Okay folks, here’s the thing (and yes, there are some spoilers at the end). I loved this film. It’s kind of an awesome guilty pleasure kind of film. Between the video game fights and the digital score, I really had fun.
What I had issues with was the entire premise of the film. Now, I haven’t read the comic. I only browsed through the first volume and read about a third of it in the store. So please understand that I am only giving my perspective about the film and not the comic.
Scott Pilgrim brings up a bigger problem for me than I thought it would, and a different one as well. I assumed that I might be bothered about another teen film revolving around a teen mindlessly obsessing about someone unachievable. Instead I saw a film about a bunch of terrible people being horrible to each other.
This film has a few issues: 1) The absurd idea of what a hipster is 2) Everyone is terribly obsessed with themselves and barley recognize the humanity of other people and 3) Wow, it felt rushed!  Elaborations follow.
1) So this is a little bit of a issue I have with films every so often. Rarely do they ever get a type of person right. Old people and rich wannabe hipsters thought 500 Days of Summer was a film about hipsters. Sure they may be different types of hipsters, but they are all latecomers to a generational style and attitude. So they say it’s a hipster film, but is it really a hipster film? No.
Scott Pilgrim suffers from the same problem. Teens and geeks who desperately want to be hipsters think the film is their training ground, or it’s about them. SP is no more hipster than 500. SP is a fun but rather random hodgepodge of 20-30 somethings’ memories and references used with the humor and wit of a 13 year old. In fact I’m rather insulted at the idea that this movie constitutes being a hipster. Not that I’m a hipster, but any hipsters I know would scoff over their matté gourds at that idea.
3) (I’ll get to two later. Deal with it.) SP was insanely rushed. What were they thinking? The first part of the film was fun and exciting. It moved fast, but let’s be honest. It was pretty cool, so no complaints. I don’t want to imply the entire film should have been like this, but oddly the points where the film drags are the fights. They are actually rather short, but they drag on forever in comparison to the rest of the film. And seriously, a comic in six parts boiled down into one film? This film could have been split into three, or two at least. I honestly think that this would have helped the filmmakers pace the films better and maybe possibly, hopefully, build something resembling a real character with dimension.
2) Okay. This is the big one. SP has no good people. Everyone is selfish. Everyone is obsessed with whatever they want and never about others. Yeah, in the end they change a bit, but we’ll talk about that in the end of the review.
For every moment of the film, we watch Scott pursue a girl who he never asks himself if he should be with. He just wants to be with her. He dates an underage girl because she is a deviant fantasy of his who he can use to feel good about himself. He is pathetically obsessed and hurt by an ex he uses as an excuse for his actions and a crutch for his love life. Scott never wonders if there is something he is doing wrong or anything that he should change about himself.
Scott Pilgrim is the anti-Twilight in that sense. Scott is the antithesis of Bella. Where she is pathetic and has completely no self-worth, Scott is so full of himself he has decided that he is so important that the world is actively against him. What an appropriate hyperbole for such a overdramatic drama queen like Scott, who turns to gin and tonics and hurtful words instead of reason when confronted with something difficult. It’s not just Scott. Everyone in the film is like this, even adorable Knives. How depressing.
There are 3 moments in the climax that are laughable:
1) Earning the Sword of Love. Seriously. One moment of questionable unselfish thought actually earns you a sword of love? Well at least the Sword of Love was pathetic and couldn’t do anything because love doesn’t really mean anything in this world of SP.
2) Earning the Sword of Self-Respect. Really? Your awesome second sword is because you are even closer to being like the cocky self absorbed big bad you are fighting? The last thing Scott needs is more of himself.
3) Nega Scott. Okay, not really laughable but sad, because it was totally fitting for the entire film, and it sets up why I think the end is totally tagged on and one of the most insincere scenes in years. At the moment Scott has to really defeat his bad qualities (I was excited about this) it cuts to him being friends with Nega Scott ’cause he is “kinda cool.”
And now suddenly everyone is making selfless decisions for no apparent reason. Pathetic.
I wouldn’t be so upset or critical except that this is a film aimed directly at high schoolers. The filmmakers have a responsibility to those kids, and they didn’t think about what they were making. Kids attach to these characters and learn not how to be better, but to be horrible. So no, it’s not Twilight. It’s Nega Twilight, which may be just as bad, especially for guys.
What a letdown.

Fun vintage look ads.

Sharpie pencil!
Best idea ever! I think I will need a couple thousand of these before they quit making them. if you love me you will buy them for me!

Spoilers.  I think.

Okay, I hate to disappoint, but I really don’t plan on discussing whether or not the whole film or parts of the film are a dream, or if Cobb’s wedding ring is his real totem, or if his wife only left him and didn’t really kill herself. Blah blah blah.

I’m very into discussing the movie, but what I think is really interesting and worth discussing is the relationship between the filmmaker, the film, and the audience. Nolan is known for his thoughtful movie making from Momento to Insomnia to The Dark Knight. In many interviews he mentions his connection of dreaming and filmmaking, and he doesn’t shy away from inserting himself into his films. I think that this film is especially familiar to me as it feels much like one of my favorite films, 8 1/2.

The focus of this film is the discussion. I hate the idea that people are comparing this film to The Matrix. That film is nothing like this one. Inception isn’t a film that screws with you, making you wonder what reality is. Nolan is too smart and intentional about filmmaking to waste our time like that. Inception is a film about film, filmmaking, and the filmmaker, just like 8 1/2.

Full disclosure on this article: I am a dream junkie. I spent years studying dreams, I really like to explore lucid dreaming, and I have written a lot of material on the ethics and morals of dreaming and the dream state (while lucid dreaming or not). On a side not, one thing I thought was fun about Inception is the use of a totem to tell if you are in a dream or not. Lucid dreamers do sort of the same thing to wake up in a dream. I think Nolan has some experience in lucid dreaming.

OK, back to the theory. Film is a fascinating medium unlike any other because it attempts to do something impossible. Films transcend time by attempting to affix your mind in the eternal present, and you have to give yourself wholly to the artist to truly transcend timespace. Watching a film allows us to live as close to the eternal present as we can without supernatural or chemical assistance.

Nolan’s Inception literally transposes the filmmaking and viewing experience into a film. One reason it’s hard to have discussions about when the characters are dreaming in the film is that film itself bends and distorts spacetime in ways that are unseemly to nature. As an audience, we are constantly being transported through timespace without questioning those cuts unless they are poorly executed. A skilled filmmaker and editor can make cuts seem natural and undetected so we don’t find it strange that our perspective moves inches or thousands of miles in 1/24th of a second.

This film takes on a bigger and more important discussion than whether are we all really sleeping (yawn). It forces us to look at every other film we watch with a careful eye. If he did his job, Nolan  is doing at least two things in this film, and they are HUGE!

1: Inception raises the bar for the rest of the industry. He is bare-faced, calling out his peers and reminding them that film is like a dream, a powerful tool that can reveal humanity and truth to the world.
2: Nolan’s film reminds audiences of what film is capable of. He reminds us how we should feel when we watch a film, and tells us not to bother with films that aren’t worth our time.

These are just a few of my thoughts. Let me know what you think!