Against my expectations, I really enjoyed this. It is worth watching for three reasons:
1) Robert Downey Jr. He is more or less perfect for the role displaying his cynical brand of humor leavened with some low key but effective acting (especially early on when he is imprisoned by some Taleban-esque Afghans).
2) the dialogue is clever, quick and genuinely funny in places. Downey’s lines with Gwyneth Paltrow and Jeff Bridges (both of whom handle their roles well) have the sort of zing that you don’t normally associate with a summer blockbuster.
3) the Iron Man him/itself. The usual superhero backstory is about how Bruce Wayne became Batman, or Peter Parker became Spiderman. Here the backstory is shorn of any real psychological drama. It is about mechanics and pulleys and “arc reactors” and stabilizers and such like. What we get is a strong sense of whizz-bangery (and several funny scenes of Downey testing the equipment).
Good old-fashioned entertainment. As one of my kids noted, it is rare that an audience applauds a movie like this when the final credits roll.
I too quite enjoyed this. (My pinky was off the keyboard as I typed that last sentence.)
MINOR SPOILERS…
But it was an odd enjoyment, coupled with some real discomfort early on. What is this thing I’m enjoying? Downey’s charismatic Stark is nonetheless a very obvious asshole when we first meet him, and he’s quickly grabbed by a gaggle of grimy “ethnics” (I gather they were Afghani, but it was difficult to figure out). And they seemed for the most part bug-eyed, hook-nosed, big-bearded, and babblingly semi-competent in ways that recalled far too forcefully all kinds of terrible stereotypes. And then they tortured this white guy–dunking him again and again in water, for instance. Even as the film lays out its strong anti-war-machine message, and (inevitably) finds a corporate white American villain even more nefarious behind it all, it still seemed like this perfect distillation of the ideological contradictions and confusion of American pop culture.
I mean that in a kind of good way. I think it’d be hard for ANYONE to easily displace the images we have of Americans as torturers and Iraqis/Afghans/Arabs as victims of said torture; the scenes with Stark then have this weird disjointed uncanny feel, and I felt the audience I was with shifting around in their seats. (It wasn’t particularly grueling to watch. I think it was much more that dissonance of representation from our recollections of the reality.) It was then enormously pleasing to return with Tony home, to see him recover (or just create) a newfound moral streak, and–yeah–to couple that morality with some big-boom violence, now all in the cause of good.
So, what I’m saying is, it’s a fun movie. But the fun is never fully escapist–not for me, and I think not for others watching.
What did you think, Chris? (Or your son/s who went with you?)
SPOILERS
No question that the portrayal of the Afghan group (Afghani is the currency, BTW, not the people) was problematic. The ethnic origins of the members of the group seemed all over the place, with the boss looking Iranian while his subordinates were drawn from North-West Frontier Province central casting. There were all sorts of opportunities for the movie to make us feel sympathy for the captors (Stark had, after all, just sold this horrendous missile to their enemies) but they were all resisted. No women and children mutilated by the missile, no speeches about the horrors of American imperialism. In that sense, the movie was entirely tone deaf, and I have to assume that was a deliberate choice.
And I agree that it is hard to see any act of torture today without thinking of the US. It didn’t make me squirm primarily because it seemed pretty tame (I had read that Stark was waterboarded, but it is old-fashioned dunking) and I remember it as being very brief.
This is going to be interesting because it is difficult to imagine the average summer blockbuster NOT containing at least one scene of our hero (or his/her loved ones) being tortured by nondescript foreign types. And all such scenes now take place under the shadow of American torture.
You Britishis are so particular.
Give me a break! I have been in the presence of “history” precisely once: living in Afghanistan in 1979-81. If I don’t milk that, and live off it for the rest of my sad, pathetic life, what do I have going for me? You know me, Reynolds; at least give me this tiny slice of expertise!
I was just teasing–you have far, far more expertise than you’re naming here, but I’m happy to stipulate how friggin’ smart your post was. The acuity of your eye, recognizing the blur of ethnicities among Stark’s captors, was impressive. I can merely recognize that I’m being given a muddle, but I’m still knee-deep in that muddle.
You make a good point about the generic tendency toward torture of the protagonist. When did that take hold? It seems like Mel Gibson’s made it a contractual obligation (surprising, for instance, in that crap rom-com where Helen Hunt applied electrodes to his nipples). I’m trying to recall a pre-Stallone/Gibson variant…. but I’m stuck.
When films explicitly about Iraq seem to be box-office poison, it’ll be interesting to see how the blockbusters circle ’round underneath that shadow. As you note, the “deliberate” neglect is not so much indifference as a kind of “choice” that filmmakers (and then viewers) are negotiating. I think that’s what I meant by squirm. The scenes are terribly tame by most measures. But–and I don’t think I’m projecting–the audience seemed restless then. (I recall that BOTH times I saw Children of Men the entrance of the ‘fugee bus to the concentration camp, and the sight of the prisoners lined up a la Abu Ghraib, made each audience literally gasp.) My group didn’t applaud at Iron Man, but there was clear appreciation. What kind of appreciation is it? I was circling ’round that age-old question about whether these are fantasies of repression or displacement. I’m assuming it’s not either/or… Jeff and I saw Harold & Kumar, and that’s a far more frontal assault on such anxieties–but still full of the kinds of displacement and repression that make it more palatably “escapist.” Plus, alas, it sucks. Like, two laughs. That’s a real shame, both because I really enjoy the first one, and the sequel seemed so ripe with subversive energy…
Didn’t the kindly doctor remark that one of the terrorists was speaking Hungarian ??! huh? and if you lived near LA and were hungry for a cheeseburger, would you go to Burger King? not The Apple Pan. not Fatburger. Not In ‘N’ Out. But Burger King??
These are the questions that preoccupied me after seeing Iron Man . That and Jon Favreau’s growing resemblance to Tony Soprano. But less importantly it also seems true that, as you have all pointed out, the film embodies a strange ambivalence toward American power. Stark decides for about ten minutes not to use the Iron Man suit as a weapon, then when he finds out that refugees are being abused, he thinks “what the hell” and turns the thing into a killing machine. Why wouldn’t the Iron Man apparatus be as susceptible to misuse and misappropriation as any other kind of weapon? Then, in the film’s strangest moment, he throws the ugliest terrorist to the crowd, to do as they like with him. Why? Because he refused the kind of direct violence it would take to kill him (he’s not posing an immediate threat) or because justice by “the people” is somehow more fitting? altogether, Iron Man is a weird kind of superhero–perhaps not a superhero at all–because he’s just the guy who happens to be inside the suit. Why couldn’t anyone do it? The film makes a big deal about putting technology into an ethical framework but then somehow exempts the central bit of technology from it. Maybe that’s fitting–because it mirrors the contemporary confusion regarding technology (it’s just a tool or its ethics are somehow built into it).
Michael wrote: “Iron Man is a weird kind of superhero–perhaps not a superhero at all–because he’s just the guy who happens to be inside the suit. Why couldn’t anyone do it? The film makes a big deal about putting technology into an ethical framework but then somehow exempts the central bit of technology from it. Maybe that’s fitting–because it mirrors the contemporary confusion regarding technology (it’s just a tool or its ethics are somehow built into it).”
Had to repeat ’em, because those are fantastic points.
There’s the ghost of a subversive critique in the film, that such technology demands its use–whether a missile or a suit, we can fret about who has access to the tech, but regardless the suit (or missile) will fulfill its destructive potential.
And it’s tempting to turn from the technology in the film to the technology of film: picking up a point Gio made on the TWBB thread, how do these representations–even when the product of nice and nice-minded folks like Favreau–produce a set of (unwanted) outcomes, produce and/or satisfy a range of viewers’ (unpleasant) desires, no matter the message inside the spectacle? I tend to disagree, but the film seems to suggest otherwise.
On reflection, I wish this had been a lot more Irony Man than mere Iron.
in the comics stark isn’t the only one in the suit. and at some point the suit becomes sentient and turns on stark. not that i’ve read the comics, but i’ve read wikipedia.
re the terrorists at the beginning: when stark is first captured, we hear someone recording demands, and it’s in perfectly accented urdu. so i was confused when the stocky dude in the beard started speaking arabic. luckily the doc explained that it was a kind of united nations of terrorists. then the bald hulking dude again spoke in perfectly accented urdu/hindi (though i suspect he was dubbed)–weirdly, the subtitles did not translate accurately what was being said. (the doc, however, had a strong accent in urdu/hindi, though not as bad as jeff bridges’ later in the film.) anyway, i guess if we take their attention to detail seriously, the chief terrorist would be pakistani/indian.
this is what i mostly took away from the film tonight. that and the fact that i found gwyneth paltrow, who usually annoys me, to be quite winning. i did enjoy it, but not as much as all the rave reviews had led me to expect i would. not as good as the first two spiderman films, but certainly better than the upcoming hulk disaster.
Watched this last night. Good: Robert Downey, Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Jeff Bridges, the dialogue, some of the direction. Not so good: just about everything else.
I agree with Michael–Iron Man is not a superhero. And I think the film is aware of this. Stark, just as himself, is pretty remarkable. His brain is amazing, and he’s got a superhuman stamina for drinking and fucking. The film flirts with this unusual idea, and sometimes subverts the conventions of the American superhero. At the end of the film, Stark can’t resist disclosing the fact that he’s Iron Man–effectively rendering the key element of the superhero myth, his anonymity, null and void.
Downey, Jr. did a really good job of conveying real fear, real shock. So I’m not sure the transition from asshole to conscientious objector was not believable. And with that, the filmmakers had the ball in their court to do anything they wanted with its own politics. It could have been really smart. This was my main complaint with Avatar, though Arnab is right to point out you can’t expect that from Cameron…but you can with Iron Man. This was supposed to be the thinking man’s superhero. Full of irony and wit. As I watched the scenes with the terrorists, a nagging voice in the back of my mind kept asking, “really?” I mean, how many years has it been since True Lies?
It would have been kind of interesting if Stark had been nabbed by thugs from Blackwater instead of terrorists of varied and vague origins. The link–Jeff Bridge’s character–is certainly there to make the scenario work. Turning the tables is not what I’m after. I just think you can’t really address these interesting ambivalences (about technology, about America as an occupying power) AND use the old conventions of films like this (i.e., everything you guys point out in your early comments–especially Mike).
Another bit of a disappointment: the final fight scene between Iron Man and Obadiah (wow! what a name! I think the last time a name like that was used in a film was in Witness. Obadiah: “Your wife is very plain”).
Still, there’s enough here to please. So thumbs up.
we watched the sequel today. enjoyable enough but much duller than the first*. not enough rourke who owns every scene he’s in. sam rockwell also very good. downey’s naughty rascal charm is beginning to wear a little thin, however. the big special effects scenes are boring and confusing (though the bit with the grand prix was great), and the climactic showdown was like an expensive production of those rock’em sock’em robot thingies.
*as always happens in american films the narrative eventually turns out to be about fathers and sons and patrimony.
I had a similar reaction, though I still get a kick out of Downey’s patter, and his dialogue with Paltrow was often clever. In fact, the dialogue was good overall, and much better than the average comic book-based movie. The problem, as Arnab says, is the action scenes. Truth be told, Iron Man versus other Iron Men is never going to be terribly interesting, and that was also true of the first in the series. And the fight between Downey and Cheadle, both outfitted with IM suits, was embarrassingly stupid.
I don’t know if you stayed to the very end of the credits, Arnab, but there was a brief scene that appeared to show Thor’s hammer. At some point presumably all these post-movie teasers (from Iron Man I, Iron Man II, and The Hulk) about the Avengers will coalesce into an actual movie.
yes, i forced sunhee to stick around for the post-credits sequence–much to her indignation once it finally played. even when i read marvel comics as a young teen i was never really into thor. and after galaxy quest i can only think of alan rickman swearing by grabthar’s hammer. so much for the son of odin.
if there are going to be any more iron man movies i hope they’ll jettison don cheadle. his earnestness is a drag. much better to invest that time on scarlett johansson’s character–i have so many questions.