Bon Cop/Bad Cop: What makes a good Canadian movie?

Kick-Ass Review: How Kick-Ass can the sequel be?

Sequels can be pretty difficult to pull off. Take a look at films like Back to the Future, The Matrix or Ginger Snaps and you can see that things don’t always work out. Back to the Future 2 was great, The Matrix Reloaded had its issues, and Gingers Snaps 2: Unleashed did well but was handcuffed by a lot of the things that happened in the original film. Superhero sequels can be even worse. Sometimes the original was great and the sequel just can’t measure up. Other times they surpass the original and that makes it difficult for the third film in what ultimately becomes a trilogy.

All you have to do is look at The Dark Knight, Superman 2 or Iron Man 2 for evidence of how things end up. The Dark Knight and Superman 2 were at least better than the original, whereas Iron Man 2 just didn't have what it takes. Of course, part of the reason why Iron Man 2 wasn't what it should be is because it was the backdrop to start setting up The Avengers, and if you read my review you know how I felt about that film. Then you have a film like Kick-Ass, and with the sequel shooting here in Toronto right now, I thought I would take a look back at the original to see where they could go. Kick-Ass was a good film. In an age where superhero films are coming out of the wordwork, Kick-Ass is a commentary on the superhero genre. As a big fan of the superhero genre, I think it was a necessary commentary as well.

To quote a previous blog about the importance of the superhero genre and what they stand for, superheroes are designed to be updated and reinvented for the times they live in. Most of them are not the same as they were when they were created and there are examples of various updates along the way. Superhero films are much the same. They need to examine the world we live in and speak to that. Kick-Ass is the definition of such a film. If you go looking for them, you can find instances where people dressed as superheroes are going around doing work like a realistic superhero would. I can't imagine they do much in the way of actual crime fighting, but they exist. And that is at the heart of a film like Kick-Ass. An every day guy tries to actually make it as a superhero. Unlike the real world versions that are out there, Kick-Ass does in fact do some real crime fighting. There's even a super-villain for them to face but he's a realistic super-villan for today's world.

They use a lot of the traditional building blocks of the genre to tell a new type of story with a very modern angle. It works perfectly for what they are doing because the people involved understand the superhero genre. Mark Millar after all has written for various comic books in the superhero genre and he has been very well received in everything he has done by the fans. So it's no wonder why he is doing so well with his own property. But where does that leave him to go? Can he succeed where many have failed in the past? In interviews he often talks about how he prefers not to do ongoing stories because he gets bored very quickly with them but with this he can see himself doing multiple stories. The sequel then, must be the continuation of that feeling.

Based on the details which have come out regarding Kick-Ass 2, I think he has a lot of room to grow and he might just pull off the second one as well. But that leaves a potential third film becoming ever more perilous. Will he burn out on the second installment and have nowhere to go with the third? Or is he thinking big and held something back for a trilogy? Let's hope he is because I want to see this go well for him and for the actors involved.

How Kick-Ass can the sequel be? It could be really great, but it could also fall flat much like a certain winged avenger from the first film.

Can a family survive the story of Ginger and Rosa?

Family, it can be a bit of a strange thing to deal with. On the one hand they can be the best people to turn to when life gets you down sometimes. That blood relationship is a powerful one and it can be a great comfort in times of horrible stress. However I don’t think anyone would disagree with me if I said that they can also be the source of that stress at times as well. For Ginger and Rosa, family is something of a combination of both in their lives. Against the backdrop of 1960s London England, they don’t have the most traditional kind of family, or at least not by any standards that would have come before such a time in society. Nowadays this type of family dynamic is somewhat common place and as a result there are quite a number of parallels and metaphors to be drawn about today’s world through this look into the past of any uncertain family.

Ultimately, the film is focused on the story of our main characters, Ginger and Rosa. Two young girls who grow up almost like sisters. After all, the film begins with the birth of these girls. Their mothers (played brilliantly by Christina Hendricks and Jodhi May respectively) lying together in the same room as they seem to be in labor at the same time, friends seemingly united against all the odds in a world that is rapidly changing after the devastation and pain of the Second World War. It seems only natural then, that their daughters (played by the young and incredibly talented Elle Fanning and Alice Englert) would grow up united by a common truth and a common pain that through the 1960s, a time of turbulence and upheaval, at least they have each other

Or do they? Sisterhood is not without its difficulties. Particularly as you grow up and you experience new things, the bonds which held you through your childhood become harder to hold onto. These are the types of things that Ginger and Rosa struggle to figure out as time goes by in the film, and this of course is set against the struggles of a world in which the very real truth of ultimate annihilation by nuclear destruction becomes a true possibility. It’s a difficult thing to watch, not because there’s anything in the film that’s particularly gruesome or violent, but because you can see the cracks start to form in these relationships as the story moves along and part of you wishes that you could do something to stop it.

In today’s modern world, these cracks in our family are something that all of us have had to deal with at some point or another. What’s interesting is that, much like Ginger and Rosa and their families, it’s often much easier to see the cracks in someone else when you’re not involved then it is to see your own. As the audience we understand what it is that they are facing and how they could stop it if they only tried to deal with their problems, but in the 1960s it was harder to do that. For all the talk of that time and the repeated insistence of freedom and personal conviction, these guiding principles can also be the thing that tears Ginger and Rosa’s families apart.

Can a family survive the story of Ginger and Rosa? You’ll have to buy a ticket and see, but I have no doubt it will be worth it.