Last Night I was fortunate enough to attend a screening for

Kick Ass at the Hollywood Arclight. As an avid comic reader, I was excited, but

not overly so as I had found the comic to be enjoyable but nothing superlative,

aside from John Romita Jr?s art. Going into this screening, all I had was the

knowledge that this had been planned before the first issue hit stands, and

that a few clips had been shown at Comic Con to a warm reception. I should have

gone in preparing to have my ass kicked!

Introduced by one of the editors, the film had some scenes

with incomplete effects, the sound/music wasn?t final, and they never made it

clear what the purpose of the screening was for, since we weren?t given any

feedback forms or even asked any questions afterwards. I imagine it was to gauge

audience reaction for pacing purposes. My sentiments would be to leave this

film alone (aside from the unpolished elements), because I can easily say that this

instantly vaulted into the pantheon of my favorite films. Furthermore, this is

a comic book film that is remarkably faithful to its source in a way that doesn?t

seem laborious (see: Watchmen), although it probably helped that this was

conceptualized as a film from the beginning.

The movie begins as you would expect, narrated by the main

character (played by Aaron Johnson), and he quickly brings you into this world.

I was a little thrown by the casting of Johnson honestly until I saw him in

costume and it was as if JRJR?s pencils had leapt onto the screen, but his

performance was solid throughout, a challenging task, given that Kick Ass?

alter ego is self-described as unremarkable. All of the casting was inspired,

even the smaller roles, but especially Nicholas Cage and Chloe Moretz as Big

Daddy and Hit Girl. I was concerned with how those roles would play on the big

screen, but both actors are brilliant in their execution. The script is especially

tight, and gives everyone a chance to shine, deftly moving between comedy,

romance, and action. The humor is a constant and is both irreverent and

referential, with the obvious dark portions scattered throughout. One of the

standouts of Kick Ass is how they are able to marry comedy with extreme,

graphic violence in such a way that is not exploitative or over the top. Hit Girl

in particular becomes a transcendent character who will join the ranks of Neo

and The Bride as timeless action heroes, something that could only have been

accomplished by Matthew Vaughn?s master hand. I harp on this point in part

because I felt the character in the comic was

in fact exploitative and over the top, but the film takes what should be

disturbing, and initially is, and

just makes you go with it because of the emotional investment with the

characters. Yes, Michael Bay, it is possible and worth establishing an emotional

connection with characters in an action film. Oh, and speaking of the glorious

action?.simply spectacular. Several times the audience broke into applause at

the jaw dropping sequences, shot beautifully in a way that you can actually SEE

what is going on, and honestly I?m still in awe of what I saw. By the last

third of the movie, all I could do was shake my head in disbelief at how

enjoyable this was and exclaim ?I love this movie!?

One thing that I noticed was that the movie didn?t try to

exist in a sole comic universe, i.e. Marvel or DC. There were so many

references to comics of all kinds: Spiderman, Batman, issues of Final Crisis,

The X-Men, even Scott Pilgrim! This is a movie for comic lovers as well as

those who need to stop seeing just comic movies and just go to a damned shop

already.

In Closing, while I found The Dark Knight and Spiderman 2 (successfully)

sought to take a comic and set that storyline in a believable, well crafted

film, Kick Ass goes a different route by creating the film equivalent of a

comic book. By doing so, this movie becomes a game-changer in a way that Iron

Man wasn?t quite able to do. While Iron man was highly entertaining, it only

differed in tone and not necessarily the aim of those films. Kick Ass carves

and I do mean carves, its own niche in such a way that once this film is

released, it will be imitated for quite a while. I cannot wait to see this film

again when it releases and I pray that they keep the music from the final

action scenes.

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