Kick Ass - Film review

Kick Ass is the story of a school boy who fantasises about becoming a Super-Hero. Dave Lizewski (played by Aaron Johnson) is an unnoticed high school student and comic book fan who one day decides that New York needs a real life Super-Hero. One day he makes the simple decision to become a super-hero, even though he has no powers or training.

I have to start with answering the obvious question,

Does this movie Kick Ass...?
Hell YES!

Director Matthew Vaughn takes on this overcrowded genre of super heroes and turns it on its head, delivering a film that in my opinion, other comic book adaptations should watch and learn. Now these are bold statements as many comic book/film fans who may read this will no doubt disagree, but for those that are wanting to be entertained for a couple of hours you won't go wrong with this film.

The film has a strong British cast delivering convincing American accents in the lead roles which provides what many films get wrong, a sense of "believability" in the characters. Actor, Aaron Johnson (character Dave Lizewski/Kick-Ass) truly delivers as our main character and is one to watch out for in future films. Surprisingly Nicholas Cage held his own and wasn't nearly as annoying as he usually is and finally Mark Strong as our mafia boss bad guy, didn't disappoint.

The only negative I would give is that the director didn't give the film an individual flare as the action scenes looked like they were taken straight from a Tarantino movie but let’s face it, that's not a bad thing at all. With lots of action sequences that provide plenty of blood and gore, it stands out from other films in a similar genre.

To summarise, I can say that leaving the cinema I felt something I haven’t in ages, I had fun!

Dear John - Film review

After receiving a call from my fellow film reviewer about seeing the film "Dear John" in Leicester square last night (30.03.2010) I got excited about the fact that my first film review will be about a film that has not yet been released in the UK cinemas. Sitting through the film I started to think to myself how am I going to write any positives about "Dear John".

Dear John is a romantic drama about a young soldier who is on a two
 week leave from the Special Forces (Channing Tatum) who falls in love with Savannah (Amanda Seyfried). Both John and Savannah quickly fall in love only to confront the realism of John having to return to the army. They keep their love alive by writing to each other but only to find that the biggest test is to hold onto their love for each other.

After half an hour of watching the film, I have to be honest, I couldn't care less about the characters. Everything seemed to happen quite fast and before I knew it they were in love, had a fight and were in love again. Although I was watching the two "up and coming" Hollywood stars of tomorrow, I couldn't help but think that the roles would have suited different actors.

Having decided the story, acting and overall feel of the film wasn't working for me, I tried and look for anything that might. There really wasn't anything.

Maybe I am being a little too harsh on the film because I know there will be millions of women who may disagree with me and fall for the standard love format in film that everybody knows so well.

To sum this up, imagine the lead actor from the TV show the O.C and stick him into the setting of Dawson's Creek, take away the fancy use of words and you have "Dear John".

After the film had finished there was a Q& A session about the film. Both Channing Tatum and Amanda Seyfried both said "We had so much fun goofing around on set, that when the director called action we found it hard to get into character". To me this sums up the entire feel of the film.