Sidekick (Blake Van de Graaf) Rating: NN Rating: NNNNN
Sidekick is Unbreakable without the twist, Clerks without the jokes, The 40-Year-Old Virgin without Steve Carell.
Norman (Perry Mucci) is a diffident computer whiz obsessed with comic books who one day discovers that his workmate Victor (David Ingram) is telekinetic. Norman becomes convinced he can train Victor to be a superhero, but Victor has other plans. As Norman’s friend Chuck (Daniel Baldwin) points out, Norman instead turns him into a kick-ass villain.
Shot in Toronto (for once not trying to disguise itself), this gala opener for the Canadian Filmmakers Festival boasts bad dubbing and lighting so harsh it’s hard to believe the film was shot on 35mm and not on video.
Mucci and Ingram are believable in their roles, though. And Victor makes a good point about the naivet of superheroes, asking why, after catching Lex Luthor for the hundredth time, Superman doesn’t just kill him and save everyone a lot of trouble.
But pop culture minutiae have been discussed to death in far wittier (or scarier) films than this, and by the time Norman presents Victor with his very own costume, the movie, along with Norman’s hero, is lost. (March 23 at the Varsity, April 15 at the Royal)
