In some ways Scott Pilgrim vs. the World‘s is like a Pilgrim’s Progress for Gen Y – a modern morality tale about love and self-esteem cleverly masked by fast-moving scenes and dialogue dripping with wit and irony. In order to win the girl of his dreams, Ramona Flowers, Scott must defeat her “seven evil exes” in videogame styled combat.
Scott Pilgrim is directed by Edgar Wright – the guy behind Spaced, Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead – so as you would expect, the movie is a triumph of fan service, pop culture references, comic-book cred and general awesomeness. The unfortunate side-effect of this of course, is that the movie has only very limited appeal to anybody who’s mental age is more than 16 – evidenced by its terrible box office earnings (in spite of largely favourable reviews).
Michael Cera in the lead role is a contentious but unsurprising choice, since he must be the only currently bankable actor with the right amounts of charisma and dorkiness to play the role of Scott. Other highlights were Ellen Wong as Knives Chau, who looks like she stepped right off the pages of a Japanese manga, and Kieren Culkin as Wallace, Scott’s gay roommate, who deadpans all of his (hilarious) lines and steals every scene that he’s in.
Frenetically paced and possessing of the highest meme density of any movie I’ve watched so far, don’t forget to put on your 80’s geek hat when you go and see it.
Here’s the trailer: