May 6, 2010
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Are Super Hero movies allowed to be treated seriously? To try and make a “serious” movie about a super hero in a costume fighting crime, doesn’t seem like something that’s wanted by the general public. By “serious,” I mean film making that’s usually seen in high drama movies like “The Departed,” “No Country For Old Men,” “Slumdog Millionaire,” or “The Hurt Locker.” Movies that are entertaining to watch, but are still able to make you think about what you just watched by stimulating your mind. It seems to me that people don’t want “to think” too much when watching a Super Hero Movie, and that’s just sad to me. I’m generalizing here of course, but I get this impression that a lot of people just want pure fantasy escapism entertainment with their comic book super hero movies, with just a tiny minimum amount of thought provoking ideas thrown in. You know, cater to the common denomination.
As a long time comic book reader, I’m quite aware that the stories found in those books are a lot more sophisticated than a layman would expect from a “comic” book. I’m talking about stories that can rival any form of story telling media from classic literature to modern art films. The only difference is that some of those stories have people in costumes. However comic books have always been seen as an industry that’s just for kids, and the people who still believe that are happy to stay ignorant about it. Because of that mentality however, they also see movies based on comic books to primarily be just for kids as well. If not directly only for kids, at least the movie has to be simple enough to enjoy. This is a huge travesty to me, as I feel like the genre is not getting the full respect it deserves as a story telling medium.
Here’s a few examples I’d like to point out…
X-Men 2 – Considered an epic tale about individuals fighting to stay alive, but people watched this for the action sequences and not really for a thought provoking story.
Spider-Man 2 – While it has general themes about moral responsibility and what not, it’s still a typical good vs evil story that’s easy to digest.
Iron Man – An action movie that has a theme of redemption and the evils of war, but people associate this movie for being fun to watch a guy in an armored suit blow stuff up!
The Dark Knight – It’s really a crime drama that involves a man in a bat-suit, but it’s still somewhat a typical good vs evil story that’s more or less easy to digest. People actually called this movie “too earnest” for a super hero movie. “Where’s the fun?” they say.
Kick-Ass – Starts off as a satire on super hero movies with touches of realism thrown in (heroes CAN die, internet celebrity, etc…), but in the end devolves into a typical good vs evil battle.
All those movies are undeniably enjoyable to watch, but with the possible exception of “The Dark Knight,” none of them really try and expand on how far a super hero movie can go with it’s story telling. The typical tale of good vs evil that kids can easily digest still reigns supreme. Any sort of analytical mind concerning who the characters are or what the story is trying to say is really not that important for many. People just want to see people beat each other up in a fashionable manner in their ideal super hero movie. I suppose it’s fair to have a preference to that simple entertainment value, but it annoys me when people actually complain when a Super Hero movie actually tries to be more serious for once, as if it wasn’t allowed to.
Which brings me to the movie “Watchmen,” which was very much a non-typical super hero movie. That was a super hero movie that actually treated it’s material seriously, by not relegating itself to just a simple story about good vs evil. The general complaint by many seems to be that it was boring, which might be because these costumed heroes talked too much, and it lacked a lot of action sequences. A sex scene in a super hero movie? A super hero who shows his penis? Graphic violence? Psychological insight to a vigilante? Indictment against politics and war? Moral ambiguity? Relationship melodrama? What’s all these elements doing in a super hero movie? I roll my eyes to those complaints, because here’s a super hero movie that’s not trying to hold your hand on the subject matters, and it’s generally shunned by the public.
* click here to read my previous write up about people’s reactions to Watchmen *So people generally only want fantasy escapism in their super hero movies? I say to them “grow up!” Comic books have grown up, you can too.
