In a world where Spider-Man is being needlessly rebooted along with Daredevil, The Fantastic Four and Superman. Where the X-Men franchise is in the toilet and hack directors are given the reins to important characters and promptly ram it into the ground. It's refreshing to see a super-hero movie that actually gets it right and not only brings a fresh take on an overly saturated genre but also opens up the door to a new wave of potentially more adult and R-rated comic-book films.
Director Matthew Vaughn started out producing films for Guy Ritchie. Films like Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch but he went off to do his own thing and has proven his own filmmaking abilities after directing Layer Cake and Stardust. Two films that have gone mostly unnoticed by the general public. Which is good cause I don't think they'd get it. He was once tapped by 20th Century Fox to direct X-Men 3. He left in the middle of pre-production due to not being able to meet the studio's release date. Brett Ratner was then brought in to replace Vaughn and gave X-Men 3 his patented stamp of blandness. But Vaughn still had that itch to make a super-hero movie. He flirted with making Thor but decided to adapt a smaller and lesser-known comic. Mark Millar's Kick-Ass.
After writing the script with his Stardust co-writer Jane Goldman, he presented it to various studios and was turned down by each one. Every single one complained about the violence and the film lacking a single nice bone in it's body. So Vaughn went the independent route and managed to wrangle up financing. And we all have to thank the movie gods that he did because he has delivered not only one of the most entertainingly wrong movies in a long time but also one of the best comic book movies ever. A movie that can proudly stand next to such great comic book movies such as Spider-Man 2, X-Men 2, Iron Man, The Dark Knight and Hellboy 2.
You probably already know the story thanks to the trailers. Aaron Johnson plays Dave, a regular high school kid without a dark tragedy in his past that pushes him towards crime fighting and also lacking the typical genetic mutations that give him superpowers. He's just a kid that decides that's had enough of people standing around and watching the helpless get pushed around and robbed by dirty criminals. So with a scuba outfit ordered from the internet and with no real training whatsoever, he goes out to make a difference as Kick-Ass. And he is promptly put in the hospital. He remains undeterred and after recovering tries again but with a more successful result. The ensuing internet video of his heroics is a hit and Kick-Ass attracts the attention of real heroes Damon and Mindy MacReady. The father/daughter vigilante team of Big Daddy (Nicolas Cage) and Hit Girl (Chloe Moretz). He's an ex-cop with a grudge against mob boss Frank D'Amico (Mark Strong) and has trained his little 11 year old daughter to be a perfect killing machine. Together they have made life difficult for Frank and his organization. Along the way Frank starts to think that it's Kick-Ass who is responsible for his number of men to be increasingly dwindling. D'Amico's son Chris (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) volunteer's to become Red Mist, another "hero" who will attract Kick-Ass to team up with him and then be lured into a trap where D'Amico will get rid of Kick-Ass. And thus the story builds bit by awesome bit to it's amazing conclusion. This a movie with actual stakes and stakes that involve people we actually care about. People die, violently. And we feel the impact of that.
Performances were spot on all around. Aaron Johnson gives Dave a nice awkwardness while also making it believable that he truly believes in doing right. Nicolas Cage plays Damon as a doting dad and when he is Big Daddy he makes the intriguing but hilarious choice to make him sound like Adam West. Chloe Moretz brings a cute innocence to Hit Girl. You see a little girl who is vulnerable but yet deadly when she has her costume on. Mark Strong continues his long line of awesome villains with Frank. The man knows how to be bad-ass without being a cliche mustache twirler. He sees these super-heroes as a temporary annoyance in his life. He'll take care of them and return to ruling the criminal world. And last but not least Christopher Mintz-Plasse. The former McLovin' portrays Chris D'Amico as the geeky son of a father who doesn't believe him capable of joining the family business. But he really wants his dad to see him as his successor and once he makes the choices he makes, you don't really blame him.
Matthew Vaughn shows an incredible ability to juggle drama, comedy and action. We feel for all these characters. They all have believable motivations. Dave just wants to help people. Damon wants to get revenge and is willing of sacrificing his daughter's childhood to achieve that. Chris wants to get his dad's approval. Some of them are ready to go to extreme lengths to get what they want. Vaughn never lets the story get too dark with some very black humor. Humor that also never takes away from the drama. It's a very tough trick to pull off. Most of time it's damn near impossible to balance the two, but Vaughn manages. He also is able to bring both a frenetic pace to his action scenes and yet make it all perfectly easy to distinguish what is going on. Editing and cinematography never getting in the way of the presentation of the action. And as the action gets more and more violent and the stakes are raised, Vaughn keeps it in line and doesn't let it explode into an orgy of non-sensical blood and guts. He has the most fun showing us Hit Girl turn large groups of mobsters into mincemeat. Her scenes are simply fun and satisfy our blood lust. Seeing her toss knives, cut off limbs and blow guys' heads off is easily the most memorable thing in the movie. I could go into a spoiler-filled list of all my favorite moments but then I ruin it for you. The joy is in seeing those moments play out and having them put a smile on your face. Let me just say this, bazookas.
This is the movie that I hope finally puts Matthew Vaughn in the spotlight. The man has made three amazing movies. Each one so different from the other. A British gangster movie, a swashbuckling fantasy film and now, a hyper-violent deconstruction of the super-hero genre. Keep your eye on him cause he's going places. And you should probably be jealous of him too. He's married to Claudia Schiffer. Lucky asshole.
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