you touch people's ears at random
Tuesday's movie: Iron Man. Y'know, when we heard that Robert Downey, Jr. was starring in this movie, Sarah expressed some surprise that he was cast as a superhero. But even tho I was never a big Iron Man fan, I was enough of a comics geek to know that it seemed like pretty good casting. Tony Stark is, basically, a bastard. He's a multi-millionaire arms dealer/playboy turned superhero. And Downey does a great job of bringing that debased charm and sense of "how cool is this" at having super-powers (okay, having a super suit) to the screen. I'd call it a great performance. Not a great movie. It's fun, for sure. But I'd say it's a B movie with an A cast.
Definite script problems for one thing. Things start out with generic "middle eastern terrorist" villians (think True Lies). Even though the action's happening in Afghanistan. But then partway thru, things get switched up and Jeff Bridges (evil billionaire industrialist) becomes the new big bad. Terrence Howard and Gwyneth Paltrow really don't have enough to work with in their supporting roles. There's some nice set pieces. I didn't think the ending was the high point. Iron Man's strike on the Afghan village and the air battle with the US fighters were, for me, the movie's peak. The final showdown w/ Stane (or Stain, or however the hell you spell it) was big and boomy but not as amazing, I didn't think.
Still, I give Favreau a lot of credit for making a superhero movie that's quick on its feet and doesn't take itself so seriously.