03-29-2015, 11:31 PM
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010) by Edgar Wright
I dreaded sitting down to watch this one. Sure, it’s on the 366weirdmovies list; but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s my cup of tea (recent misfires were Barton Fink and A Serious Man). Then there's all the negative sentiment here on DOOM towards Michael Cera. In fact, I’m not a big fan of his either. Finally, basing a movie on a video game doesn’t exactly give me goosebumps.
But I'll step out in front of the firing squad and say it; Michael Cera was born to play this part, and it’s a great part. As for the movie itself, it’s intensely inventive, the dialog is very witty (I laughed out loud a few times, was smiling at the cleverness through much of it), and the characters work surprisingly well.
That being said, the movie did get long in the tooth. Scott Pilgrim must battle the seven ex-lovers of his new girlfriend, and this leads to action sequences that, despite their inventiveness, begin to feel repetitive. The early fight sequences are top quality, making this film worthy of a Kungfumagazine.com review (discussed in earlier posts). Michael Cera appears to be doing all his own fighting, though clearly some topnotch stuntman was doing it, with Cera’s face (and perhaps body?) superimposed in post. Still, very impressive. As for the later battles, those were so CGI-tainted as to lose all drama.
What is with this affliction? Why do directors or producers -- Asian and Hollywood alike -- think that CGI is the way to scale up the later fights? It just takes all the life out of the characters. Grrr.
The film has a short Bollywood number, and there’s a gay roommate who steals a number of scenes in what I felt was a funny, non-cliched and positive-role-model sort of way. The DVD extras include an alternate ending that I slightly preferred, though the scriptwriter really needed to think things through, kick around the possibilities, and come up with something even better.
In summary, a very energetic and inventive film full of interesting characters, with lots of laughs, but loses considerable steam in the later CGI-infected stages.
I dreaded sitting down to watch this one. Sure, it’s on the 366weirdmovies list; but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s my cup of tea (recent misfires were Barton Fink and A Serious Man). Then there's all the negative sentiment here on DOOM towards Michael Cera. In fact, I’m not a big fan of his either. Finally, basing a movie on a video game doesn’t exactly give me goosebumps.
But I'll step out in front of the firing squad and say it; Michael Cera was born to play this part, and it’s a great part. As for the movie itself, it’s intensely inventive, the dialog is very witty (I laughed out loud a few times, was smiling at the cleverness through much of it), and the characters work surprisingly well.
That being said, the movie did get long in the tooth. Scott Pilgrim must battle the seven ex-lovers of his new girlfriend, and this leads to action sequences that, despite their inventiveness, begin to feel repetitive. The early fight sequences are top quality, making this film worthy of a Kungfumagazine.com review (discussed in earlier posts). Michael Cera appears to be doing all his own fighting, though clearly some topnotch stuntman was doing it, with Cera’s face (and perhaps body?) superimposed in post. Still, very impressive. As for the later battles, those were so CGI-tainted as to lose all drama.
What is with this affliction? Why do directors or producers -- Asian and Hollywood alike -- think that CGI is the way to scale up the later fights? It just takes all the life out of the characters. Grrr.
The film has a short Bollywood number, and there’s a gay roommate who steals a number of scenes in what I felt was a funny, non-cliched and positive-role-model sort of way. The DVD extras include an alternate ending that I slightly preferred, though the scriptwriter really needed to think things through, kick around the possibilities, and come up with something even better.
In summary, a very energetic and inventive film full of interesting characters, with lots of laughs, but loses considerable steam in the later CGI-infected stages.