I can say with all sincerity that I did not expect to be putting this much thought into a movie called Kick-Ass. But then, life is full of surprises.
For those unfamiliar with the plot, the movie is about a nerdy teenager named Dave who decides to become a superhero, because hey, no one else is doing it. So he gets himself a wetsuit and a couple of batons, sets out to fight crime, and promptly gets himself knifed and hit by a car, in rapid succession. Luckily for Dave, things begin to look up once he gets out of the hospital.
While he’s attempting to defend a man against a brutal gang beating, someone films the incident and slaps it on YouTube. Suddenly, Dave (styling himself “Kick-Ass”) is an internet phenomenon, and taking superhero requests via email daily. When the crime he’s fighting becomes increasingly more mob-related and Dave begins to get over his head, he teams up with Hit-Girl and Big Daddy, a father-daughter duo of fellow (albeit much more accomplished) superheroes.
And that’s about it. There’s also a back story about Dave trying to score with the girl of his dreams by pretending he’s gay, but that’s not central to what I want to talk about.
On the one hand, the movie’s ridiculously entertaining. The characters are engaging, the writing is snappy and funny, and there’s a good ol’ moral undertone about standing up and doing the right thing.
On the other hand, um, the “heroes” kill all the bad guys. And not just in self-defense. There is at least one scene where a villain is brutally executed by the so-called good guys, despite the fact that he has cooperated with them and he is helpless to do any more harm. Furthermore, the protagonists seem to actually enjoy disposing of their enemies in this way. Big Daddy in particular makes it clear that his is primarily a mission of vengeance against the crime lord who framed him.
True, Kick-Ass himself doesn’t do all that much killing. He gives the crooks a good beating – and receives one in turn – but he doesn’t kill them. Still, it’s made pretty clear that he admires and even envies Hit-Girl and Big Daddy their ability to slaughter criminals so efficiently, and we the audience are never made to wonder whether his admiration may be misplaced. In the whole movie there is never any moment where the rightness of this brutal style of vigilante justice is questioned.
Am I taking this whole issue too seriously? It’s possible. But I would argue that the movie is not taking the issue seriously enough, dishing up sadistic bloodshed as entertainment, passing it off as morally acceptable (even applaudable), and all the while never breaking the comedic, light-hearted tone. It genuinely bothers me, because there is so much about this movie that I love, and for the first forty-five minutes I had virtually no complaints. (There were some technical flaws later on that annoyed me, but my complaints in that department are comparatively minor.)
I’m glad for a movie that upholds ordinary citizens standing up for what’s right, but if barbaric vigilante executions (and taking pleasure in them) are supposed to be “what’s right,” I can’t in good conscience give the movie credit for any kind of moral backbone.
