beyond “This looks cool.” After watching him literally almost die multiple times there is NO real reason for him to continue on. If the hero is lacking some sort of convictions it’s difficult to keep up with his journey. Honestly, I thought the villains had much more going on for them than the heroes.
Although I am not the biggest advocate for Kick Ass, I cannot say enough good things about Aaron Johnson! This kid is on his way to big things and I can’t wait.
Go see it to be mildly amused, but this is DEFINITELY not the comic book inspired movie we had all hoped that it would be.
3 out of 5
i kind of enjoyed kick ass but i agree with everything you said. I thought it was either going to be fun or gruesome. Not a little bit of both, done badly
I liked the movie. A lot. I personally thought that it was well put together, not so much for the purists out there… Considering I went in completely oblivious to the fact that there was any comic book tie-in, I thought it was a good movie.