Super
By now, you can tell whether I liked a film by whether there are bullets at the end. In fact, this is not strictly true. Sometimes I have this urge to write about a film that I did not like; for instance when I want to rant or vent on it. Or when it’s just a film with a lot of content or things to think about, but ultimately I didn’t think the story was particularly well-written. “Super” is the kind of film that just wasn’t so well-written, and now I am not even sure whether I want to vent.
Overall, it was a decent film. Pixelmatsch mentioned the film when we discussed “God Bless America”, and boy are they similar. In both cases, we are dealing with a black comedy about this old outsider man and this crazy outsider girl who set out to do crazy, murderous things. Most importantly, in both times it’s the young girl who wants to engage in some sort of sexual encounter with the man, who is just like “Eww, gross, I’m not a pedophile!” while having to admit that he developed feelings for the girl after all. However, despite these similarities the premise is still rather different. One man wants to change the world, the other just wants to save his damsel in distress. With “God Bless America” my beef was that I don’t really get behind that incredible hatred against low-class television; with “Super” my beef is mostly with that damsel in distress. Sure, this setting is preordinained due to the Superman references, but maybe that is precisely the problem. A superhero world where great men save weak women – I just can’t get behind it anymore. That superhero movies are so popular these days is pure nostalgia, and the moviemakers are trying to save it by forcefully inserting somewhat strong female characters. “Super” is not ashamed of its weak female character, but unfortunately that just makes her so incredibly annoying. How can anyone just let themselves get drugged like this all day? My goodness.
To add to the anti-feminist insult, I don’t know why every single film (except “Harold and Maude”) including a couple with an age difference has to involve an old man and a young girl. “God Bless America” and “Super” are even worse, because you have this obviously attractive girl with a strange personality who wants to sleep with some lame old guy and it’s the lame old guy who gets to say “Eww, gross! I’m no pedophile!” Ellen Page’s tried-too-hard-seductive dance just takes the cake.
Unsurprisingly, what saves the film is the character of Libby. The chemistry between the main characters is even greater than it was in “God Bless America”, and Libby is positively crazy, certainly much more crazy than Frank. While I was disturbed at her dangerous, murderous personality at times, every single scene with her promised a lot of fun. Ellen Page was perfect for that role, it’s like her character from Hard Candy suddenly grew up (just a little). After painstakingly going through Frank and Sarah’s backstory, the film became much better and funnier as soon as Libby came into play.
In essence, the film is somewhere between facepalm-enducing and Ellen-page-awesome. I want to see more Rainn Wilson too.