Friday, October 29, 2010

2010 - SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD, aging hipster loses the light

Didn't laugh once and thank god for 2nd run theater prices.  Anyway you look at it, not so great.

A geek hipster 21st century love story with lots of overloaded visuals.  Looks like cool guy director Edgar Wright is getting a little to old to make this kind of film. 


After Spaced, Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, a lot of people probably felt Edgar Wright had a pulse on comedic geek coolness.  Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World  proves that all of Wright's visual tricks mask an unpleasant and empty film really lacking in ideas.


This film is Wright's  tribute to  ideo games, but the film also borrows plenty from other TV shows and films.  Forbidden Planet, Seinfeld and in particular the old Adam West Batman TV show which also used graphics and weird camera angles to put a comic book on screen.


Wright completely blew it with the casting of his two main leads.  Michael Cera has been criticized for pretty much giving the same performance from film to film, have to agree with that.  Mary
Elizabeth Winstead as his girlfriend Ramona Flowers makes absolutely no impression as a meta chick.  Their lack of chemistry as a couple finally kills the film.  I could get behind all the razzle dazzle stuff if the characters were interesting but these two have nothing going on.

 
Edgar Wright seems like a smart guy, he knows a lot about film, but he has wasted 5 years of his life on this piece of crap.  Richard Lester the cool guy director of A Hard Day's Night, another hip and much better film retired because he felt he was no longer in touch with contemporary culture, looks like Wright might have the same problem.

112 very pointless minutes. Written by Michael Bacall and Edgar Wright.

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