Tank Girl's a pretty bizarre movie. It reminds me of "The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension" but with a much more acceptable title length. It's not as strange as, say, "Mirror Mask", but it's definitely up there. Tank Girl's hair is continuously changing, so watch for that.
There's a lot to say for this movie, and a lot to say against it. So much that I can state with relative confidence that I will not cover it all. It's a comic-book film from a little before comic-book films seemed to really take off. And being based off such a medium, it's unsurprising that it feels it's trying to cover too much. There are a lot of instances, a whole lot, where things just don't make sense. "How did she just survive that" sort of moments. But, as the movie is fundamentally unrealistic, it doesn't really matter. This is not a movie for "serious" movie watchers, wanting to get something "profound" out of their time.
That being said, it does have a very strong female protagonist, which is rather rare and pretty profound. Two of them, in fact, which is well neigh unheard of. Actually, all of the major characters are female! Such a fact is a definite breach of the normal action/adventure genre. And one which the genre needs more often than it gets. It has such a "women power" message that my friend whom I watched it with describes it as a "chick flick". Including this movie in the "chick flick" genre elevates that one as well.
Therefore, it has a lot more going for it than one might initially give it credit for. It elevates two separate genres by its inclusion.
Male characters of some worth are eventually introduced, and they are all very interesting characters with sarcastically large personalities. Not that this is in any way different from how the movie has been progressing up until this point. The characters are all very interesting and fun and it is partly because no character is really "3-Dimensional". They are simple and exaggerated.
One of the best stylistic choices in this movie is when they decide to splice in comic art, both in still frame pages and in animation. That style is very different than the average comic. Reminding me, in a very violent way, of a picture search book. There are so many things! It advertises the comic pretty well, I can imagine the comic is pretty fun, probably significantly more so than the movie. Tank Girl fans certainly think so.
I was never a Tank Girl fan, had never heard of the comic before now, and I found the movie "enjoyable". If that is what you want, then this is a good movie to rent.
No comments:
Post a Comment