Iron Man Review
The GistHe's a man... in an iron suit.
The Review
Iron Man Before I head into the review proper, I want to just talk a bit about The Incredible Hulk trailer that plays before it, as well as a tiny bit on TDK trailer (that's The Dark Knight, aka Batman II, or six if we're counting the films within a twisted Bond/Doctor Who style canon).
TDK has that built in buzz factor, and is creepy as anything (in a good way, although seeing Heath as The Joker still unsettles me a little because, well, it's a little hard to disassociate there), but The Incredible Hulk is the perfect trailer to set you up for Iron Man. Why? Not just because it's spine tingly awesome (which it is), but because the footage of TIH has the same feel as that of Iron Man. They feel like they belong in the same universe, which is excellent. There's also the sense that they've figured out TIH this time, which is good because while I did enjoy the first one it was way too crazy to work for a mainstream audience.
Now, onto our feature presentation.
Iron Man is the best comic-book film to date. Flat-out. For me this is as damn close to a comic-book as you can get, while ironing out the crinkles within the character that cause people to roll their eyes. Heck, for me this film is the best solo Iron Man story to date because it feels organic and genuine in a way that the comic-book seldom does. I know there's a fair few of you thinking 'No, Batman Begins is the best comic-book film to date'.
But I disagree.
While it is a truly great film, Batman Begins does not have the feel of the comic-book. At all. It nails Batman perfectly, but the film feels like a reinvention of the comic-book, so much so that a lot of what makes the comic-book good (a mixture between the colourful and the gritty) is missing. That's not a bad choice, but if you put a panel from, say, Hush up against Batman Begins there's very little the two have in common. Not to mention how BB is structured in such a way that no other DC property can exist in that world.
Can you imagine Superman there? Or Killer Croc? Or even The Penguin?
No, because BB is a very loose adaptation of the comic-book. Which means it's a terrific film, but really doesn't want more than a basic association with the Batman that comic-book fans know. Iron Man does.
It has rid itself of the goofier elements, but every single fibre of the film itself lends itself to the comic-book. Tony Stark feels like he's leapt from the page to the screen and lost nothing, and so do Pepper Potts and Rhodes. These guys weren't modified for the screen, they were put up in their true forms and allowed to exist as they should.
Credit has to be given here, the casting in this is flawless. Downey Jr, Paltrow and Rhodes are pitch-perfect, and Bridges isn't far behind. They embody their characters genuinely, allowing them to embrace the comic-book elements but maintain a truthfulness. While Bale is an awesome Batman, his is more an interpretation than anything else.
Downey Jr NAILS Tony Stark, in such a way that shortly into the film you stop seeing him and there's this crazy moment where you just see Tony Stark up there, with no acting involved. Taken as an origin story, this film successfully sets up a new universe. You believe there's superheroes out there, you buy that Tony has a redemption story, and you get the sense that he's going places. He kicks ass, he sleeps around, he's basically James Bond in a suit, but they let Tony go to darker places than Bond does.
Even in Casino Royale (another great flick), we knew Bond was going to be okay. Here, it's never quite that sure. Stark is an amoral son of a gun, and even when he's doing the right thing does it in such a way that you can see them pulling off a Civil War flick in twenty years, and not having to change or modify his personality to do it. As for Favreau, well he surprised me. I didn't dig on Zathura, disliked Elf, and felt he was the wrong man for the job. The trailer got my hopes up, this surpassed them. He delivers a memo to everyone else on how to frame a comic-book story, managing to make it feel as if it takes place in the real world while ensuring plenty of 'whoa' comic-book visuals. He never goes too far down either direction, and the result is a film which doesn't need to wow us every five seconds, because it knows the money shots need to be set up properly.
This is an exceptionally well crafted flick, and the only real drawback is that it's all set-up. This isn't bad in any way, shape, or form, because they're not plowing through thirty years of stories. They are creating a new universe, the film full of hints to future Iron Man tales (The Mandarin... War Machine... Tony's alcoholism), as well as introducing us to SHIELD, which is so subtly done that it'll go over the heads of many non-Marvel fanboys I'd imagine. Is it better than X-Men II? No. But it feels like Iron Man the comic-book more than X-Men II felt like an X-Men comic-book. And allows other such films to play in the yard. So I'd give this a 4/5, and advise people to go and see it.
Perfect casting, excellent set-up, a killer last-line and the feeling that they've genuinely made something that works equally for the geeks and mainstream.
The Verdict:
4 machs out of a possible 5.
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