These days it seems like everyone wants to be a
superhero especially nerds. Following on
from comic actor Rain Wilson’s brave attempt (with a lame script) as the Crimson
Bolt in ‘Super’ last year, we have Australian heartthrob actor Ryan Kwanten
disguised as a nerd disguised as ‘Griff The Invisible’ out to make the streets
of Sydney a safer place.
Griff is a quiet introvert who works as an office clerk
by day where he is taunted by a loud mouth bully, but at home, fueled by
an over-active imagination he plots and plans to fulfill his dreams of fighting crime on a nightly basis. His straight-laced brother Tim introduces his
new girl friend Melody a young scientist who has her own weird ideas on life
and she immediately sees Griff as a kindred spirit. The connection, which leads to a romance between the two (which horrifies
Tim, and initially scares Griff to death) becomes the centre focus of the drama,
and lifts it from being just another story of a nerd breaking through.
Newbie director/writer Leon Ford has somehow given the
area of Sydney he filmed in a very definite feel of Gotham City which gives a
great visual impact especially to the night scenes where Griff is rigged up in his Outfit and roaming around looking for ‘baddies’ and helps you forgive (forget?) the somewhat blurred crime
fighting storylines.
I have to admit that I liked this unpretentious and
easy going comedy that had a real old-fashioned feel to it … and being the only
gay man that I know who has never seen Mr. Kwanten in ‘True Blood', I had no preconceived
ideas about his talent or other qualities. He and Maeve Dermody (playing Melody)
make for a nice loony couple that almost do convince you that walking through
a wall is actually possible!
