Film at two-thirty - The Incredibles
Nov. 28th, 2004 09:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
This film was made by a lot of people who absolutely loved superhero comics. Not the storyline, that's very much a product of the last year or few, but the graphic style and iconography are absolutely unmistakable. (I'm even led to conclude that they were very much Marvel fans rather than DC fans). The soundtrack seemed spot on, too.
I'm still a bit confused about the message the film wanted to send, though - it wavered rather between three themes.
i) Superheroes have a moral responsibility to use their powers to help others. It's the powers that set them apart from ordinary people, so using them is pretty much an end in itself. This broadly Nietzschean viewpoint is very much Mr Incredible's theme, and helps Violet out too - she gets a lot of confidence from using her powers to solve problems.
ii) Life would be much easier if superheroes were just like everyone else - the powers only cause trouble. Very much Elastigirl's theme, with a lot of support from Dash.
In the end, I think, it all comes down to "We really are special, and we shouldn't hide it, because we can have a lot of fun helping people." I'm rather dubious about this message, partly because it's basically saying that Mrs Parr - the conscientous wife who puts her family first - is admitting she was wrong after all.
Oh, and did you notice that all the short people are comedy characters?
I'm still a bit confused about the message the film wanted to send, though - it wavered rather between three themes.
i) Superheroes have a moral responsibility to use their powers to help others. It's the powers that set them apart from ordinary people, so using them is pretty much an end in itself. This broadly Nietzschean viewpoint is very much Mr Incredible's theme, and helps Violet out too - she gets a lot of confidence from using her powers to solve problems.
ii) Life would be much easier if superheroes were just like everyone else - the powers only cause trouble. Very much Elastigirl's theme, with a lot of support from Dash.
In the end, I think, it all comes down to "We really are special, and we shouldn't hide it, because we can have a lot of fun helping people." I'm rather dubious about this message, partly because it's basically saying that Mrs Parr - the conscientous wife who puts her family first - is admitting she was wrong after all.
Oh, and did you notice that all the short people are comedy characters?