Iron Man (2008)

The thing about this superhero movie, is that it doesn’t feel that much like a superhero movie. This is because Tony Stark, the titular ‘Iron Man’, isn’t much like the self sacrificing, scrub brushed hero’s of the Superman/Captain America tradition. Stark is flawed, a self satisfied lady’s man of the type Bruce Wayne only pretends to be. The fact that Robert Downey Jr. plays the part is a major asset in selling this characterization, because let’s face it, wittily smug super-confident lady’s man is kind of what we all hope Downey is like in real life (I’ve heard the comment that Downey is quote: “Playing himself”, several times in relationship to this role.).

The film starts out a little like I imagine Lord of War does, a slick, brandy chugging weapons dealer is enjoying his amoral life, when something complicates his guilt free existence. In Stark’s case this is his kidnapping by a group of Afghan based war lords, who are well supplied with weapons made by his own company. They force Stark, with the help of another hostage (Shaun Toub, in a good little performance), to build them a kind of super missile. Instead of the missile, Stark builds himself a super robot suit which he uses to escape his captures, but not with out poor Toub dying in the process. The impact of this event causes Stark to reassess his life, and start building a more advanced robot suit with which to rectify his unintentional legacy of arms proliferation to rouge elements.

The film has the requisite light moments (such as Starks difficulty in perfecting the second generation of his super suit), and the endearingly named love interest Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow, who we haven’t seen that much of lately), with whom Downey as genuine chemistry. I did find the villain towards the end to be perhaps a little bit too much of a megalomaniac, but on the whole this is a first class work, with what I consider to be a pretty impressive screenplay for its genre. Terrance Howard and an almost unrecognizable Jeff Bridges have good supporting roles. The sequel teaser towards the end is probably over rated, but your gonna want to stay through the credits and see it anyway. Four out of Five.