While my classmates scampered about carving their bodies into statuesque chiseled granite, or becoming young virtuosos, or getting their proverbial
Tortoise and the hare, my friends.
Case in point, I was lucky enough to have a friend who got some premier tickets for Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World. Rest assured, it was the first "some" that either of us "got" in a very long time.
So, is it any good?
Well, let me preface this review by mentioning I never read the comic series off of which the movie was based, and I liked it. My buddy did read the comic and he also liked it.
Thank you for reading.
For those of you
So dreamy...
Amidst his lukewarm courtship of Knives, Scott Pilgrim meets the girl of his dreams: Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead). Literally. As in, this exact girl was the focal point of one of his dreams. Scott Pilgrim manages to muster the monumental balls necessary to take a shot at Ramona and ends up finding her favor, and dumps Knives. In exactly that chronological order.
Things get even more complicated when all this coincides with the battle of the bands competition in which Scott Pilgrim's and his friends Kim Pine's (Alison Pill) and Mark Webber's (Stephen Stills) band, Sex Bob-omb, are scheduled to play. And it gets even more complicated still when Ramona Flowers' evil exes emerge from the shadows of her past to do battle with the new guy. Also, their world is kind of like a video game/comic book.
As you can see, there's a lot going on. Not that that's a bad thing.
But in this case, it kind of is.
The Scott Pilgrim comic series unfolds over six self-contained, full-length graphic novels. It's a monolithic breadth of content director Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz) decided to tackle in making Scott Pilgrim a 112-minute, stand-alone feature. And that's exactly where the problems start.
The whole movie is spread entirely too thin. The beginning of the movie, especially, skips from scene to scene like a sugar-junkie playing hopscotch on a pogo stick (check out that analogy, huh? Yep, I've still got it). Not only is it disjointing for the audience as Scott Pilgrim seemingly phases in and out of the first 20 minutes like flipping through pages of a comic book, it seems to even throw Scott. I was seriously concerned for our protagonist as he flashed from one scene to the next wondering how the hell he got there like he was the main character from Memento or something.
Things settle down a bit as Scott Pilgrim wades through the seven-mannnnn? (you'll see) gauntlet and the movie starts to find a comfortable groove. Too comfortable, in fact. Unfortunately, the script, cinematography, and direction never really manage to strike a suitable balance between fast-paced, Ritalin-fueled, smash-mouth movie-making and managing a cohesive narrative. At its best, Scott Pilgrim manages to be the awesomest parts of Moulin Rouge and the Wachowski brothers' Speed Racer. At its worst, it manages to be like the other 180 combined minutes of Moulin Rouge and Speed Racer.
At it's heart, Scott Pilgrim is a rom-com. A rom-com targeted at a much different demographic from the usual rom-com, but a rom-com all the same. Rom-com. As a comedy, I've got no complaints; plenty of belly-laughs to be had by even the non-Nintendo generation. But as a romance, I don't buy it. Like I said before, it seems like writers Edgar Wright and Michael Bacall were trying to pack so much content into every scene, and stay so true to the comics (for the most part), that it seemed like by the time they got around to actually writing a convincing love story, there was no ink left in the Bic.
Watching Scott Pilgrim and Ramona Flowers interact, I just don't buy that they're in love--or even in like--with each other. With the exception of a single scene, there never seems to be any chemistry between these two at all, and by the start of the third act, I had to wonder--like the titular (and title) character--why he's even bothering with the romantic royal rumble at all.
Scott Pilgrim certainly peaks early--in fact, of the five (ehhhhhhhhhhh... six?) major fight scenes, the first was by far my favorite, because it seemed to best capture what I had hoped the movie would settle into: a musical, fighting-game inspired, thrill-ride. And it was a thrill-ride, to be sure. But, like a rollercoaster, the biggest and best plunge was at the beginning.
I shouldn't be harsh, though. Like I said, I liked it. Like a NASCAR race, for all the crashes, there's still a lot going right. Wait let me check Wikipedia and make sure that's correct shit they actually turn left God dammit okay hold on wait okay: like a NASCAR, it's only tolerable if you're drunk and can hit your wife no wait. Okay, like the NFL, it's more fun to watch than NASCAR.
Scott Pilgrim sports a very, very unique visual style. It actually feels like you're watching a video game or reading a comic, and that's something that absolutely no other movie with this sort of source material has ever really accurately pulled off.
With one exception...
Every scene engages the viewer, because there's always something new. Every frame of this movie is fun to look at. Every single God damn fr-
In a day and age where most movies--and especially games--are all the same puke-brown and gun-metal gray, it's nice to actually see a little (a lot of) color splashed up on the screen. After some initial hiccups with the scene direction and editing, the film settles down into a very flashy style with a lot of punch. Scriptwriters Bacall and Wright clearly had a lot of fun cramming jokes (and fighting game references) into every nook and cranny of this script, and there's great pains taken to make sure the sight gags hit perfectly (see if you can spot the hidden Street Fighter 4 reference; it's my favorite). I'm sure a lot of critics will contend that Scott Pilgrim is a lot of flash with little in the way of content, but this is a movie that gains a lot of its substance from its style; the director is almost as much of a character as Scott and friends.
And while I didn't really buy the romance angle between Scott and Ramona--I know, I know, it's the entire plot of the movie--believe me when I say that there's real chemistry between the characters. A movie shot like Scott Pilgrim insists a lot upon its actors: believe in these silly people, this silly script, and this silly world every second you're on-screen. That's a lot to ask, especially when each scene is so radically different from the last. If any of the cast phoned it in, this entire movie would collapse on itself. With something this wild, there's no room for anyone to play tame, and no one ever does. Even when our characters blow each other off, or act selfish, or do something stupid, like two people hugging in marshmallow fluff, there's a lot of sweetness between them.
For as much fun as Scott and friends seem to have keeping pace with the film, it's really the evil exes who steal the show. They're all unbelievably funny and have a ton of great lines, in spite of the relatively short screen-time afforded to them. Each showdown crackles with its own unique brand of energy, like coal, steam, nuclear, or two-headed dragon sprouting from a synthesizer and doing battle with a gorilla monster controlled by a bass guitar. That's not a metaphor, that's actually a fight scene. That really actually happens, and by the time it does, you've seen so much wacky shit that you can just go with it. The fight scenes are all very well done and completely distinct, keeping things from getting too repetitive, which I think is the mark of a really good action movie. There are a couple cheap cop-out endings to a few of the fights, but even then, they all manage to end on such a high-note that it's not even worth complaining about.
What I will say is that the final fight scene was actually a bit of a disappointment, and was characteristic of the movie's main fault: 90 minutes in, you've already seen everything. By the time the climax rolls around, it feels a bit like a "best of" rather than another creative addition to the robust catalog of styles and settings. That said, the action still finds harmony between cartoony and visceral without ever wearing out its welcome.
The soundtrack does a lot to make every scene--particularly the fight scenes--memorable and entertaining. Scott Pilgrim is as much about the visual style and video game references as it is about the music, and this film got the soundtrack it deserved. Each battle is set to its own pulsing rock score that gives every crushing blow the appropriate intensity. Scott Pilgrim is proud of its soundtrack, perhaps to a fault, as there are more than a couple occasions I can think of where it actually drowns out the dialog. Oops.
In conclusion: go see Scott Pilgrim. It's opening today, and you will not be disappointed. Or you will be disappointed, but you'll still have financially supported a part of what I hope is a new wave of fun, creative, imaginative films hitting theaters this year (Kick-Ass, Inception, Repo Men). And hell, it even inspired me to pick up the comics and give 'em a read. Even if you don't like it (you will), it's still a great moviegoing experience, and you're sure to have never seen anything else like it.
Until my Moulin Rouge Vs. Speed Racer mash-up is finished, anyway.
No comments:
Post a Comment