Super

A cleverly hidden and easily overlooked film, overshadowed by the more famous Kick-Ass. It rides a similar wave only with a lower budget and less ambition, but thankfully blood and black humour are not spared, so I was pleasantly entertained by this offbeat comic-book film with a looser hero who has only two good memories in his life, getting married and giving direction to a police officer about a suspect. I had fun. 75% (24/07/2015)

An interesting mixture of film and real life. Frank was a man I wouldn’t like to meet, Libby was clearly a psychopath, and you wouldn’t find an actual positive character with a flashlight in broad daylight, but I found the whole tragicomedy quite entertaining. I was a bit annoyed by the casting of the female characters here. I can’t say Liv Tyler isn’t pretty, but there’s something about her that always turns me off. I don't know why, I just have an innate dislike for some people, and I just can't help it. Anyway, the film was fun, and it also made me think unhappy thoughts (which I did appreciate). I wasn't thrilled, but I was satisfied. / Lesson learned: Don't let your imagination take hold of you. (12/09/2022)

I was originally only going to post a sonnet here about Ellen Page, but I’ve decided I’ll just rave about her elsewhere for her green eyes and doe-eyed charisma. Super is exactly the basket of so moronic it’s funny, a celebration of tastelessness (James Gunn ultimately ended up working for TROMA, after all), and dealing with a budget that can't even be called a budget. The price for a sleeping producer and the support of a studio who are too happy to have someone making movies under them to worry about what kind they are, is sheer unpredictability and amorality paving over good intentions. Super is the Kick-Ass kid, but wins where the parents nervously flip-flopped – in an ending that pushed this film to five stars. And yes, this movie truly has no concept. (06/10/2011)

At times even more bloody and brutal than Kick-Ass, which may seem almost unimaginable at first glance. Although in the overall reckoning for me, Vaughn's Kick-Ass clearly wins, Gunn's Super has something that Kick-Ass simply didn't have (or that it wasn't rendered as vividly and convincingly as in the case of Super) and that is the strong motivation of the main character. Kick-Ass mainly wanted to stop being an outsider, whereas Crimson Bolt is driven to fight crime by the loss of the woman he loves (I consider this to be the only serious motivation in the whole film, because all the other troubles of the protagonist and especially the ways he deals with them are heavily overdone). The three main actors without issues, though I think I liked the psychopathic Ellen Page the best. (30/07/2011)