From Paper to Celluloid to Digital

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World might be the greatest movie ever made....provided that you grew up in North America during the late 80s and happened to be into indie rock or video games.  As you can probably see those are some pretty major caveats.  In fact, I think the film being a theatrical failure had a lot to do with it being specially tailored to a rather niche demographic.  Certainly, the cinematography is not lacking.  So many shots throughout the film have a creative density that practically necessitates multiple viewings in order to fully appreciate.  The dialogue is also chalked full of humorous wordplay...the kind of thing that is practically impossible to convey in another language.  As if killing any potential for international success wasn't harsh enough Scott Pilgrim vs. The World is a tricky film to categorize in terms of genre.  Is it a comedy?...an action film?...Fantasy?...or romance?  One of director Edger Wright's previous movies, Shaun of the Dead, is often described as a romantic comedy that just happens to have zombies in it.  Edger Wright himself described Scott Pilgrim vs. The World as a musical with the songs replaced by fight scenes.  Much like how each song has its own theme, it does feel like each fight in the film has its own flavor:  Bollywood, Pro Skater, Rock Band, Chinese martial arts, kaiju and chambara to be chronologically specific.  Since this is a blog about video games though, lets focus in that particular aspect of the movie.

References to video games in Scott Pilgrim vs. The World range from obvious to so obscure they might not have been intentional.  One of the most overt tributes is to River City Ransom in that defeated opponents transform into coins.  Some of the martial arts moves in various fight scene are taken directly from Street Fighter Alpha 2 (particularly the "K.O." announcement).  The sequential nature of the one-on-one battles mixed with the girl-in-peril trope is a common thematic pairing for games like Karateka, Kung-fu Master and Double Dragon (the last of those three also makes a visually symbolic appearance toward the end of the film).  Somewhat less obvious is the name of one of the fictional indie rock bands - Clash at Demonhead.  This is actually a direct reference to a little-known 8-bit era NES game released in 1990.  During the "Bass Battle" the character Scott Pilgrim plays the bass line from a Final Fantasy II song (actually IV) for the SNES.  The Legend of Zelda is refrenced is several places: music from the series plays during the opening and during a dream sequence, Ramona's three different hair colors (pink, blue and green) are based on the three goddesses from Ocarina of Time, and Nega Scott is a spoof on Dark Link.  I've also seen it suggested that the indoor pyramid structure at the end of the film is a reference to Zelda 2: Adventures of Link.  What isn't clear though is whether or not it was intentional.  Another example is the importance of speaking in rhymes during battles.  The Monkey Island series by now-defunct Lucas Arts often featured swashbuckling sword duels wherein players had to select rhyming dialogue options in order to progress.  Some of the shots in the film use comic book style framing composition but few are actually taken from cutscenes in the original Ninja Gaiden.  Speaking of ninja...I think it is pretty obvious where the fictional "Ninja Ninja Revolution" arcade game got its inspiration from.  There are also numerous instances of video game sound effects being used from titles such as Sonic, Tekken, Smash Bros., and Super Mario 3.  In a more general sense, there is the appearance of health bars, 1UPs, leveling up and dialogue bleeps lifted from Commodore 64 bootup noises.  

Getting points for defeating foes has to one of the most universal aspects of classic video game design, but I wonder how many young people would understand the reference?  Even the "Continue?" countdown sequence at the end might be lost on someone who has never set foot in an arcade.  Regardless, I think Scott Pilgrim vs. The World will be a time capsule of sorts for future generations and for the foreseeable future the very definition of a "cult classic".