2010
112 minutes
rated PG-13
Mean as Hell Rating
9/10
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is the fourth film from British director/writer Edgar Wright. Wright captured world attention with the cult hit of his second film Shaun of the Dead (2004). Subsequent to this, he went onto the cop show parody Hot Fuzz (2007) and then entered the Hollywood mainstream with Scott Pilgrim. Ahead for Wright are a bunch of projects, including the conspiracy film Them (2011) and his long announced adaptation of Marvel Comics’ Ant Man (2012), as well as co-writing the script for Steven Spielberg’s The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn (2011). Scott Pilgrim is adapted from a series of six graphic novels published by Toronto-based comic-book artist Bryan Lee O’Malley between 2004 and 2010.
Since Scott Pilgrim vs. The World is adapted from a comic book that’s ripe full of video game references, the movie follows the same road. There are tons of musical cues from Zelda, Super Mario and Street Fighter. There are also really heavy video game references like Scott Pilgrim getting beat down only to get up and grab a life, (something akin to a 1-UP) or the evil exes turning into coins when they’re defeated. Also the films structure resemble a video game with each ex being boss battles of increasing difficulty and Scott Pilgrim “leveling” up between each fight.
All of this is going on while Scott and Ramona continue to work through their tenuous relationship — plus Scott tries to break it off with Knives — as if it were just another ordinary day. But it’s honestly hard for the casual observer to tell if that’s actually the case and what we’re seeing in the “Scott versus” matches is merely an allegorical depiction for how our hyper kinetic hero deals with his inner demons (especially since no one around him seems to realize what a bad-ass their bass-rockin’ friend really is). In spite of that… this is a WHOLE lot of fun, and you can pretty much throw caution to the wind! At times, the movie does indeed drag while waiting for the next adversary to appear; especially near the end where the wear & tear of the high-impact battles gets a little exhausting to watch.
Within this heightened unreality, the characters exist in a uniquely surreal and sugary pop world of their own. The characters’ emotions which are all but reduced to love and heartbreak are contextualized into exaggerated gestures – tears, rage, unbridled glee – like a silent film. The highly superficial character of Scott bares no psychological depth. We learn very little about Scott (except that he doesn’t own a cell phone or understand how to use the internet), and we gain no understanding of his true feelings for Knives or Ramona. With little rhyme nor reason, Scott is just going through the motions as if being controlled by someone standing off-screen playing with a joystick (he even jumps from scene to scene as if time and place are irrelevant) and lucky for Scott, the master of his destiny has mastered the game of life.
After all is said and done, it is sad that this film has yet to get the credit it deserves. Maybe when the DVD comes out it will gain a respectable cult following. As a "geek" I can really appreciate movies like this stroking my inner fanboy, but if the rest of us don't get together and start showing these films some love as whole... they will surely die apart.
No comments:
Post a Comment