Films have often been an excellent way of portraying human emotion, socio and psychological behaviours and desires of human beings. Looking at films we can begin to draw patterns between the fiction of these films and the non-fiction of life itself. Kick-Ass is such a film that personifies and exaggerates the behaviours of society and reactions by individuals. This film, by use of possible symbols, metaphors and imagery, paints a picture that reflects the flaws of the society we have created for ourselves. Though the means that the characters go to resolve the main conflict of the film may be extreme, they show, upon deeper reflection, the amount of damage and problems in society.
In this paper, we shall be looking at the three core sociological theories presented subtly in the film. The first one we will start off with is conformity. This film revolves around children and teenagers for the most part with only a few key adults as main characters. As such there is a lot of opportunity to look at the obvious conformities that occur in a highschool environment. We can look at how this conformity can lead to the various behaviours the main character ends up taking part in throughout the film.
The second sociological theory witnessed in this film, one that ties closely with conformity. This is the concept of roles and statuses. This film, being partially a superhero film and indeed more of a social commentary if you are willing to look a little deeper into the content, we can see the various roles being developed by the various characters throughout the film; and indeed these roles evolve and change radically throughout the film.
The third and final theory witnessed in Kick-Ass is perhaps one of the more immediately visible themes presented in the film. The primary antagonists deal in violence, crime and other such deviances; and this becomes the case with most of the protagonists as well. It asks the viewer to look at the two parties and wonder if the similar behaviours can end up being justified for the greater good. It looks at deviance as not only a means to the dubbed "evil" behaviour, but also used to accomplish good in this world.
We will start this paper with a summary of the beginning of Kick-Ass. This film begins in the life of Dave Lizewski who is in the process of going through High School. He is a kid that does little to stand out in his school, and is in short, invisible in all of society. He is regularly robbed by various punks and thugs. There is one thing that separates him from most teenagers and that is his fantasy of becoming a superhero. While this does seem similar to many teenagers, he is one of the few who actually acts on this fantasy and begins a setup to become an actual superhero. This does not end well as someone ends up knifing him when he tries to intervene in a crime. This kicks off the plot of his gaining of "superpowers" through use of damaged nerve endings giving him an improved pain tolerance.
The main antagonist of this film is a mob boss by the name of Frank D'Amico who believes that Kick-Ass is interfering in his business, when this actually winds up being a couple of other superheroes, only known to Kick-Ass at first as Hit-Girl and Big-Daddy. This ends up pulling Kick-Ass into this world of violence and drugs and ends up concluding with the death of Frank D'Amico and his son carrying on the legacy, while Kick-Ass retires from crime fighting.
We start by looking at the first theory we will present is the aspect of conformity. As we mentioned before the fact that much of the film revolves a high school aged kid; we witness a lot of conformity into groups. These various groups tend to keep to themselves, as noted by the various groups
