Back
in 2008, the hot ticket was "The Dark Knight", the wildly anticipated
Batman reboot "Batman Begins". And rightfully so. Director Christopher
Nolan's reboot of the franchise was a critical and commercial success,
and pushed the director, and his star, Christian Bale, immediately into
the A-list and in high demand. Now, the sequel was upon us, with an
insane amount of hype and mystery surrounding not only the film itself,
but the performance of Heath Ledger as the Joker.
However,
before Batman could reign supreme, there was another comic book film
building up mystery and interest. Director Jon Favreau was bringing a
screen adaptation of one of Marvel's slightly lesser known heroes (when
compared to the iconic Spider-Man, Hulk, and X-Men); Iron Man. The film
had no real expectations, people expected it to be moderately successful
and just merely OK. But as the interest and anticipation of the film
grew, it gained an audience. Robert Downey Jr. had been cast in the lead
role, which was genuinely unheard of to cast such a risky actor in the
lead of a summer blockbuster tent-pole film.
And
then the film came, and boy did it make a splash. Breaking box office
records for a non-sequel, the film was an unexpected critical and
commercial hit. That was sooooo 2008.
2010
is upon us and we are now seeing the release of "Iron Man 2", the
wildly anticipated sequel to 2008's surprise smash hit. In one of the
opening scenes of the film, Tony Stark makes a grand entrance to the
"Stark Expo" and asks the cheering audience "Oh it's good to be back!
Did you miss me", as if asking the film's audience themselves. We sure
did Tony. The question is, the film indeed shoots to thrill, but is it
as good as the first film? The answer, yes and no.
First,
the good. The acting is all around excellent. The film is a bit more of
an ensemble piece than the first film, but that's not a bad thing. In
some ways, it makes you wish that each character was given more
screen-time, but overall, the more important ones are given plenty.
Robert Downey Jr., of course, proves why he was so perfectly cast in the
first place. What makes Robert Downey Jr. so brilliant in the role is
that in some ways, it's a more extreme extension of his own personality,
charming, suave, and full of dry wit, but when the going gets tough, so
does he. You can really see the pain in his eyes as he realizes that
the technology that he needs to keep himself alive is also slowly
killing him. But just as well, when duty calls, he's there to kick some
serious ass.
However,
if there's one actor that threatens to steal the show and own the film
all to himself, it's the great Mickey Rourke. Rourke takes a somewhat
underwritten yet nonetheless potent role and turns it into something
brilliant. Rourke's use of method acting really shows here, as he went
to great lengths to avoid phoning it in, which, in the hands of a lesser
actor, Whiplash/Ivan Vanko is the kind of role any other actor would
have simply done a half-assed job and collected their paycheck. But not
Rourke. He famously did research at Russian prisons to get a sense of
what the character would be like, and how he would look. From the
hundreds of Vory v Zakone (Russian Mafia) tattoos that evoke memories of
Viggo Mortensen in "Eastern Promises" to the glasses, to the black hair
with white streaks, so his cockatoo, Rourke creates something out of
nothing, which is sheer acting brilliance. He's intimidating, hulking,
and at once, despite how scary he can be, you feel for him at times.
He's not so much a villain as much as a guy simply rebelling against the
military industrial complex and going after the biggest perpetrator of
them all; the Stark family.
It
really is Downey and Rourke that make the film worth the price of
admission alone, but the rest of the cast is firing on all cylinders.
They simply are just a bit underused and thus don't get to truly shine,
but they leave their mark nonetheless. Clearly, Jon Favreau's experience
as an actor really makes him an actor's director and promotes really
top notch work from his cast, which is especially significant in a comic
book film, where all too often talented actors simply phone it in and
get paid. Speaking of Favreau, his breezy, fast and loose style of
filmmaking returns from the first film, making the film easy to swallow
and altogether fun. It can be a bit unfocused feeling at times, but just
when the film feels like it's going to stay too far off, it gets back
on track.
One
way in which the sequel really outclasses it's predecessor is the
action sequences, which are directed with far more assurance and boast
some truly great visual effects. The Monaco race track sequence evokes
some great tension in it's buildup, with Rourke striding confidently
onto a high speed race track without batting an eye and just tearing
cars apart with his whips. Stark is caught off guard and unprotected,
and the tension used as Rourke slowly lumbers toward him, whips
crackling with electricity, is so intense that one begins to fear for
Stark and fear Whiplash. The suitcase suit itself is just so damn
awesome when it finally gets used that it's hard to remember how lame
that suit was in the comics. That Favreau and ILM could take something
previously lame in the comics and make it badass in the film is just
great.
Luckily,
the final act of the film doesn't run out of steam and create an
anti-climactic finale like the first film somewhat suffered from. The
big action finale of "Iron Man 2" is every bit as jaw-dropping as one
could hope. By the way, was anyone able to pay attention to Iron Man in
the botanical gardens sequence? I didn't think so. I was too busy
watching War Machine rip drones apart with his awesome artillery.
However, not to be outshone, Iron Man busts out a move that can only be
describe by the loud chorus of "HOLY SHIT!" heard throughout the
theatre. Even I yelled it out at that point.
For
all this talk about the great things of the film, it is in no way
perfect. The main issue with the film is Justin Thoreaux's script. At
it's best, it's funny and good, at it's worst, an unfocused mess of a
screenplay. It's the very definition of a mixed bag. The film kind of
struggles to gain solid footing in the first act, and there's a bit too
much heavy handed exposition in the second act, but the second act is
nonetheless where the film finds its legs and gets back on track. Also,
there's a lot of clunky dialogue in the first act in particular, with a
number of scenes that try to be cute little moments of comic relief, but
evolve into noisy, unfocused scenes of people talking over each other,
which takes away from the intended humor because one can't discern what
anyone is saying. Lastly, the pacing is all over the place until the
major turning point in the second act, which creates for an uneven
experience.
Despite
it's flaws with the script, "Iron Man 2" remains one hell of a ride,
even if it doesn't quite reach the excellence of it's predecessor. It's
still much better than most everything out there and is a worthy
successor to 2008's smash hit. The performances from Robert Downet Jr.
and Mickey Rourke alone make the film worth seeing, and it's still
wildly entertaining and fun.
