Scott Pilgrim Vs The World

Edgar Wright's new film is his first one that takes a very conscious step away from his British roots and toward the Atlantic. Scott Pilgrim is not a Hollywood film, though its main actors are American. In fact it takes a great deal of effort to align itself with Canada by being based in Toronto and including many references to the boom in films made in Canada ("They make films in Vancouver"). This focus on Canada might perhaps be an indirect way of informing us the last thing we will be watching is a formulaic slice of Hollywood. Perhaps it is also a way for Wright to indicate the last thing he intends on doing with Scott Pilgrim Vs The World is selling out (to use a cliché) while watering down his individual talent. In fact Scott Pilgrim Vs The World shows Wright developing his talent. Where his first two films, for all the merit, felt like continuations on a theme in a Spaced world Scott Pilgrim feels like a complete fresh approach from the director. Deciding to break away from Simon Pegg and company for the new film and adopt Michael Cera and company in their place pays great dividends, showing that Edgar Wright is much more than a mere collaborator for Pegg. We can all look forward to the final part of what is termed by Pegg, Wright and others as the Ice Cream Trilogy. The, perhaps surprising, news is that Scott Pilgrim Vs The World is better than Hot Fuzz and Shaun of The Dead. In fact Scott Pilgrim is one of the very best films we have had this year and certainly one of the most unique.

Michael Cera has never been better and fills the title role with charm, confidence and vulnerability, not an easy combination it should be noted. Kieran Culkin is also a revelation taking on the role of Pilgrims gay flat mate with gusto and he goes well beyond in showing that his starring role in 2002's excellent Igby Goes Down was no fluke. Is it just me or does Culkin look exactly like I imagine Holden Caulfield to look like were he real (minus the grey silvery patch of hair)? Acting aside the source of real merit in the film comes from the two main areas. The script adapted from the comic book, which I cannot say I have read, is witty and clever without being smug or indulgent and genuinely touching without being reductive or sentimental. There is more than a touch of the old Spaced humour present, I found it to be most welcome and it feels somehow incredibly fresh when executed by this young troupe of actors. It manages to weave together a type of hyper unreality and mundane reality to great effect while still faithfully managing to suspend belief in the narrative. Of course all this work on a great script with some sharp one liners would be wasted if the film making went on to be a mess. To be honest this is what I feared about Scott Pilgrim Vs The World the most, that it would be a self indulgent mess with a director at the helm keen to show his colours to the audience, kind of an over eager peacock syndrome. Tim Burton engaged in this to detrimental effect with his misjudged remake of Charlie and The Chocolate Factory, the song set pieces with abundant CGI proving conclusively that more is not necessarily better. Tarantino fell victim to this peacock syndrome as well with the absurdly bloated Kill Bill which seemed so concerned with style that the rizla thin narrative seemed to just blow away. One of the few to succeed in using highly stylized film making to the advantage of the narrative was Darren Aronofsky with the traumatic Requiem For A Dream. Then Aronofsky went and fell victim to peacock syndrome with The Fountain before ultimately regaining his footing with the sparse The Wrestler. Scott Pilgrim is a world away from the work of Aronofsky of course, it never takes itself terribly seriously but this is one of the reasons the film is so successful. That painstaking work has gone into post production, right down to the editing which uses a vast array of styles to draw us emotionally in is clear. Part of what makes this work so successful and seamless is that Pilgrim is a film with music at its very heart and good music it is too. Nigel Godrich is the producer of all original music and the genre hopping Beck is behind many of the original songs. From the title sequence onwards we are led into an intriguing world that mixes music with video games / video game culture along with a romance that never feels contrived. The romance is also never idealized, tempered with a kind of Woody Allen neurosis and balanced with comedy which disdains the easy laugh. It will prove to be too much for some of the young audience it is aimed toward, not a film that you can go to and actively switch your brain off, letting the film do all the predictable work. For those that give undivided attention though it will more than reward. It is a bold piece of work by Edgar Wright which as a comic book film compares most closely to The Watchmen but then proceeds to better it in every single way - which is no mean feat. Who would have thought that Edgar Wright after Hot Fuzz would be presiding over a film that is not only progressive in the literal sense but also takes delight in smartly smashing conventions with aplomb. It also stands alone as a film which instead of adapting video game culture incorporates it thereby creating a new beast which is as elegant as it is purely entertaining. In short a real unmitigated treat which in all its sheer joy and effervescence is very hard to resist. Can be seen to be running laps around the clever but po faced critical darling Inception - which I only mention in passing to emphasize what a superior piece of cinema we are dealing with.

State Of The Arts - The Three Dimension boom - HBO's sheer quality and Other Side Dishes.

Being at once a lazy man and a committed film pirate (thankyou Piratebay) It has taken me sometime to come around to seeing one of the new in vogue 3d films that are now seemingly in production everywhere. Toy Story 3 was oddly enough the film that caused me to pay what is now ten pounds to go the cinema and don the quite attractive looking new 3d glasses. I had time for Toy Story 3 - although I thought a similar narrative had been done elsewhere and arguably better by Finding Nemo (and they only needed two dimensions). So Toy Story 3 was a solid piece of intelligent animation that we have come to expect from Pixar but did it need the novelty of 3d? Well, no, it did not and you suspect the only reason they had it in three dimensions is just because it was the third film in this series. If they add a dimension each time we should certainly be expecting big things of Toy Story 6, although the potential for it regressing into a bad acid trip is certainly present. A good film, not the best pixar film but you feel the 3d is just tacked on, nothing seems built especially for the technology. The same cannot be said for Piranha 3d. Aja who was such a promising horror film director with the remake of The Hills Have Eyes (which I felt was superior to at -the-time Rookie Wes Craven's original) goes for high camp along with high gore. Its disappointing because it is a one note film and while I kind of admire the fact that Aja writes himself into the history books by providing the first 3d severed cgi penis the film is a let down. Much of the problem is that contrary to Toy Story 3, Piranha is a complete slave to the technology. Its fun at first and the opening sequence which is a great homage to the terrific Jaws has Richard Dreyfuss sucked into a whirlpool on his boat before meeting a grisly demise, The 3d works great here, providing a real feeling of going down a plughole. The Jaws references don't let up there either, The musician friend I saw it with who is obsessed with Jaws counted many other knowing in jokes. A big notable one is the use of the famous zoom in - out shot of Shnieder on the beach which has the disorientating effect of flattening the picture (Easy to forget how fantastic Spielberg was at this point - a rival to Kubrick in terms of film making genius. Pity the fact that he blew it and seemingly invited the studios to interpret his work). Piranha is not a long film at under 90 mins but it certainly feels it toward the end as the film relies on sheer wow and gross out factor to the detriment of characters and narrative. A lot of people get eaten but its impossible to give a monkeys and we see the Piranha so often that they become entirely devoid of any excitement or thrills. The references to Jaws reflect very badly in the end as where that film played on tension and music to genuinely make people scared to go in the water, Piranha just manages to illustrate how absurd the whole thing is. Additionally the whole film is screaming out for a character even a third as compelling as Quint. In conclusion its a disappointment, more so as its come from Aja - who seems just to be content to take the pay check for this one. The film is just overpowered by the sledgehammer comedy and Camp quotient, so much so that you start to wonder how cynical a move this is by Aja. Well its sure to be a box office hit for the 3d sequences alone - we can only hope Aja uses his ill gotten gains for the next project he actually wants to make a mark with. I also caught Knight and Day and Grown Ups recently but won't waste space on them. Both can be summed up as incredibly indulgent films with a big star behind them (Cruise and Sandler respectively). Both films are essentially glossy vanity projects. At least Knight and Day seems to hold some hope at the start aiming for Romancing the Stone / Emerald Isle territory, before it falls apart under a weak script that just does enough, barely, to keep the whole thing on rails. Pity no one actually bothered to write an ending of any quality whatsoever. Grown Ups is very bad stuff though indeed and means the Jury is still out on Adam Sandler. He can be funny and and he also has range, of that there is no doubt and Punch Drunk Love proves it. Grown Ups though is only marginally better than the excremental Remote Control (which I doubly hated because it slurred Walkens fine name). Sentimental, Crass and stuffed with jokes about peeing Grown Ups is really a film for cow people. People with the brains of cows. It will probably be very popular but it is the epitome of manufactured tat and its disheartening that Sandler felt the need to not only do it but do it with such a uniformly fine cast - wasting them and staining them at the same time.

Cinema output of late has definitely had its real stinkers. Alexander Payne remains quiet since Sideways unfortunetly and Paul Anderson hasn't done anything since the incredible There Will Be Blood. Taking this into account it is at least good to know HBO are turning out high quality series that look more and more like fully fledged and very long feature films. The Sopranos and the Wire may have finished and are missed. I still resent HBO for axing Deadwood in its prime as well. There cannot be any argument though that the new kid on the block is True Blood by Alan Ball and what a witty, violent, sexy, intelligent show it is. The third season is seeing its influence and viewing figures grow - everthing in the show is excellent in truth but Dennis O'Hare as the charismatic and deadly Vampire King of Mississippi is a revelation. It is surely the edgiest thing on television anywhere at the moment?

HBO are also still running the Payne co-produced Hung with the adorable Anne Heche. It seems to have been cut though to half hour episodes for the second season. Or perhaps it was always half an hour, the point is it always leaves you wanting more. It has a definite American Beauty flavour to it and the cast and writing is consistently fantastic.

Scott Pilgrim will be my next port of call. I like Michael Cera very much - he seemed to turn his best performance as of yet in Youth In Revolt but I have reservations about Pilgrim. Perhaps its because I am wary of overly stylized work - Aaronovsky can do it well enough in Requiem For a Dream but as in Tarantinos hands in Kill Bill it can become grating and terribly showoffy. Perhaps its due to me not having any knowledge of the rated comic book. All reviews have been uniformly excellent so far - I do hope its not down to the recent dearth of quality mainstream cinema. I will go with an open mind and report back my findings in due course.