My long and frustrating quest for an Actually Good Movie Critique Podcast has been (temporarily) achieved.
After nudging through an uncounted dearth of film discussion pods that seem more interested in trying to make jokes at a movie’s expense while doing little more than a basic rehashing the plot than actually discussing the film itself, I tripped over one by critic Amy Nicholson and actor Paul Scheer called Unspooled and down the back-episode rabbit hole I have fallen. It’s just what my ears and I have been looking for, and it has fumbled reminders of films I’d long-since-watched that I was suddenly re-inspired to dust off the digital dust and rewatch anew.
What’s the movie?
The first of those films turned out to be Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, that now 15+ years old comic adaptation by Edgar Wright, with Michael Cera and Mary Elizabeth Winstead. My two-bits recap goes like this: nerdy bassist Scott, recoiling from the struggles of his post-high school dating struggles, meets Manic Pixie Dream Emo Ramona Flowers whose dating baggage manifests as a roster of seven evil exes that Scott must defeat in successive video-game style throw downs in order to continue their relationship.
All the while Scott learns the value of self respect and comes to understand how he has hurt his past girlfriends and himself and everyone around him while the surrealist retro gamer aesthetic drives a fantastical world building anchored upon a Toronto backdrop.
How does it hold up?
I was in my mid-thirties when this came out and much closer then to the source inspiration than I am now to even the release date of this film. Back then I would have told you that half the appeal to my sad little brain was the aesthetic of this film, wrapped as it was in this eight-bit echo back to my own gamer youth. I got the other layers of message, sure, but I have fifteen years of emotional growth and parenting and personal self realization under my belt on this rewatch that I can almost guarantee I didn’t have back in 2010. I wasn’t a Scott, but I easily might have been equally oblivious to the nuances of some relationships as he was.
That’s a tough thing to admit, but hell, I’m gonna be fifty this year and people grow.
That’s the moral lesson of this film, I think, if there is one to be had: people grow and change and move on and stuff. We’ve been through the #metoo movement and the backlash against it that has manifested as this sour self-loathing wave of stubborn people declaring that empathy is for losers and being woke is weakness, and a reprisal of hate-filled nationalism, so dare I ask where are we as a society on the Scott Pilgrim meter of self-reflective growth? Pretty low. It might just be better to ask if society holds up to the core message that is this movie.
Did I like it?
I have been tracking my movies over on Letterboxd for a couple years now and I rarely give films a bad rating, but also I rarely give them more than four stars. I gave this one a four point five. I did like it. It was something about the feeling of it. It was cozy and familiar. It was well made.
The effects still felt effective (though to be fair, I’m living through an eighties nostalgia infection that I can’t seem to shake) and twinkled wittily at my own youth.
The cast is a who’s-who of modern awesome people who have not broken our trust or gone wildly queueanon or done anything but make great work these past fifteen years, so I didn’t need to hold my nose at that. It’s just a good movie that is fun to watch.
Is it worth a rewatch?
I started this post by alluding to a movie review podcast. If you are into those, you should look up Unspooled. Paul Scheer is a stand up guy, seems like an honestly hard working actor, and has led a couple of podcasts that I would put on my list of favourites. And hearing his and Amy’s insightful commentary on this (and about a dozen other flicks from back episodes I’ve devoured these last couple weeks) inspired me to click on my copy of Scott Pilgrim and settle in.
If you’ve seen it before, it is a movie about growth after all, and layered enough that I think it’s an interesting measure for personal reflection.
And if you’ve never seen it, like why not?