A Kick-Ass Movie

April 19, 2010

  

I came to the movie with no expectations at all. I would have watched Clash of the Titans, if not for the negative comments, even coming from a grade-schooler. So I went there with just a tiny idea of what the movie was supposed to be. When I saw the posters, I can’t help but think that this might be a B movie, well, because the poster that I saw was too simple…and too colorful.

But I was totally wrong. The title speaks for itself. During the first minutes, you’d think this one would be a comedy film. It has comedy all right, but one that was really dark. And dark comedy and dark fantasy are two of my favorites.

The whole movie is surreal, and most themes are just plainly true. Kick-ass, the character, was a comic-book-fan teen who wonders why nobody tries to be a (super)hero. He said, of all the superhero fans in the world, nobody ever tried to be like one. Oh, how true. So he searched the web for a wet suit, made some online printing, and decided to be a masked hero who doesn’t know how to fight.

Even though Kick-Ass was the name of this boy, all he actually had was his ability to take a beating and a vision. He wanted to help, but he wasn’t hero material. He thought the society needs help, but I don’t think he knew how much. He knew there are bad people out there, but he was naïve on how bad they really are. He thought he understands, but he only knew not quite as much.

Hit Girl was everything Kick-Ass wasn’t. And she was just 11! She was a cute, blonde little girl who was brought up in vengeance by her ex-police/ex-con father. Her playtime was gunfight, and her Barbie doll was a balisong from her father. She was a hard-core killer, with kick-ass moves. At her age, she was already deadly. Seriously.

Her father, Big Daddy, was motivated to kill the cocaine kingpin who set him up and brought him to prison, leaving her pregnant wife alone and desperate and thus committed suicide. He was Anakin Skywalker consumed with hatred. He speaks calmly, but with rage. He loved her child, but there was only one purpose in life: To kill that one man.

The movie has no pretensions, and all I saw was raw truth. Hit Girl didn’t have angst against her father because she “missed” her childhood; in fact, she enjoyed training with him. She is REALLY good in fighting, and she knows about it. And when she kills, she kills without hesitation, without a blink. When she fights, she fights with passion. She is Achilles personified—only she is WAY cooler.

Their whole world is twisted, revolving around greed and vengeance, magnified in a lens. The heroes are the villains, and the villains are the heroes. And in their crazy world much like ours, who’s gonna save them all?