How does one define a film like Scott Pilgrim vs. the World? It such a different film, taking on the tried and tested story of love and discovery, and fills it in-between with surreal humour, lovable characters, strange plot, kinetic and impressive fights, wonderful dialogue and everything that every great films do right.
I already had high expectations for this film considering its director, Edgar Wright, is a man whose previous works I have thoroughly enjoyed. But did it live up to those expectations, hypothetical question mark?
The story…ah, the story, I will try to explain it as best as I can. Not that’s it is a complex and convoluted plot, but that mixed in with its simplicity is bat-shit insanity, which is kind of awesome. The story follows Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera), our protagonist, who is an unemployed, bass guitarist for independent, garage band, Sex Bob-omb (A nerdy reference I unashamedly got). Scott soon begins dating 17 year-old, high schooler Knives Chau (Ellen Wong), much to the protests of his gay roommate, Wallace (Kieran Culkin), his band mates and his younger sister. But then, Scott sees Ramona (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), a girl seen in his dreams, and falls in love with her, because she…was attractive. I’m not entirely sure, it’s almost quite sporadic, and loses interests in Knives. Now you might think "this is just a simplistic story of the love triangle, where’s the insanity?"
Well, during a ‘battle of the bands’ concert, Scott is confronted by Matthew Patel (Satya Bhabha), an ex-boyfriend of Ramona’s, who is a super-powered member of the League of Evil Exes, which contains Patel and six of Ramona’s other exes. Therefore, it is revealed that in order for Scott to date Ramona, he needs to defeat her seven evil exes, and along the way discovers himself and faces his (metaphorical) demons. So it is near enough, a basic video game plot, which isn’t that bad.
So, yeah…..in order for you to kind of understand and enjoy the plot, you need to accept the insanity and the surrealism, which is very humorous; people in the film just accept the unnatural things that happen with cool nonchalance. One hilarious example of this is when Scott defeats Patel who inexplicable turns into a bunch of coins (retro video game reference) and all Scott can comment on is that the resultant coins aren’t enough for a bus fare. It is well-timed jokes like that, which fills this film.
The characters in the film are all so charming, funny and lovable. Many people will say that Scott is a bit of a selfish douche bag, if you’ll pardon the American vernacular, but that is kind of the point; we supposed to see Scott grow into a better person, a person who thinks of other’s feelings, and a person who is more caring and thoughtful. If he was like this at the beginning of the film, then the rest of it would be pointless. Wallace, Scott’s “cool, gay roommate”, was also a well thought-out character; full of enjoyable dry wit and is a positive gay representation. He’s not a flaming, flamboyant, lisping, limp-wrested, vain guy talking to girls and trying to flirt with straight men (although Wallace does do the last thing with great and hilarious success), he’s just gay, so what?
Scott’s band mates are just as lovable, with the optimistic and nervous Stephen (Mark Webber) , the pessimistic and cynical Kim (Alison Pill) and the naïve ‘Young’ Neil (Johnny Simmons).
And Knives Chau is well portrayed as this naive and smitten girl who gets spurned by Scott but blames Ramona.
The least likable character was Ramona. She wasn’t annoying, but didn’t really have any redeeming qualities. People in the film put her on this high pedestal, but I have no idea why; she’s uninteresting and underdeveloped and has a quite swinging personality, from a misanthropic cynic to a hurt flower with need for nurture.
The visual effects were fantastic and enjoyable, reminiscent of retro, fighting games; bright, colourful and kinetic; fast paced, but distinguishable. And the fight scenes were just so kick-ass and hilarious, I totally geek out to every single one, because I knew what they were referencing and, again, they were KICK-ASS.
And that’s Scott Pilgrim vs. the World and it is possibly one of the greatest films of all time. The jokes are spot on, the characters and script are brilliant and, in case I didn’t mention it, it’s KICK-ASS and AWESOME!!! But, unfortunately the box office results for it were quite poor. But hopefully its DVD sales will help and keep encouraging Edgar Wright to always try different things. Go out and buy it now.
I’m Random Internet Critic and I criticise it because ich bin ein Nerd.
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