Kick-Ass 2 (2013) Film Review

It is some time after the first Kick-Ass. Dave (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) has given up his Kick-Ass activities for his girlfriend, but they break up fairly quickly. Mindy (Chloe Grace Moretz) is living with her dad, Detective Marcus Williams (Morris Chestnut) and, after being sprung training with Dave, vows to give up the superhero life. Then a bunch of popular kids shame her and she vows vengeance. Meanwhile, Dave has hooked up with a group of other folks playing at superhero, and Chris D’Amico (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) after accidentally killing his mother in a most magnificent manner, decides that he wants to be the most evil supervillain.

It’s as violent, gory, gross and magnificent, still funny, not quite the charm of the first film, but still worth a look.

Clueless (1995) Film Review

Cher (Alicia Silverstone) is rich, not-the-brightest, great at arguing her position and loves a good project to work on. After successfully setting up lonely teachers Mr Hall (Wallace Shawn) and Miss Geist (Twink Caplan), she is waiting for the next one. Luckily, along comes Tai (Brittany Murphy) a new student whose grunge style deeply offends Cher and her best friend Dee (Stacey Dash).  They make her over and try to set her up with one of the popular guys, but things don’t go to plan. Between this and her home life with her step-brother, Josh (Paul Rudd) hanging around, Cher has a lot on her mind.

I really like this film, and can’t totally explain why. Perhaps it is seeing Turk from Scrubs (Donald Faison) as a young guy. Or it brings back memories from my youth. Certainly, the basic plot is quite strong, but I’m sure that Jane Austen has a lot to do with that, given that the film is based on Emma. It can’t be the acting, because that is really not very good. It’s ok, but Alicia Silverstone spends a lot of time repressing smiles and many of the other actors are extremely over-the-top. Perhaps it is just because it seems that the teenagers are generally nice and innocent and everyone really wants the best for each other. Even the gunman (spoiler alert?) isn’t too scary.