I can't read your mind. But I can kick your ass.

Rating: 7/10 (18 April 2010)

"How come nobody's ever tried to be a superhero?" When Dave Lizewski dons a wetsuit to become the no-nonsense vigilante, Kick-Ass, he soon finds an answer to his own question: because it hurts. But, overcoming all the odds, Dave quickly becomes a phenomenon, capturing the imagination of the public. However, he's not the only superhero out there – the father-daughter crime-fighting duo, Big Daddy and Hit Girl, have been taking down the criminal empire of local Mafioso, Frank D'Amico. And, as Kick-Ass gets drawn into their world of bullets and bloodletting with Frank's son, Chris, the stage is set for a final showdown between the forces of good and evil - in which the DIY hero will have to live up to his name. Or die trying...
KICK-ASS is one of those movies that is difficult to market to the mainstream audience, especially since the opening weekend for this film was disappointing. It has a lot of bloody violence along with a little girl who makes people think that this is a kiddie flick and the fact that this film is rated R just brings a whole lot of mess and confusion to the table of what this film really is. The best way I can describe what this film is is SPIDER MAN mixed with ZOMBIELAND without the zombies.
Unlike the title of the film might suggest, Kick-Ass does end up being overshadowed by the characters of Big Daddy and Hit Girl. In fact, I'll even go as far to say that Hit Girl herself made the movie what it is. She's such a fantastic, awesome, wild, brilliant, colorful, bad-ass character that I liked her more than Kick-Ass. Chloe Moretz plays the said character so well, that she lightens up the screen every time she comes on. You thought the profanity-mouthed kid in ROLE MODELS was shocking? You haven't seen anything yet.
However, saying that, Aaron Johnson as Kick-Ass did a great job as well. I can relate to the nerd-type character he plays. Nicolas Cage is a mixed-bag. In some scenes, he's brilliant, while in others, he's rather weird. Mark Strong as the villain is more of the same from SHERLOCK HOLMES a couple of months back. Still, he has some great scenes with comic timing. Christopher Mintz-Plasse doesn't have much screen time as the trailers suggested, but he's good for the amount of time he appears in the film.
It's apparent the main goal of the film is to entertain its audience and it succeeds at that. The film is filled with bloody violence, vulgar language, and big laughs, most coming from my favorite character Hit Girl. Because of this, however, the many themes touched upon in this film is never fully explored, which could have made the movie a so much better. There are some really moving scenes as well, along with suspense in the fantastically shot action scenes.
The main flaw of the film comes from the tone. It found a hard time whether to be a straight-up comedy or a dramedy because somewhere in this film, it does get serious and dark, unlike the marketing might have suggested. In some parts of the film, I didn't know when to laugh or not. Because of this, I didn't enjoy the film as much as I would have enjoyed it.
However, with these flaws aside, director Matthew Vaughn successfully delivers to the audience an action-packed popcorn flick with great characters. I found the movie to be ludicrously entertaining from beginning to end with a lot of big laughs and some bad ass action scenes. This is the very definition of an awesome movie. I know I'm not the first person to say this but KICK-ASS kicks ass (for the most part).