This is where "Watchmen" left off

Rating: 10/10 (28 April 2010)

When I went to the 2009 New York Comic Con, I managed to ask "Watchmen" co-creator Dave Gibbons that if the movie version of his and Alan Moore's monolithic graphic novel of dysfunctional costumed troubleshooters would inspire more R-rated features that have superheroes, powerful or otherwise, to be made. Mr. Gibbons didn't think so, and I respected his opinion. Now, here comes the deservedly-titled "Kick Ass", a hard-hitting, morals-rattling, gallows-hysterical adaptation of the comic book, co-created by Mark Millar (co-created "Wanted" and a fan of Mr. Moore) and John Romita Jr. (son of the legendary Spider-Man artist and a legend on his own), that delightfully defecates on the grave of Frederic Wertham, the psychiatrist who, in his book, "Seduction Of the Innocent", crucified comic books for causing juvenile delinquency in the 1950s. It's a pretty big manure pile.
Unassuming NYC fanboy Dave Lizewski (Aaron Johnson of the upcoming John Lennon biopic, "Nowhere Boy") isn't the sort of ideal costumed hero, even when strutting in a scuba suit and getting nearly killed (!), but he feels he should be one because no one else is doing it (reason: sanity). After getting some metal implants, Dave becomes an Internet sensation, adopting the movie's title as his codename, and inspires two other loose cannons. Ex-cop/comic book artist Damon Macready (shameless fanboy Nicholas Cage of the National Treasure films) and his spunky, pigtailed daughter Mindy (Chloe Moretz of "500 Days of Summer") have revenge on their minds as their masked personas Big Daddy and Hit Girl, and their target is the callous mobster Frank D'Amico (Mark Strong of "RocknRolla" and "Sherlock Holmes"), who despises this crimebusting fad, since it's ruining his enterprises, and lets his too-eager-to-please son, Chris (Christopher Mintz-Plasse of "Superbad") to become a hero, Red Mist, to draw the heroes out. In conflicts like these, all hell breaks loose.
Uh. . .what Keene Act? Directing the script he co-wrote (as the comic book was being produced!) with his "Stardust" compeer Jane Goldman, Matthew Vaughn ("Layer Cake") has the courage and giddiness (!) to bring this adult fantasy to life, picking up where "Watchmen" left off, in terms of costumed crimefighters being in the real world. It's madcap bloody yet somber in some parts, because there are ramifications when wanting to do the right thing.
With his optimism and bravery, Johnson, in the title role, could be the perfect child/successor of Dan Drieberg and Laurie Jupiter of you know what film. Cage nicely goofs on Adam West and Hugh Beaumont while having bravado by Frank Miller. Mintz-Plasse surprisingly twists the tired mobster's goofy son joke while Strong dutifully balances patriarch and high-life scum.
Both disturbing and fascinating, since Jodie Foster's underage harlot in "Taxi Driver", the real thespian surprise is Ms. Moretz, a merry old soul who doesn't mind wearing a Kelvar vest while being a target (!) and using longshoreman vocabulary while dispatching thugs to the sounds of the "Banana Splits" theme song, an Ennio Morricone lick and "Bad Reputation" by Joan Jett and The Blackhearts (Are these in her head?!). She's delighted when she gets a bunch of elaborate switchblades and plays expertly with one of them, without cutting herself! Like the film's title, her role as Hit Girl has had critics, both film and social, all upset. I wonder if they've been upset when children are used as soldiers in an African country. If they've seen the film, were they upset when two characters were mugged at gunpoint and a bystander does nothing or one character's a hit-and-run victim? What about when a TV station refuses to air the unmasking and execution of two heroes, but the event's Internet accessible? It's hard to be morally upholding when you're morally selective. Ergo, hypocritical.
Evan Peters and Clark Duke are reliable as Dave's fanboy chums. Eye winks appearances by Yancy Butler (the Witchblade TV series) as Chris's mom and Jason Flemying ("The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen") as a dim blub, mob-employed doorman are fun for fanboys. Mr. Romita Jr. nicely supplies an animated origin sequence, detailing the Macreadys' reason for "suiting up".
"Kick-Ass" takes a lot of from Tarantino, Snyder, Peckinpah, Miller, Rodriguez, Scorsese, Cody, Smith, Apatow and Raimi, and it screams a loud "thank you". It'd be cool if the heroes faced social cowardice, an unspoken crime in our society, but they'd be out of work, if everyone had guts. This film certainly has a lot of them.