In Alexander Payne\u2019s new film Downsizing, Matt Damon is shrunk down to five inches tall so he can reap the benefits of being incredibly small \u2013 such as all biscuits being the size of a dinner table, and being able to crawl up inside your boss\u2019s arse and vibrate until they give you a promotion.<\/p>\n
Yet the film doesn\u2019t really address the physical implications of being a real-life Borrower. Instead, it considers the impact shrinking everyone might have on the population problem and the environment \u2013 you\u2019d take up less space, you wouldn\u2019t eat as much, and you\u2019d produce less waste. It even goes on a political tangent, suggesting that those who undergo the procedure will no longer be contributing to the economy in the same way as fully-sized people, so are therefore not entitled to a vote. But at no point does Matt Damon jump several hundred feet in the air and obliterate a pigeon with a single punch.<\/p>\n
If you were really shrunk down to five inches tall you would basically become Ant-Man. You\u2019d be able to jump incredibly high and you\u2019d possess superhuman strength. You\u2019d probably even achieve the power of flight if you attached some feathers and flapped like a maniac. It just seems a shame that none of this is included in Alexander Payne\u2019s otherwise intriguing sci-fi comedy.<\/p>\n
I was at least expecting a scene in which Jason Sudeikis gets violently mauled by a vole. Matt Damon would then come to his rescue by kicking the usually innocuous rodent into the sun. Cheesy chin-heavy man Christoph Waltz could have played the super villain releasing all kinds of vermin into their miniature community, and Hong Chau, who gives an incredibly moving performance as a Vietnamese refugee amputee, could have used her prosthetic leg like a baseball bat to hit rats into space.<\/p>\n
What I really had trouble with was the fact that they also shrunk horses. What a wasted opportunity to have Matt Damon heroically trot onto the scene on the back of an armoured guinea pig, a birthday badge shield in one hand and a weasel\u2019s head on a spike in the other.<\/p>\n
Perhaps if Downsizing had incorporated such elements, the Marvel-loving contingent would have given it better reviews. Idiots.<\/p>\n