The nine-day film SXSW film fest opens March 12 with the world premiere of Matthew Vaughn’s Kick-Ass, starring Aaron Johnson, Cholë Grace Moretz and Christopher Mintz-Plasse, who will all attend a Conversation panel at the SXSW Film Conference, along with the comic’s writers, Mark Millar and John S. Romita.
“Kick-Ass” most certainly does. Equal parts audacious dark comedy, wish-fulfillment fantasy and over-the-top, tongue-in-cheek action-adventure, Matthew Vaughn’s bloody funny adaptation of a cult-fave comicbook series manages to be sufficiently faithful to its source material to please fervent fanboys while remaining easily accessible for ticketbuyers unfamiliar with the superhero storytelling conventions Vaughn (“Layer Cake”) and co-scripter Jane Goldman satirize as well as celebrate. Scenes of hilariously overstated violence perpetrated by an 11-year-old girl doubtless will discomfort many and incense quite a few. But this deservedly R-rated Lionsgate release should nonetheless score a knockout in theatrical and homevid venues.