Flights of fancy have driven us to the movies for decades. That magical liberation from real life into a place where the rules of everyday life are warped and noble people — or repulsive individuals, if it’s a German art film — live out an extraordinary existence that we’re invited to share is the heart of cinema and the core of any good film.

“Kick-Ass” isn’t perfect, but it beautifully captures the thrill of fantasy and the snubbing of our dreams that always accompanies leaving the darkened cinema to go back to daily life.

The movie recounts the tale of Dave (Aaron Johnson), a guy living through the part of his life us college students are fortunate enough to be forgetting: high school.

His home life with a remote father and slightly dickish friends at school provides the same impetus as a radioactive spider.

With nothing to lose and a passion for the colorful and noble calling of fighting crime, he buys a wet suit and dons a cheap pair of work boots to patrol New York and bring about justice.

Of course, he gets kinetic force applied to his proverbial keister, but he does begin to inspire people.

Soon a small motley crew of supers is fighting the mob, and the noble calling of fighting crime becomes a target of the kind of guys who interrogate people with a microwave.

The film is beautifully shot with short, intense action sequences. The violence here has its share of choreography, but there’s a real brutality and amateurishness to the fight sequences.

It looks like it hurts when Dave gets bloodied and stabbed, injecting a layer of grittiness to the proceedings.

The jokes are incredibly well done, even though there are a few duds.

The sense of the ridiculous is perfectly captured here, gathering laughs from the insanity a person would have to possess to go out dressed like Adam West.

The characters are well developed and quirky in an endearing rather than grating way. Johnson and Chloe Moretz — playing the delightfully hard-edged yet playful Hit Girl — are actually teenagers, and despite the high-pitched voices and unpolished acting skills, the benefit of being able to believe that these are damaged kids out fighting crime adds to the thrill.

Hollywood needs more movies like this. “Kick-Ass” has its share of genre conventions and a few lame jokes, but it portrays an excellent skewering of our cultural identity crisis.

Dave, breaking free of his chains at first as a vigilante, soon finds that hiding his true nature from the world — whether from behind a mask or pretending to be gay in order to get closer to his crush — results in the most disappointing and dangerous of situations.

When watching, pay attention to what happens to those honest about who and what they are as opposed to those who rely on false senses of self.

I’ve waited my whole life for a movie about superhero wannabes who just say, “Screw it,” and solve their problems with guns.

 Obviously this isn’t a realistic solution to real-world strife, but that’s the dichotomy at play in “Kick-Ass.”

We’ve had many movies that take us far away, but when you can ground us in the real world with just enough tweaking to make us laugh and cheer, it’s an accomplishment.

See it, talk about it and revel in it.

Alexander Hutchins is a junior in journalism and mass communication from Ankeny.