“I love peace,” quips billionaire arms manufacturer Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) after successfully demonstrating powerful new cluster missile technology to the American military in Afghanistan.
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Iron Man
Directed by Jon Favreau. |
out of 5After all, it’s easy to love peace when you live in a state-side mansion, exposed to Middle East conflict only on television and during the occasional field trip to demonstrate, in relative safety, your latest gadgets to the participants in those conflicts. What’s more, Stark is not only a military engineering genius, but a playboy womanizer with a streak of reckless, flippant immaturity – think Bruce Wayne crossed with James Bond via Old School’s Frank the Tank (or, really, any Will Ferrell character), or, in short, the kind of guy whose private jet comes equipped with a stripper pole for his cohort of sultry flight attendants.
Unfortunately for Stark, his renown makes him desirable to less savoury clients than the U.S. military, and so, following half an hour of pure Lord of War meets Thank You For Smoking, the film kicks into comic book gear. After the weapons test, Stark is kidnapped by an Afghani terrorist organization called the Ten Rings and told he will remain imprisoned until he builds his captors a cluster missile of their own out of the Stark Industries weapons they have been stockpiling. Instead, Stark fashions himself a mechanized suit of armour, the likes of which RoboCop could only dream about, and blasts his way to safety.
At its core, every superhero movie is about growing up. Stark is not saddled with Batman’s brooding, self-indulgent angst or Spiderman’s literal adolescence, so his maturation is the development of a conscience. Back in the States, even as he works on an upgraded successor to his exoskeletal suit with which to destroy the Ten Rings and return comparative peace to Afghanistan, he announces his company will no longer manufacture weapons. The decision is blocked by his business partner, Obadiah Stane (Jeff Bridges), and the board of directors; Stark’s only supportive ally seems to be his secretary and potential future love interest, Virginia “Pepper” Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow). Ultimately, after overcoming the Ten Rings with apparent ease, Stark returns to the U.S. only to find that the Iron Man prototype he built while imprisoned in Afghanistan was recovered and upgraded by a deadly enemy back at home.
Downey Jr. is well suited to the superhero gig, with a patented personal insouciance that is more than a match for Spiderman’s wisecracks or Superman’s earnest platitudes; this does render his performance emotionally hollow, but it hardly matters. The screenwriters wisely decided to make room for all Iron Man’s trappings – political, thematic, computer-generated and plain old metal – by eschewing the requisite love story. Instead, the focus falls on building a believable character and what feels like the very solid foundation of a new comic book film franchise.
Good writing certainly helps. Stark’s rapport with Pepper, Obadiah, and his liaison in the U.S. Air Force acquisitions department, Lt. Col. Rhodes (Terrence Howard), feels totally authentic. There are no eye-rolling speeches or corny one-liners. Director Jon Favreau can take credit for a well-rounded film with a superbly even feel to it; its high points may not compare favourably with other superhero film climaxes and fight sequences, but there are few low points at all.
If Iron Man has one real flaw, aside from a predictable choice of antagonist, it would be poor pacing, which gives Tony Stark more than an hour to acquire back-story, character arc, and idiosyncracies aplenty, but ends up rushing through its third act with very little action. Iron Man’s run-in with American fighter pilots clueless as to his nature or identity lacks tension, as Col. Rhodes is watching the entire time from a command centre, communicating with Stark over the phone. The climactic robo-suit showdown is the only piece of serious action, and will definitely leave fight-scene junkies wanting more.
In terms of quality, Iron Man is difficult to rank against its fellow comic book films. To be sure, it stands head and shoulders above the bad – The Fantastic Four, Ghost Rider – and the mediocre – Superman Returns – but as much as it doesn’t outright fail on any level, it lacks the endearing characterizations of the first two Spiderman movies, the epic, team-based feel of X-Men and its immediate sequel, or the sheer intensity of Batman Begins. It follows the same tepid conventions as its peers, right from the training montage up to the return of the former mentor, now evil, and if it makes up for them with a solid cast and seamless special effects—robot duels didn’t look half as good in Transformers, despite all the fuss – it is only because of the incredible talent and effort put into a film project that is at its foundation of narrative and plot quite unremarkable. But no movie with production values this high, special effects this costly, and actors this capable – it is especially nice to see Jeff Bridges playing a role diametrically opposed to Jeffrey Lebowski – could possibly be tedious or difficult to watch.
At the very least, by questioning (even in that hyperbolic yet superficial comic-book way) the practices of arms manufacturers and the corporate stake in the balance between peace and war, Iron Man achieves a contemporary resonance which demonstrates exactly why Superman no longer feels relevant.
Comic book aficionados would be well advised to stick around for an extra scene after the closing credits.