‘Scott Pilgrim’ hits the mark for fanboys
– but no one else
”
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
”
will likely appeal to a very small demographic, but lucky for
the creators of the film the fanboy set is the type who is likely
to see a movie over and over again. Unfortunately, I wasn’t part of
that demographic and I found the quirkiness of the film starting to
grate on my nerves midway through.
‘Scott Pilgrim’ hits the mark for fanboys – but no one else
“Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” will likely appeal to a very small demographic, but lucky for the creators of the film the fanboy set is the type who is likely to see a movie over and over again. Unfortunately, I wasn’t part of that demographic and I found the quirkiness of the film starting to grate on my nerves midway through.
“Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” is based on a graphic novel by Bryan Lee O’Malley. The screenwriters Michael Bacall and Edgar Wright, who also directed the film, try to take that graphic novel to heart by adding elements of it onto the screen. Think words floating through the live-action film, waves of motion coming off the actors as they fight and pink hearts drifting from people’s mouths as they kiss for the first time.
It worked for a while, but then it just got kind of old.
Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera) is a really dorky guy who for some reason still finds girls attracted to him. Perhaps this is the draw of the film for really dorky guys who are really into video games and graphic novels – that maybe they will someday be like Scott Pilgrim so that their videogame fighting abilities translate into real life and they have hot girls in love with them.
Scott Pilgrim had his heart broken a year ago by Natalie, known by her rock star alter ego as Envy Adams (Brie Larson.) He’s out to prove he is over her since he has a new girlfriend, Knives Chau (Ellen Wong.) Scott is 22, as viewers learn from the boxed text that shows up on the screen (like in a graphic novel.) Knives is 17, and a high school student. The funniest moments in the movie are some of the jokes his skeptical friends make about his new girlfriend – they don’t believe he really likes Knives all that much – and they razz him a lot about her being so young. His roommate Wallace (Kieran Culkin) is especially witty when it comes to Scott’s “fake high school girlfriend.”
Soon enough Scott does find himself distracted by another girl, Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead.) Ramona is literally the girl of his dreams, as he dreams about her before he sees her in real life. He finds himself unable to stop thinking about her, and when he sees her at a party, he bumbles his attempt to talk to her. He gathers all the information he can about her from other party guests and friends.
She is American, works for Amazon and may or may not have a boyfriend from New York. We also learn that Scott is perhaps not such an innocent when it comes to relationships, despite his moping about his ex-girlfriend. He has left a trail of broken hearts behind him, though he has lots of excuses for not feeling guilty about any of the things he’s done in the past.
Scott comes up with a reason to meet Ramona again and he badgers her into “hanging out” with him. Soon enough he is wheedling his way into her heart, though it is still lost on me what the ladies see in him. He just has that slight problem of already having a girlfriend.
And then there is the issue of Ramona’s exes. Apparently since she broke it off with her last ex, Gideon, in New York, Gideon decided to form a league of evil exes. In order to date Ramona, the current suitor must defeat all of the exes. Now, if the movie weren’t already quirky enough, this is where things get even quirkier. All the exes have some sort of super human power. The scenes borrow heavily from the world of videogames, including the block letters VS showing up in the middle of the screen between the two opponents. It’s like a fight out of “Mortal Kombat,” as Scott squares off against the first ex. It was funny the first time, but after a couple repetitions it lost the humor for me.
The movie is definitely one that is aimed at the videogame generation. A coworker, who is a decade younger than I am, really liked it and said it was like a blender of pop culture references for his generation. And my sister laughed through the whole movie and said she loved it at the end. She played a lot more videogames than I ever did. She even recognized the music at the very beginning of the movie as the theme from “Zelda.”
As I was describing the movie to another co-worker he asked if it was like watching someone else play a videogame – which we both agreed is really boring – and it was a little bit like that.
