Closer to "20 years ago" now than I care to admit, I was a struggling baby screenwriter in a meeting with people who were way beyond me in success and experience and connections. And I was digging in my heels over the idea of turning the villain of my script into the hero's mother, because then our climax would be a 25-year-old guy beating the living crap out of a middle-aged woman. I was certain any reviewer would crucify us and any audience would turn against us.
Closer to "20 years later" than I care to admit, I put Kick-Ass in the DVD player, sat down on the couch with my wife, and watched an 11-year-old girl ("Hit Girl") on a bloody, mass murdering rampage and a climax that featured a middle-aged thug beating the living crap out of the same 11-year-old girl.
Suddenly, that long-ago argument about where to draw the line seems downright quaint. And I have never felt so old.
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Why Kick-Ass Makes Me Feel Like a Geezer
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5 comments:
Have you read the comic? I'll bring it over for you to borrow if you have not. It's a better example of deconstructing the genre then the film. Though the film is more fun.
And neither comes close to Watchmen
Yeah... I felt the same. It couldn't have been made even seven years ago.... But it was funnier than hell!
And Nic Cage's best role by far in the last ten years at least!
PS. What screenplays have you had successfully brought to the screen? I want to know so I can use my long-ago atrophied skills garnered from my Radio Video Film BA to deconstruct and mock your work!!! :-)
Ryan,
Haven't read the comic, but I can see "Hit Girl" working much better in that format. Maybe this was one that should have stayed a comic.
Sonic,
I actually really enjoyed the first 30 or 40 minutes -- right up until Hit Girl's first bloody rampage. The movie was lost to me from that point on. Even stuff I knew I should be laughing at, I just couldn't.
I never got out of development hell, by the way (hence the "semi-successful" beneath the blog title!). But somehow, I think *your* mockery and deconstruction would be a lot more fun than what I got at the time! :-)
Hey, if you're going to do "mockery and deconstruction", you might as well make it fun!!!! :-)
Wes, your comment brings me back to my college days. For whatever reason, my spelling has never been my strong suit. Back then, few students had computers or access to them. So most of us still used a typewriter to print our papers... In other words... No spell check. One of my instructors handed a graded paper back to me and said "your spelling is atrocious; you need to make a dictionary your best friend!". If that would have been followed by a nicer comment such as "I like your writing style, but..", maybe that would have encouraged me to work harder on it at the time. But all she did was piss me off and make me not want to write at all!
It wasn't until I decided to get my teaching credential in history that I became motivated to work on that. I still goof up (almost misspelled "atrocious" a moment ago), as anointed Sonicfrog.net spell checker Jeff A can attest, but over the last six years of blogging, it's "deffinitely" gotten much better!
The most fun I've ever had with "mockery and deconstruction" is still my fourth post, back when I was just starting this blog:
http://inmycopiousfreetime.blogspot.com/2008/11/bonekickers.html
I remember learning to type on a manual typewriter, too -- and having to use white-out to correct all my spelling mistakes. Ugh.
Saw an exhibit at the LA Art Walk last week that actually included an old manual typewriter, by the way. Was a lot of fun watching some of the younger people trying to figure out what it was!
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