Two stylized films about literally fighting for what you want — it’s Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World vs. Polite Society.
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Every episode of Tasteless, I take a critically acclaimed film and compare it to one that shares the same themes but didn't get the attention it deserves — and explain why that second movie is my pick. This week: two stylized films about literally fighting for what you want. It's Scott Pilgrim vs. the World versus Polite Society. I'm very excited to get into Polite Society.
Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World
A young man must defeat his new girlfriend's seven evil exes, who are willing to do anything to prevent her happiness with someone else.
This movie came out in 2010. It has an 82% on Rotten Tomatoes. Michael Cera as Scott Pilgrim was genius casting. Please know that every mean thing I'm about to say about Scott Pilgrim has nothing to do with Michael Cera.
But I hate Scott. I hate him so much. He is 22, dating a 17-year-old, which is not good. Maybe it's legal. It's not good. But the real problem is how dismissive he is of her. It's not like he's like, she's 17 but so mature and I respect her. He's like, oh, she's 17, so she puts up with me. Knives Chau, the 17-year-old, is played by Ellen Wong, who does a lot with the material given to her. Scott doesn't even have quarters. Knives has to pay for the arcade games they play. What's the point of dating a 22-year-old with no quarters?
Scott has one Pac-Man fact. He tells it to all women to woo them. Disgusting. This man is my enemy. But I am a noted Ross Geller, Ted Mosby, Jerry Seinfeld, Ray Romano hater, so I might be against the supposed everyman. That could be the problem.
Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Ramona is somehow so effortlessly cool that it's like, yeah, okay, I'd fight seven people to hang out with her. But why does Ramona like Scott? I did find it interesting that she just let Scott fight all her other exes, but when her female ex, played by Mae Whitman, shows up, Ramona joins in and fights her. I can't tell if that's because Mae was more significant or less, but it's definitely a statement. And I'm leaning towards it being a statement I don't particularly like — because Ramona seems especially angry over Mae's claim to her, references to their past, and she doesn't react that way to the other exes who are all men.
I love Mary Elizabeth Winstead. She's so cool in Birds of Prey, 10 Cloverfield Lane, great film. But everything is in service of Scott, so she's just there to be cool and attractive.
It's hard not to just go down a list of cast when talking about this film because the cast is out of this world. The standout for me: Brie Larson as Envy Adams, because she sings a fantastic Metric song. All those words together — Brie Larson, Envy, Metric. I like those words together. She takes on this persona, puts on a voice. It's a role we haven't seen from her elsewhere. I love Oscar winners using those talents for goofiness.
Everyone is really perfectly cast — from Aubrey Plaza to Anna Kendrick to Kieran Culkin. All sort of one-note characters, but in a way that's purposeful and uses what the actors are best at. And what's extra cool is that the 2023 animated series got all these actors to reprise their roles 13 years later. That's pretty wild.
Back to Brie Larson though — the way she plays her rockstar role Envy versus when she's just the normal Natalie before that, it's totally different. My favorite moment is when Brandon Routh punches a 17-year-old girl and Envy is very into it. It's just bizarre. Brandon Routh's vegan powers. Chris Evans as a skateboarding actor. Satya Bhabha doing a full-on Bollywood song.
This movie is all about extremes. It's honestly a movie you just have to watch. It's all about the visuals, the humor, the feeling it evokes. Such specific nostalgia — the SNES sounds, the comic panels. It's a really well-done film that I also have no strong feelings about. There are so many moments that work. No one has been able to copy it. What a fantastic poppy way to adapt a comic book. But I think the problem for me is I can just watch the fight scenes on YouTube and be fine. I don't need whatever tenuous thread holds the cool moments together. I just need the Envy Adams music video. Watch it on Max. I know you've seen it. I'm using this film more than any other episode as a jumping-off point.
Polite Society
Ria Khan believes she must save her older sister Lena from her impending marriage. After enlisting her friends' help, she attempts to pull off the most ambitious of all wedding heists in the name of independence and sisterhood.
This movie came out in 2023. It has a 91% on Rotten Tomatoes.
One of the greatest joys in this world is happening upon a movie I didn't know about and falling in love with it. Being truly surprised instead of waiting on something and having it disappoint. There is a very negative flip side, which is: why would a great movie like this not get a ton of marketing? I saw some rumbles about it from people I trust. I should have tracked it down on my own. That's on me. But Polite Society is an absolute must-watch.
It was directed and written by Nida Manzoor. You know I love when a woman writes and directs. You might also know her as the creator of We Are Lady Parts. Nida created something so special with this film. It's universal while also being so specific to sisterhood. You could have never even met a sister and you'll laugh and cry and enjoy yourself. But if you have a sisterly relationship with anyone — someone where you know you'll always be there for each other so you can fight hard because you love hard — the movie is even more affecting.
The humor is really great in that it's not broad. It's an action comedy but in a subtler, more clever way. Even the slang the young women use made me laugh — they have a language all their own, but you pick up on the meaning because of context clues. I felt like I was led into their friend group. I'm sure there are eight more levels if you are also Pakistani or Southeast Asian in the UK, but for my purposes, I adored it.
The cast is wonderful. There's so much heart but it's not cloying. It's really light and bright but grounded in this strong relationship between two sisters and relationships between women in general. The film plays with style to highlight humanity. It becomes more real in its fantasy because it taps into how we really feel about things, how big certain things can feel. We are all the main characters in our own stories, and our protagonist Ria has been thrust into an action heist where she needs to rescue the person she loves most.
Fight scenes involve blood, smashed mirrors, broken doors and walls. They're brutal but beautiful, choreographed to the hilt. But there's power in the attacks. It's less of a dance and more of a representation of emotion.
Priya Kansara is Ria, a high schooler whose dream is to become a stunt woman. She practices kicks at home, recording herself for YouTube, enlisting her sister Lena, played by Ritu Arya, to help. Ria is too much in so many ways, in a way that feels real. She's hot-headed, ready to fight for what she believes. But no one is fighting her. Her family is supportive. Sure, they want certain more traditional things — they want her to be a doctor, not a stunt woman — but they're overall really loving and kind. They just don't get it. They don't quite understand her.
I find that sort of struggle very interesting, because no one is putting up a real barrier but herself. She's fighting her own self-doubts, her own beliefs of how other people behave. It's why her sister choosing to get married instead of being an artist is so hard for her — because if her sister gives up on her dreams, what are Ria's chances of achieving her own?
Priya as an actress — it's this wonderful star-making performance. So charming, so awkward, so loving, so angry, so human. She loves her sister so much. The way she hypes her up, the way Lena hypes her in return, how much they care about each other's goals and futures. There's no judgment between the two until things take a turn. And even then, apologies are exchanged for words that were just a little too biting.
Ritu Arya as Lena is just plain cool, much like Ramona Flowers. She is the epitome of the cool older sister. She takes off her earrings before a fight scene later in the film. It's one of those moments that gives you chills — yes, it's about to go down. You see why Ria idolizes her, but you also clearly see the front that Lena is putting up. Lena has left art school, come home, and isn't sure what to do next. She doesn't feel like her art is good enough, so it's easy to be swayed into dating the successful Salim, who steals her away from her sister.
What's important about Ritu's portrayal is how she shows how trapped Lena feels. On the surface she's cool and collected, but you can sense the turmoil underneath. She plays both levels in a way the audience can see. There's a scene with the two sisters when they're not on great terms, in Lena's room — I was really struck by the lighting. The room feels like a real girl's bedroom. There's just a lamp on and things are awkward and Ria wants to be forgiven and Lena just needs space. It feels small, like I'm in this house with them in this tension. The whole film is really well shot — there's an intimacy even though it has massive fight scenes.
Our main villain is Raheela, mother of Salim, played with deliciously evil brilliance by Nimra Bucha. She has a real Yzma-Eartha-Kitt-in-Emperor's-New-Groove vibe with a dash more patriarchy. She wants her son married off to someone who can have a kid, but what I love about her is that she's working in service of herself. There's a strange empowerment to the ways she's trying to take control of her destiny, how she uses her son as a pawn for her own ultimate goals. She taps into the idea of sisterhood to trick the women around her.
She also has this incredible villain scene where she tortures Ria with a spa day that includes cuticle care and very aggressive waxing. The fight scene between Raheela and Ria — a big one with slo-mo and bird screeches and an evil laugh to end all evil laughs and screamed phrases like get me that womb — she's the perfect foil to Ria, someone upholding a standard that Ria is railing against, who sees Ria's goals as insignificant: what could you do to me?
Lena takes off her earrings before a fight scene and it's one of those moments that gives you chills. You see why Ria idolizes her, but you also clearly see the front she's putting up.
Salim is not the focus, but Akshay Khanna plays him as appropriately charming yet suspicious in the way hot, nice people are. He uses good looks to throw people off, and his kindness mixed with his mama's-boy energy plays into the strength of the women in the film. I love a male actor playing a role that uplifts the women around him. His chemistry with Nimra as the mother is very believable — they're a little too close in the way weird mama's boys and their mothers are.
The sisters' parents are traditional but loving. Their mother Fatima, played by Shobu Kapoor, is wonderful — warm but also wants her kids to be normal. She says something about a woman's giant ankles and both daughters immediately yell at her: Mom, that's not okay. She's trying to support daughters who are very lost and she points them toward what's easiest. You can't fault her for just wanting her kids to have an easy life.
I love Ria's friends Alba and Clara because they aren't yes men. There's a nod to Mean Girls, to Cady and Janis and Damian. These friends back her up 100% until she acts like a jerk and then they're out. But they also believe her — when she starts claiming her sister's boyfriend is part of an evil plot, they believe her. They're not unquestioning lackeys. When they go undercover at a gym and sneak into a men's locker room, it's so funny and dorky, but in a way where I want to be friends with them. They put on costumes, they have slang, they have a secret handshake.
Shared Themes
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World and Polite Society are both highly stylized in a way that compliments their artistry, in a way that feels rarer these days, in a way that I miss so much. They achieve a vision that is singular, that other movies haven't and can't copy. I think of films that have done this — Sin City, Sucker Punch. They take inspiration from grander types of film, the wire-fu of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. They weave in references and culture to make their points in a way that is clever.
This comparison is actually interestingly timed because I keep thinking about when I saw Deadpool & Wolverine and how furious I was that people were just laughing uproariously at a film with no script or plot other than, hey, did you know Ryan Reynolds is an actor and he has a wife and a list of IMDB credits? Remember that? And everyone's like, I remember that! He's been in other films!
That makes it all the more impressive for a film to use shared cultural consciousness to highlight themes and plot instead of to make up the structure. Both Scott Pilgrim and Polite Society have references, allusions. They weave shared references into their worlds. But their worlds don't hinge on the references. The references are used to highlight, to expand on what's already happening.
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is just plain fun if you don't think too hard about the underage girl. Everyone is giving it their all. Over the top, the editing is specific and punchy. Some of these talented actors are giving their best performances. I love a movie where it feels like people had fun making it. I love how Edgar Wright puts movies together. The comic pop-ups, the flying through the air, the way people use sound, voices, and physical ways that push against the boundaries of the screen. What a fantastic homage to the original comic — to capture the feelings of flipping pages in such a dynamic way.
Polite Society is done with such reverence for martial arts films, but also tells a very compelling story of sisterhood. The heightened emotion of being a high school girl is portrayed so brilliantly. The fact that the most brutal fight scene in the whole film is between the two sisters — that that is of course the one that affects Ria the most, that there is passion and anger in this fight — you feel it. You feel everything in this movie. Characters speak through action scenes just as much as through dialogue.
Like in Scott Pilgrim, battles happen in this world that no one else really reacts to. You don't know what's real and what's imagined. But you don't need to know. You know why they're battling and you know what the outcome means for their relationship.
Both films have their plots spurred along by the selfishness of their main characters. And that's not a bad thing. Scott and Ria have a goal. There's something they want for themselves, not taking into account what anyone else wants, and their films are about making these things happen, with the fighting being ancillary to that goal. I think you need an element of selfishness to get what you want in this world. You really do. If you're passive, things pass you by.
Scott Pilgrim I give less credit to because he's a grown man. Ria is a teenager. But look at the actual impetus behind Scott fighting the seven evil exes. It's not because Ramona needs saving. The exes aren't threatening her. It's because Scott wants to date Ramona. And the exes want Ramona too — they don't want anyone else to have her. They're not protecting her. Even the aggrandizing of it being Scott versus "the World." All right, Scott, it's only like seven people. Come on.
But how often do we get a full-on battle that isn't about the greater good? Scott isn't saving anyone, avenging anyone. He just wants to date a girl. That's not a negative — it's interesting. I don't like Scott, but the story structure that things happen because he wants this one thing for himself contributes to the whole vibe.
I especially love when women get to be selfish on film. And you know who is incredibly selfish? Teenagers. Don't mean that as an insult — that is just how it is. You think only of yourself. You don't think of your parents as real people. Everything is a means to an end.
In Polite Society, Ria wants to be a stunt woman. She wants to achieve this difficult dream, one made harder because a path hasn't been set out. She writes letters to the stunt woman she loves, Eunice Huthart — who is a real stunt woman — spilling her guts, begging for some of Eunice's time. She drags her sister to film her practicing moves. During a particularly awful fight, she tells Lena, I want you to be an artist, and Lena says, for Christ's sake, I'm not an artist, and you are not a stunt woman.
For Ria, their dreams are inexplicably entwined because she doesn't think about what her sister wants, but about how what her sister does affects her, how it reflects on her own capabilities. If her older sister can't make it at what she wants to do, how will Ria? Her fight to get her sister back into art, her constant reassurances to their parents and to herself that Lena will be an artist — she loves her sister, but it is in service of her own goal. I'm not judging that. I understand it. She has to realize her own self-worth and capabilities are hers alone.
What Polite Society Does Better
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is a little harder to watch in 2024 through a more critical lens, because it's such an imaginative world with just the most boring dude at its center. I guess he's an everyman and that's the point, but he's dull. Women are all over him. He's super weird. They keep hanging out with him anyway. We have so many everyman stories, so many anti-hero dude stories.
What's incredibly thrilling about Polite Society is that it is an interesting story about a British-Pakistani family, and yet the story itself is not at all about ethnicity. It's not even about gender. It is in no way a message movie.
Not every non-white, non-Christian, non-male story, every minority story needs to be about being a minority. Sure, some are and they're great. But for a film to just exist, to have a certain kind of representation without trying to speak for a community — when that's pulled off, it's really exciting.
On the Scott Pilgrim side, this movie is the ultimate fantasy for an introverted white dude. He doesn't have to try and things just go his way. Ramona is willing to go on a date with him for God knows what reason. Knives is into him. His friends keep hanging out with him. He sucks. A redeeming quality is never shown. It's ultimate Mary Sue wish fulfillment. There is a place for this kind of story, but it is not especially compelling to me.
In Polite Society, we are set amidst an Eid celebration. There are discussions of arranged marriage. Certain traditions are upheld. But the film is not about any of that. The film's about sisterhood, about growing up. It's sentimental, sweet. It left me with a smile. I cried. But it's not Oscar-bait about struggle and hardship. Ethnicity doesn't define this film. Heritage doesn't define it. But they heighten the realism of this world.
This movie is wholly itself, and even though I didn't grow up in a British-Pakistani household, I inherently understood what's going on with these relationships in the way I do in any film about families.
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is a fun movie, but I feel no connection to it, to Scott. I don't particularly relate to a single character. I leave it not thinking about it. It does exactly what an entertaining movie should do — it entertains while you're watching — but there's a special kind of magic in a film that you talk about later, that you're excited to talk about. I felt a connection with Polite Society. It has a point of view. It's saying something. It made me think. Not about anything heavy — just about my own relationships.
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is the perfect popcorn movie. Bright colors, loud sounds. But if someone said it was their favorite film, I'd question that a little bit. I remember the performances — it's so fun to go back and see all these successful actors being so silly — but there's no emotion in this film. And I cry at all movies, and I didn't cry at this. I'm not invested. I'm not invested in Scott or Ramona, who has taken such a backseat to her own life. There's no outcome that would have hit me emotionally because those bonds aren't developed.
Polite Society is one of those movies that just makes you happy. You smile because you see this girl — I've been this girl — and to see her figuring things out in the trappings of this very fun, out-there world layered onto a typical high school experience, it's just wonderful. It's the kind of movie you recommend to other people and are dying to know what they thought of it, because it speaks to a piece of you and you're hoping it speaks to them too. Every character is fully formed in such a way that I understand them. They're given moments for us to see who they are and who they wish they were. You're on a journey with these characters.
I hope you will watch Polite Society. It's on Peacock, available to rent, and on Delta flights. Great plane movie — very fun — but also great on a big TV to see the fight scenes.
Hit me up at @tastelesspod on social media. Tell me when you watch Polite Society, what you think — or if you've already seen it. I really love this one.
