Review of Kick-Ass, thanks to @newsunlimited - SPOILERS AHOY

Last night I saw the upcoming movie Kick-Ass, based on the comic written by Mark Millar, thanks to a free ticket from News Unlimited, which I won by replying to a message on their Twitter account. There are spoilers in here, but I stop telling the plot about two-thirds of the way through.

The film is about a young New York man, Dave Lizewski (Aaron Johnson) , who decides he wants to be a costumed superhero, not because of any great trauma or earth-shattering event in his life, but just because it's so mundane. The most exciting thing that happens to him is getting mugged every now and again by local hoods, but even that's hardly an adrenaline rush, it's just one of the tedious things he has to put up with.

So x buys a green wetsuit with a matching neoprene mask and becomes Kick-Ass. After a few weeks training, he encounters the same hoods who routinely mug him trying to break into a car, ducks into an alley to change into his costume and confronts them. He ends up getting stabbed in the belly and takes a vicious kicking. While in an ambulance he persuades the paramedic to get rid of his costume so no-one will know why he was beaten, which means he is brought naked to the hospital. This leads to a rumour spreading around his school that he was beaten after a gay encounter went wrong, which means Katie Deauxma (Lyndsy Fonseca), who's ignored him up to now, starts paying him attention as she's always wanted a gay best friend. This is, presumably, the fault of Will and Grace.

X continues to patrol the streets as Kick-Ass, and when he takes on three hoods fighting one man he's recorded by spectators on their moble phones, and becomes a celebrity when the footage is uploaded to YouTube. He starts a MySpace page (why MySpace? The comic was first published in 2008, when MySpace was already in decline, and the film doesn't appear to have any connection to News Corporation, MySpace's owner) for Kick-Ass, and when he learns that y is being harassed by a client of the needle exchange she volunteers at, he tells her to contact Kick-Ass for help. As Kick-Ass, he goes to the client's home to tell him to back off, and is almost killed when he is saved by Hit Girl (Chloe Moretz) and Big Daddy (Nicholas Cage), a father-and-daughter team of costumed heroes who have some serious fighting skills and a ridiculously large arsenal of weapons.

Big Daddy has been beating up the soldiers and and stealing the drugs of crime kingpin Frank d'Amico (Mark Strong), but when D'Amico's minions tell him that drugs were stolen by a man in a mask and cape, he assumes they are lying and has them killed. When D'Amico realises that there really are costumed heroes after him, he assumes Kick-Ass is the real danger, as Big Daddy, an ex-cop named Macready who D'Amico had framed as a drug dealer after Macready refused to be corrupted, has carefully stayed hidden up till now.

In a seriously psychologically unsatisfying scene Dave and Katie become lovers, AFTER Dave (dressed as Kick-Ass) breaks into Katie's room at night, frightens the hell out of her and then admits he's been lying about being gay so Katie would pay attention to him. Maybe this is meant to show that Katie likes abusive relationships, after all she also befriended the client at the needle exchange and gave him money (and continues to be allowed to volunteer there? OK, it's a film based on a comic, not a documentary, but still...)

Meanwhile D'Amico's son Chris (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) poses as Red Mist, another costumed hero, to try and lure Kick-Ass into a position where he can be captured, in an attempt to win his father's approval. He makes contact with Kick-Ass but before the ambush can be sprung, Big Daddy destroys the lumber mill which is the front for the drug operations, enraging D'Amico. A hidden camera Chris hid in the mill reveals Big Daddy to be the real threat, and Chris remembers that Kick-Ass mentioned the existence of other costumed heroes, and uses Kick-Ass to lead his father's soldiers to Big Daddy. This sets up the final battles in the movie.

The movies was fun enough, with lots of well-done, slick action, and it had the audience laughing. A few people walked out - Hit Girl is only "eleven" according to one character, and she has some pretty foul language, including calling some of the bad guys "cunts" as she kills them. Her character is an incredibly dangerous fighter, and her weird relationship with her father is quite endearing, if utterly traumatising for a young child. As one character points out, she has no real childhood - her whole life with her father is training to kill very effectively. Naturally, Nicolas Cage plays the fairly creepy yet doting and protective parent quite well.

I wonder if anyone paying attention to racial issues in the USA has had anything to say about this movie. Most of the evil characters were either Italian or African-American, and only one African-American character was unequivocally a good guy (Omari Hardwick as Marcus), and he had barely any screen time. I first really noticed this in the scene where Kick-Ass gets saved by Hit Girl and Big Daddy in the junkies' house - all the enemies there are African-American. This makes me wonder if the movie isn't just another story about scary black people (and Italian Mafia) being kept in their place by good white people, with a few "good blacks" thrown in for good measure. The corrupt police officer who was in D'Amico's pocket also had an Italian name.

Another thing I found a little tedious were the obvious references to other comic books, films and so on. Ok, ok, we get it. It was quite witty when The Simpsons started referencing other works, but that was twenty years ago, and these days I find it a little tedious. Since I'd never even heard of the comic book until yesterday, and since I'm not very big into comics anyway, I assume I missed out on plenty of stuff that fans of the comic would have picked up. Dave's fear of being thought of as gay and the jokes around that theme were a bit annoying too, but I guess that's fairly true-to-life.

And lastly, a word about a rather irritating habit that seems to be spreading at review screenings - we had to stand in a great big line and hand in our phones and iPods. This is presumably so I couldn't take a nasty, grainy, small video of the film with horrible muddy sound, which you would watch in preference to seeing the film on a screen twenty feet tall with surround sound. I guess since I didn't pay cash to see the movie I can't complain too much (but then, they're getting free publicity out of me from this review). But it was annoying, and I really doubt that the most popular illegal downloads are from people sneaking in video cameras. Most of the downloads I've seen were direct rips from the DVD or, possibly, directly from digital copies distributed by the maker. Taking mobile phones off people strikes me as being as effective as arresting street-level drug dealers while the kingpins are protected by their money and power. Also, it meant I couldn't tell Twitter that I was waiting for the movie to start. Oh well, if you don't want free publicity guys....

Anyway that's my review. The film opens in Australia on Thursday April 8.

Report on "Politics in the Pub" debate about a Charter of Rights between @andrewbartlett and Professor James Allan

Last Wednesday, March 10 2010, I went to a debate at the University of Quensland about whether Australia needs a formal Charter of Rights, between Andrew Bartlett and Professor James Allan. Please note that all links in this article were researched by me and have not been approved or checked by either of the debaters.



Left: Andrew Bartlett. Right: Professor James Allan.


Professor Allan started the debate, asking how many people were in favour of free speech. No-one said they weren't. He said that a charter of rights sets out moral abstractions that no-one disagrees with. He then asked how many people are in favour of allowing tobacco companies to advertise outside schools, or campaign finance limits, and said that Canadian judges had struck down laws banning such advertising, and imposing campaign finance limits, using the Canadian Charter of Rights as their justification. [Although in Harper v Canada (2004) the Canadian High Court affirmed that such (third-party) spending limits were legal under the Charter - BBlog ].

He said that a charter of rights takes issues like these and takes them out of the hands of elected representatives and puts them in the hands of unlected judges. He stated that a law degree does not "fine-tune your morals", and that when judges disagree with each other, they decide by vote, not by what is "right".

Professor Allan said people disagree about things like hate speech, or whether it is fair to stop people who say they've been raped being cross-examined in certain ways in court. He said that allowing elected representatives to decide these things is more equal than politicising the judiciary by making them decide.

He said that Father Frank Brennan, and all the other members of a panel appointed by the Australian Government to enquire into the idea of a Charter of Rights, were already in favour of such a charter.
He also said that people in Australia who want a Charter of Rights propose a simple law, not an alteration to the Constitution, but that even a simple law is the same as a Constitutional Bill of Rights because it allows judges to interpret the law in an "Alice in Wonderland" way.

The normal approach to interpreting the law is to assume that laws mean what they say, but with a Charter of Rights at hand, judges can interpret laws in new ways. Professor Allan said this happened in a case in Victoria last September [I assume he is referring to "An application under the Major Crime (Investigative Powers) Act 2004 [2009] VSC 381 (7 September 2009)", where Warren CJ ruled that, since the Victorian Charter of Rights says that someone may not be compelled to incriminate themselves, when someone forced to give evidence into organised crime under Victorian law, it can't be used against the person who is forced to give evidence. I will check this assumption with Professor Allan].

Professor Allan finished his opening statement by saying that democracy is not the same as imposing one's moral values on another.


Andrew Bartlett began by saying that Professor Allan's opening statement used a lot of political rhetoric and straw-man arguments. He said that courts have often made decisions that politicians don't like. He also said that Australian judges are not and should not be elected, and that judges are accountable through the appeal process.

Bartlett said that the Charter of Rights would be a simple law like any other, and that we already have a system where judges interpret laws, and Parliament can change those laws. The Victorian Parliament, for example, has changed laws after they weren't happy with a judge's decision.

Bartlett said that a Charter of Rights is about expanding protections in law against administrative decisions. A Charter would give direction to judges making decisions about those actions, especially when gross injustices occur from those actions.

Bartlett rejected the idea that a Charter would undermine democracy or expand the rights of judges, and said it would rather strengthen the Parliament against the Government.

Then, each debater was able to ask questions of the other.

Professor Allan asked Andrew Bartlett if individual citizens have more ability to speak their mind in Australia, or in the UK or Canada. He also asked why that right to speech is better protected by judges?

Bartlett replied that it is NOT better protected by judges, but by Parliament. Judges are not in fact better, they just apply the law that Parliament decides. He also replied that part of the problem with free speech in the UK is defamation laws which are easy to sue people under, which has nothing to do with the UK's charter of rights.


Professor Allan then asked Andrew Bartlett about an example from the UK. The UK Parliament passed a law saying that the defence in court is restricted in the ways it can cross-examine someone who says she has been raped. The UK courts said that the right to a fair trial over-rode the right of a rape complainant to not be cross-examined harshly. Who should decide in a case like this?

Bartlett replied that Parliament should decide. If Parliaments don't like judges' decisions, they should change the law. Professor Allan followed up by asking why the UK has never done that. Bartlett replied that that is up to the Parliament, and anyone who thinks that Australian parliaments are too weak to change such decisions should look at history, where they will see that they have often done that.

Andrew Bartlett asked Professor Allan that, if he thinks it's not a good idea to elect judges, why is it a problem that unelected judges should make decisions on what a charter of rights means?

Professor Allan responded saying that judges can strike down laws and re-write them, not just interpret them. He also said the Canadian Parliament has never over-ruled judges decisions in rights cases, and that it "cannot" do so [he meant politically they can't, not that they don't have the legal power to do so].

Andrew Bartlett then asked Professor Allan what the difference is between judges deciding cases under, say, the Immigration Act and under a Human Rights Act?

Professor Allan said that the difference is that in the first sort of case, the judges decide which set of politicians should be making the decision, while in the second sort of case, the judges are making the decisions for themselves. He said that this leads to re-writing of laws, and terrible lies. He brought up the Al-Kateb case, in which the High Court of Australia ruled that it was lawful to detain a stateless person indefinitely. He said that this would have been decided differently if there was a Charter of Rights. He said that Canada has decided through judges that every refugee applicant should have an oral hearing, although the money spent on that could well be spent on other things.

Professor Allan says these things need to be decided through the political process, and that it was good in the Al-Kateb case that the judges "didn't lie" about what the law actually is.

Andrew Bartlett said that it's a very hard thing to say that judges are "lying" when you disagree with their decision. He said that when Parliament introduced mandatory detention, that it appeared that indefinite detention was not in fact their aim. Laws are often ambiguous and judges need to interpret them and work out which law should take precedence.

Then questions from the floor were invited.


I asked Professor Allan what he, as a citizen would do if a majority of people agreed with a policy that he thought was immoral. Professor Allan said that as a citizen, you'd have only three options: armed insurrection, civil disobedience, or to run away. But he said the question was not so interesting if you were talking about citizens, and said it was more interesting if you were talking about what judges should do. He said that in some cases a judge SHOULD lie about what the law is, to stop injustice, but only rarely.

Professor Allan was asked why the greater danger with human rights legislation was of judges making bad decisions. He said that he was going on the evidence of common law countries. He also said that politicians were afraid to confront judges talking the language of rights, even if the judges' decisions are absurd.

Andrew Bartlett responded to that by saying tht Parliament *likes* fighting judges and courts.

Professor Allan was asked another question about Parliaments being reluctant to overturn judges' decisions; the questioner asked if that wasn't an indication that the system is working as it should? The questioner also asked about the idea that politicians wouldn't want to pick a fight with tobacco advertisers, and said that didn't seem logical.

Professor Allan said that he didn't know why section 33 of the Canadian Charter had not been used by politicians to over-ride decisions they disagreed with.

He also said that Australians should have a vote on a Charter of Rights, as 2 referendums on a Bill of Rights have already failed. He said it would be much less objectionable to have a Charter of Rights if it came in after a vote.

Andrew Bartlett replied that we don't normally have votes on ordinary pieces of law, which is what a Charter of Rights would be.

Professor Allan was asked which would be worse, a Charter of Rights, or cases when judges find implied rights in the Australian Constitution.

Professor Allan said that because the idea of implied rights is so illegitimate, judges are often quite restrained when they find those rights exist. He said that this is likely to change if a Charter of Rights is enacted.

Andrew Bartlett was asked that if a Charter of Rights has the same weight as other legislation, will it lead to vague interpretations of the law?

He replied that the vagueness of the law depends on what you put in it. He also stated that people sometimes overstate the gains that a Charter of Rights might bring, and that if the courts get "too flowery", the Parliament can change the law.

Then the two speakers wrapped up. Professor Allan said that Andrew Bartlett had said that you can get justice by going from the national court system to the international one, which is a bad idea. He also said you cant get "justice" because people disagree with what it is.

Andrew Bartlett repsonded by saying that he did not say going to International courts is a good idea, and that they are often quite clumsy. He said that in this federal election year, political parties should state where they stand on a Charter of Rights, and reminded the audience that he is a candidate in the Australian Greens interest for the seat of Brisbane, and that the Greens support a Charter of Rights.

The Mana Bar - dedicated to console gaming - opens Sat Mar 20 2010 @themanabar

The Mana Bar, a bar in Fortitude Valley dedicated to console gaming, opens this Saturday, March 20 2010, from midday to midnight.

Entry is free, and it's also free to play the games - all you have to pay for is your drinks. The games will be played on LCD monitors on the walls, while the consoles and games will be kept behind the bar. The Mana Bar's Facebook page is here, and their Twitter account is here.

One of the people behind the Mana Bar is Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw, host of the Zero Punctuation video game review - click here for his Twitter account. This video shows his review last year of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2:



Croshaw will be hosting regular gaming trivia nights at the Mana Bar.

The three other people behind the bar are Guy "Yug" Blomberg, co-creator of AustralianGamer.com, Prasant Moorthy and Shay Leighton.

The Mana Bar is at 420 Brunswick St, Fortitude Valley, in the same building as the Judith Wright Centre for Contemporary Arts. The Mana Bar's door faces the street, you don't have to go into the Judith Wright Centre to get to the bar. The best way to get there by public transport is to catch a 196 or 199 bus to stop 5 on Brunswick St, or catch a train to the Fortitude Valley station and walk up Brunswick St - click here for a Google Map. If you need to look up bus or train timetables, click here to use Translink's journey planner.

Photos, video, sound from Quensland Locked Out rally against 2am Brisbane closing times @qldlockedout

Last Thursday, 11 March 2010, I went to Parliament House to see the Queensland Locked Out rally. The rally was protesting proposed plans to close all Brisbane clubs, pubs, bars and so on at 2am.

Go To FileFactory.com

Click "play" to hear 4 of the speakers from the rally. The first track is an edited report mixing excerpts from the 4 speeches with chanting, trumpet playing, singing of the national anthem and so on. The next 4 tracks are full version of each of the speeches I recorded.

The speakers I recorded were:



Amy Britten of Aim Strategies. She said that the proposed 2am shutdown will damage young entrepreneurs, and local culture.




Jeremy Iliev, a local DJ and producer - (Facebook). He said that the proposed 2am shutdown would destroy his dream to become a top DJ, and also hurt people like bartenders, security guards and glass collectors who make a living working in bars and clubs where locals perform.




Joanna Nilson, musician with local band "Butcher Birds" and board member of 4ZZZ-FM. She said that the proposed 2am shutdown would damage local music labels, and musicians who would no longer have places to hone their skills.



Nick Braban, owner of Bar Soma. He blamed problems with violence on judges who refused to properly punish people who "want to drink Bundy Rum all night and punch each other in the face".



The trumpet playing on the report is by Darren Skaar, who is accompanying beatboxer DJ Cutloose in this short vid:

DJ Cutloose













To see all 41 photos from the rally, click here to see the set on Flickr.

Brisbane Exhibitions: Go Font UrSelf* on at Nine Lives, TONIGHT, Thu Mar 11

The Go Font UrSelf* exhibition is all about artworks that are based on letters, on writing and on typography - "the alphabet becomes the source". Chapter 4 of the exhibition is on tonight, Thursday March 11 2010, at Nine Lives Gallery in Fortitude Valley, opening at 6pm.

The artists whose work is on display are:


Sarah A King






Super Expresso







Raza Uno




Istvan Szugyiczky





Above





Adrian Gray





Blends






Helen Mycroft






Rob Abel






Saynt





Timba Smits





Marin Horikawa





Yok




I found out about this exhibition through This Art Attack's Twitter account, so if you like art in Brisbane you might want to follow them too. Nine Lives Gallery is at 694A Ann St, Fortitude Valley - click here for a Google Map with public transport details. You can also click here to use the Translink journey planner to look up train times, or click here to look up timetables for the 199 or 196 bus.

Brisbane Blues Festival - Sat Mar 13, Jubilee Hotel @brisbluesfest

The Brisbane Blues Festival is on this Saturday, March 13 2010 at the Jubilee Hotel in Fortitude Valley

Playing this year are:

The Trophy Brides





Jimi Beavis and the 385s - their Facebook page is here.



This YouTube vid by HarpDogAustralia shows Jimi Beavis and the 385s playing at the Jubilee Hotel in April 2009:

Asa Broomhall - his MySpace page is here



This vid by blackdotsvid shows Asa Broomhall singing "That Old Car" from his album "Revelry Road"

Doc Span and Ross Williams - Doc Span's MySpace page



The video here, by harrylegends, shows Doc Span and Ross Williams playing the Samford Blues Festival in 1998:

Diamond Doug Wilshire and the Tailspinners - the MySpace page is here



Bluesville Station



The video here by YouTuber flagmanbrad shows Bluesville Station playing "Wastin' My Time" from their album "Ridin' The Warrego"

Mojo Webb, and band - MySpace page here



The video here, uploaded by harrylegends, is of the Mojo Webb Band playing at the Step Inn in November 2008

The Hipshooters



This vid also by harrylegends shows The Hipshooters playing Legends Hotel on the Gold Coast in November last year

Entry to the Brisbane Blues Festival is $20 at the door and you can find the full program here at the Festival's website. The Jubilee Hotel is at 470 St Pauls Terrace, Fortitude Valley - click here for a Google Map with public transport details, and click here to use the Translink journey planner to look up public transport routes and timetables.

Brisbane Pro Wrestling Fri Mar 14 and Sat Mar 15, Bray Park PCYC @pwaqueensland

PWAQ is putting on "Rise of the Warriors 4" Pro Wresting tournament this Friday night,  March 14 and Saturday night, March 15 at the Bray Park PCYC on Francis Rd and Baker St, Bray Park.

There are 16 wrestlers competing on the night, with two preliminary rounds narrowing the field down to four athletes, who'll go into a Four Man Showdown for the tournament title. Some of the wrestlers who'll be vying for the championships are:

Mason Childs

Esteban Molina

AJ Istria
Sean O'Shea
Mikey Broderick
Zero
Johnny Lukas

Tickets are $15 for EACH night (so $30 if you're going on both nights). Call Luke Davison on 0430 315 906 to book your tickets, or email pwaqld@gmail.com

The PWAQ Twitter account is here, if you want to follow them, and you can join their Facebook group here.

Click here for a Google Map showing the location of the Bray Park PCYC, including public transport details. If you need to look up bus timetables you can do it here, and the Translink journey planner, for train times, is here.