Director: Edgar Wright
Cast: Michael Cera, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Kieran Culkin, Chris Evans
Have I Seen it Before: Oh, sure.
Did I Like It: There are two forces at work here in the film. The first is the creative force of Edgar Wright at the height of his cinematic inventiveness, amidst a Hollywood system that would still allow him to let loose those talents. He comes here as close as anyone will to translating any kind of non-superhero comic directly to the screen. The influences seep in through every moment of the film, from the 8-bit tweak to the Universal logo, to the floating tiles, all the way to using the coins that appear after defeating an enemy for the bus. One would have been forgiven for assuming a property like Scott Pilgrim was never going to be adapted with any kind of faithfulness, but we were all* pleasantly surprises.
What’s more, I wondered if Wright’s magic could be implemented outside of his collaboration with Simon Pegg, but I was pleasantly surprised, just as I continue to be.
Then there’s the matter of the material itself. Enjoyable, yes. But how much can we root for a hero like Scott Pilgrim? He’s insensitive to the point of psychopathy. He’s just barely on the right side of some statutory stuff for most of the film. His grand catharsis doesn’t really make him much of a better person, it just makes him slightly less of an asshole, no matter how many special swords he might get for his efforts.
It’s almost as if the film is more about the characters surrounding Scott than Scott himself. Some might complain that makes the story about a callow jerk, and refuse to engage with it.
I’m not bothered by those problems.
*At least, those of us who knew what we were doing and watched it during its theatrical run.