KICK ASS

So, Kick Ass. What can I say...it was an all around good time. Sort of Super Bad meets Super Heroes. If Quentin Tarantino, Kevin Smith, Judd Apatow, and Robert Rodriguez had a movie love child this might be the result. For the unfamiliar, check out the trailer.

It is an ensamble cast but the story revolves mostly around Kick Ass himself and his dreams of being a super hero and getting the girl. Surprisingly I was quite invested in the romantic relationship between Kick Ass and his dream girl Katie (played by the charming Lyndsy Fonseca who HIMYM fans may recognize as Ted's future daughter who appears at the beginning of several episodes.)

But while the RomCom stuff between those 2 is highly enjoyable this is Hit Girl's movie. Played by the young Chloe Moretz She steals every seen she's in as you can see here...

And of course, this being America, people are very uptight and easily offended so this movie, and Hit Girl especially, have created some controversey. Even Australia got squeamish about this one...

"In January 2010, an uncensored preview clip of the film was attacked by family advocacy groups for its display of violence and use of the line "Okay you cunts, let's see what you can do now," delivered by Chloë Moretz, who was 11 at the time of filming. Australian Family Association spokesman John Morrissey claimed that "the language [was] offensive and the values inappropriate – without the saving grace of the bloodless victory of traditional superheroes". In response to the controversy, Moretz stated in an interview, "If I ever uttered one word that I said in Kick-Ass, I would be grounded for years! I'd be stuck in my room until I was 20! I would never in a million years say that. I'm an average, everyday girl." Moretz says she cannot bring herself to say the film's title out loud in interviews, instead calling it "the film" in public and "Kick-Butt" at home. Christopher Mintz-Plasse expressed surprise that people are angry about the language but do not seem to be offended by the many people killed by Hit-Girl."

It's not a movie for little kid's...it's rated R for a reason. So the outcry seems silly. The "saving grace of the bloodless victory of traditional superheroes" doesn't exist in the movie becasue that's not the kind of movie it sets out to be. It's a movie about what would happen if real people tried to be super heroes...sort of. The first time Kick Ass tries to "fight crime" he gets a knife in the gut and almost dies. This isn't Spider-Man so keep the kids at home if you think this isn't for them. It definitely earns it's R rating, which is what makes it so enjoyable. Besides, any movie being protested or surrounded by controversy is just that much better. Case in point...

My favorite part of the whole thing was perhaps somewhat subtle and would go unnoticed by most people I imagine. Nicolas Cage makes a birrliant acting choice with his "Big Daddy voice". It is a spot on impression of Adam West from the 1960's Batman. If you've never seen it check it out below before you go see Kick Ass.

I'm sure people in the theater thought I was crazy when I laughed at everything Big Daddy said but if you are and old school Batman fan you will love it just like me.

My main complaint with the movie was they didn't give Christopher Mintz-Plasse, (aka "McLovin") who plays the "villain" Red Mist, enough to do. I guess it was nice to see him do something a little different this time (HINT HINT Michael Cera) but he was not nearly as funny in this as he has been in Super Bad and Role Models. But it appears there will be a sequel so maybe he will have more time to shine there.

Overall I highly recommend this one. See it in theaters if you can, it's worth it. Rotten Tomatoes has it at 76% and calls it, "Not for the faint of heart, Kick Ass takes the comic adaptation genre to new levels of visual style, bloody violence, and gleeful profanity."

SOYLENT GREEN Review

Just a heads up before we get started. I am not going to attempt to write spoiler free reviews. It's to difficult and I really just don't care. So if you see that I am reviewing a movie/show that you haven't seen and you don't want it spoiled just skip that entry. We good? Cool.

So Soylent Green. For the unfamiliar this 1973 flick stars Charlton Heston in a sort of post apocalyptic world, where he uses guns, and is overtly chauvinistic towards women. So pretty much every Charlton Heston movie ever made. But in case you are interested here is the trailer...

Well....nothing like a nearly 4 minute long trailer to give away the entire plot of the movie. What were they thinking? Did anyone in 1973 who had seen this trailer still not know what Soylent Green was. If the conveyer belt of cadavers and then the cut away to a conveyer belt of Soylent Green "crackers" wasn't enough of a hint they then go as far to show skid steer shovels picking people up and dumping them in the back. They had the potential, I guess, for a Fight Club/Sixth Sense kind of reveal but it didn't turn out that way. But yeah...in case you still can't figure it out, Soylent Green is made of people. But don't take my word for it...watch as Charlton Heston chews the scenery and reveals the not so secret secret of Soylent Green....

Not much else to say about this one. As far as Heston sci-fi flicks go this one ranks well above The Omega Man and far below Planet Of the Apes. That trailer pretty much sums it all up: the future sucks and people unknowingly eat other people...and oh yeah, women are literally equal to furniture...the end.

If you are curious what the professionals have to say,

"SciFi.com film reviewer Tamara Hladik calls the film a “basic, cautionary tale of what could become of humanity physically and spiritually [if humans do not take care of the planet.]". She points out that "there is little in this film that has not been seen in other films", such as the film's depiction of "faceless, oppressive crowds; sheep mentality; the corrosion of the soul, of imagination, [and] of collective memory". While she notes that the director has a "tendency... to overuse Charlton Heston" in scenes depicting this beleaguered, futuristic dystopia, she admits that the film "often succeeds despite [the missteps of] its director."

Hladik argues that the "most powerful moments do not belong to Heston['s]" police detective character Thorn, whom she calls a "dubious, ambiguous hero". Instead, she calls Robinson’s characterization of the aged police researcher Sol Roth the "most moving passages" which give the film "conscience and soul". She acknowledges that the film has "imagery [that] is powerful and haunting", such as the scenes in which riot control vehicles scoop up protesters with metal shovels, as if they were garbage. Her overall impression is that "the profundity of humanity's transformation [in the film] is dealt with in less than a masterful manner"."

Rotten Tomatoes has it at a 71% but I say skip it. If you are really in a Heston kind of mood, stick with Planet of the Apes, The 10 Commandments, or hell even Waynes World 2...

Until next time...

WELCOME WELCOME WELCOME

So my buddy Ryan over at, http://reelrhino.blogspot.com/, (AKA the blog I hope to live up to) has inspired me to start writing my own movie centric blog. I am not a writer I am just a guy with a computer who likes movies and tv a whole lot. I will try to be funny, interesting, and entertaining but I promise nothing. I will try to keep the language PG13, but I am an avid Kevin Smith fan, so again, I promise nothing.

At the very least I hope to write a new entry once a week and hopefully more than that. We'll see how it goes.

I will try and post not only blog reviews but video reviews as well. The goal is to one day get a podcast going with Ryan but that may be pie in the sky, who knows...

You can follow me on facebook, http://tinyurl.com/kid-in-the-helmet, and twitter twitter.com/kidinthehelmet

So stay tuned. Next time I will review SOYLENT GREEN for no other reason than it is the movie I watched most recently.