Kick Arse

So my weekly column got hijacked. I was ready to talk about self-publishing when a friend of mine said, “I saw the trailer to Kick Ass. I didn’t know that it was a comic book until I saw the report on the news.” The news report wasn’t about the excitement of the build up to the movie or about the fact that the comic was a non-traditional superhero book. The news report was about how one of the main characters, an 11-year-old female character, uses the C-bomb and is brutally violent throughout the film. Have movies gone too far? Is this sending the wrong message to younger viewers? Is this harmful to actress that plays the character? I was both bemused and amused.

Young characters portraying characters that act older than their biological age. Jodi Foster as a prostitute in Taxi Driver is probably best example of a character that acted in a controversial way that was older than her real age. While I can’t really comment about the how the Taxi Driver was reviewed or reported on back in its day, I can tell you that aside from being tangentially linked the man who shot President Reagan through his obsession with the movie, Jodi Foster left that movie untouched. I don’t think that there were a lot of kids sneaking into the theater because they wanted to be like Jodi Foster or starting careers as prostitutes because of the film’s influence. I think that the main difference between Taxi Driver and Kick Ass though is the way that the film was likely marketed.

Lately, there has been an upsurge of comic book related R-rated movies. I don’t think that’s a bad thing. If you have a story that is violent and shouldn’t been shown to kids, then there is no use “watering it down”. Films like Wanted, Watchmen and Kick-Ass were never meant to be seen by kids or even teenagers. They were made for adults and should be seen by adults. The thing that drives me nuts though is that they don’t market the films for adults. They market it like the films like they are the next X-men or Batman film and every kid watching the trailer wants to go see it. Based upon what is shown in the trailer, what parent wouldn’t consider taking their kid because after all it looks like the X-men or Batman film that they just saw not long ago. The problem is that Wanted isn’t just about Angelina Jolie riding around in fast cars. Watchmen is more of a detective movie than a superhero movie with a male character that walks around naked throughout the whole film. You won’t see that in the trailer. Kick-Ass has all of the ultra violence of Wanted plus a ton of F-Bombs and the already mentioned C-Bomb. I know they won’t, but I’d really like to advertise these films correctly, but it would involve bleeping the curse words and blurring the extreme violence like they do on the news, but in a movie trailer. At least, a moviegoer would know what they are really walking into.

The real thing I want to see though is more variety. For every comic book adaptation of Whiteout, we get three films like Kick-Ass. I’m excited to see Scott Pilgrim Saves the World come out, but there are so many great comic books that cross so many genres that could be made. An animated version of Art Spigelman’s Maus. Craig Thompson’s Blankets the Movie. Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba’s Umbrella Academy. There is a wealth of great comic book material out there to mine. Unfortunately, movie companies follow the cash flow and despite being inappropriately advertised (or because of it) these ultraviolet mature themed comic book movies have been able to successfully garner movie deals for other comic book properties that are like them. The latest news this morning is that Garth Ennis’s Crossed is going to be made into a movie. I can’t wait to see the news get a hold of that one.

Shawn Demumbrum
SpazDog Comics
www.spazdogcomics.com
SpazDog Press
www.spazdogpress.com

Email: shawn@spazdogcomics.com
Twitter: www.twitter.com/SpazDog
WebComics Articles: http://www.examiner.com/x-10892-Web-Comics-ExaminerDi