Kick Ass (directed by Matthew Vaughn, 2010)

I don’t necessarily know what I expected from Kick Ass but what I saw was not what I expected. Again maybe because I am a comic book novice, I guess I sort of had visions of a screwball comedy with teens trying to be superheroes, and while of course there is an element of that, most of the attempted humor was greeted with a largely silent audience. What surprised me most about Kick Ass was that its greatest merit is probably as an action movie more than anything.

The biggest disappointment of the film is Kick Ass himself (Aaron Johnson). The character is nothing but whiny, plain, and unentertaining. It’s quite possible that this was the intention but it seems a bit curious to bank your whole franchise on a character with so little merit or likable quality. Essentially Kick-Ass is the kind of guy you would have made fun of in high school without ever feeling bad about it later. This may be a bit harsh but my biggest desire during the movie was to punch Kick Ass/Dave Linzewski in the face, luckily this happens repeatedly throughout the story so I was able to derive some guilty pleasure from it.

Luckily for us Kick Ass has a great supporting cast in the form of Big Daddy/Damon Macready (Nicholas Cage) and his deadly daughter Hit Girl/Mindy Macready (Chloe Grace Moretz). The interaction between Big Daddy and Hit Girl is both funny and provides the film with a pleasantly touching quality. Nick Cage is great as Big Daddy as he always is when he plays characters that are a bit wacky and he doesn’t take himself seriously. In Hit Girl we find the star of the film. She has a great lovable little sister quality about her (if your little sister was a knife wielding assassin). Big Daddy and Hit Girl are the true ass kickers of this film not only in the ways already described but also in that the they are responsible for the wildly entertaining action sequences sprinkled throughout.

A word is also necessary here in response to the media non-controversy surrounding the profanity and violence exhibited by the supposed to be 10 year old Hit Girl (Moretz is actually 13). Given the buzz around her use of the dreaded C-word I expected this little girl to have a mouth that would make a trucker blush. Hit Girl does certainly use a few words that would get a real 10 year old sent to her room but I generally think media watchdogs need to chill the fuck (HA!) out. I remind you this is an R-rated picture and if you don’t have an understanding of what that may entail keep yourself and your kids out of the theater.

My experience of watching Kick Ass was a perfect example of the phenomena I call “the arc of acceptance”. For the films first third, I strongly regretted having made the trip to the theater, by the second third I was lukewarm, and by the end I decided I was pretty well entertained and even mildly interested in the sequel. See Kick Ass only if your expectations are in the right place and you are intrigued by a 10 year old girl killing bad guys.