Based on a series of graphic novels by Bryan Lee O’Malley, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is a movie with ADD and a lapsed Ritalin prescription. It moves with bullet-train speed, crackles with wit and packs enough hip pop-culture references to make Chuck Klosterman green with envy. There are nods to arcade games, comic books, rock songs and the like. There is visual invention, some laughs and, ultimately, exhaustion borne from overkill.
Whether this high-flying mash-up yields anything more than a slightly pleasant buzz likely depends on your capacity for video games. A lot of the action in Scott Pilgrim finds the title character on a hero’s journey that makes Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 look emotionally complex by comparison.
Scott is a 22-year-old slacker living in Toronto and playing bass for a middling garage rock band, Sex-Bob-omb (a Super Mario reference). As played by Michael Cera, Scott Pilgrim has a little-lost-lamb veneer useful for masking self-absorption. Rebounding from being dumped by an up-and-coming pop singer, he is feeding his ego with an adoring high school girl, Knives Chau (Ellen Wong).
The nookie-free relationship is a source of disgust for Scott’s bandmates, disapproving younger sister (Anna Kendrick) and acerbic gay roommate (Kieran Culkin), especially since Knives is so smitten with the older lothario that tiny purple valentines literally float from her lips when she professes her love.
But then Scott then meets the girl of his dreams, Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), whose manga-friendly eyes and ever-changing hair color speak to her allure. Scott learns just how high-maintenance a girlfriend Ramona will be, as he must do battle with seven of her evil exes if they are to be an item.
Story isn’t really the point here. Writer-director Edgar Wright is more interested in filling the margins of this caffeinated coming-of-age tale with the visual language of comics and gamers. Words like “ka-pow” and “boom” take literal form. Tangential asides appear in pop-ups and bubbles. Scott’s vanquished foes explode in a shower of coins.
It’s tempting to interpret all these cinematic bells and whistles as something provocative about how we process life in our media-saturated age, but sometimes a cigar, to borrow a phrase attributed to Freud, is just a cigar. Or a Sega, as the case might be. In any case, what begins as inspired whimsy gets wearisome, and it becomes virtually impossible to care about our hero or his plight.
Cera’s languid brand of uncharismatic charisma doesn’t help this Pilgrim’s progress. He never quite gels as the self-satisfied gamer. At his most mannered here, Cera is a gangly grab bag of sheepish and stammering vapidity. Thankfully, he is surrounded by an excellent supporting cast, especially Culkin and Alison Pill, while Chris Evans and Brandon Routh have memorable turns as evil ex-boyfriends.
Cutting to the Chase with Phil Bacharach 