Along with half of the owners of a “I <3 Haters” t-shirts, I attended the midnight showing of Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World. I have a review of it coming up (with my buddy Alex, again!) but before that, let me say a few things. Can I? Thanks. Bee Tee Dubs, it doesn’t matter if you would have let me or not. I’m writes the blog, I makes the decisions. Mmm, power.
Fun fact: I read all 6 Scott Pilgrim graphic novels in about 6 and 1/2 hours. Maybe not impressive, but damn was I determined to know the entire Scott Pilgrim universe before I watched the movie. I fell in love. It’s such an incredible concept. A world where street-fighter type fighting is normal, music can be seen as it’s played and video-game references are almost replaced with curse words with how frequently they are used. Not to mention the characters are super fun to follow.
The movie nailed it. And it’s easy to tell because the movie has such a weird/different feel to it. There’s never been a movie quite like this. In the theater, I looked around and some people didn’t know how to accept what they were watching. Quick transitions from scene-to-scene, dialogue about sub-space highways that go through the minds of other people and pretty much anything else going on during the movie. Some accepted it in a great way: laughing, smiling, even clapping! A few others were frozen, just staring at the screen.
I know a lot of the stories for the past few days on Chud.com have been about Scott Pilgrim. People are complaining. Biased, they say. Favoritism, they scream. Here’s what I’m really happy about though: Due to the release date of the movie being TODAY, chances are that these people have not seen Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World yet. Which completely explains why they are upset. We’ve seen it, they haven’t. So of course, they are confused as to why we, as a writing staff for cinema, are incredibly excited for this film to exist. It’s completely a generation-defining piece of cinema. It defines gamers, slackers, lovers, teens as a generation. This is OUR movie.
Don’t get me wrong, I love this movie. LOVE it. But this will bomb in theaters. In a just world, Scott Pilgrim would take over theaters and we’d see merchandise everywhere for it. But sadly, this won’t be the case. Most people aren’t prepared for a film like this. It’s an A.D.D film (staying true to the video-game formula) about love for music and gaming and how when filled with desire, any person can do anything they want. Scott can get his band to perform at large venues, get the girl of his dreams (literally) and battle 7 evil ex’s.
Being such a fan of the graphic novel series, I’m probably biased of the movie. But to be honest, it was jaw-dropping how good of a job Edgar Wright did transferring the book into film. Sure, things were left out and the ending is different. It had to be. But the characters, the fights, THE FEEL. God, the feel. It felt exactly the way the novels do. I was smiling throughout the whole movie. Not because of the films humor or heart, but because I was seeing some of my favorite characters born again on screen.
I’ve already started reviewing this movie during this blog, so I’ll stop myself from saying more. Bottom-line: Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World is the movie we’ll be watching at independent theaters 10 years from now. 20 years from now. It’s a defining movie and if you love anything about culture, make your way to a theater now and experience Scott Pilgrim.