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Iron Man (2008)
Reviewed on 2008 May 2
I’ve never been much of a comic book geek, but when it comes to the movies there were a few exceptions I knew I’d really like: I enjoyed all three Spider-Man movies, and the second X-Men was worth watching just to see Alan Cumming wearing 20 pounds of woad to play Nightcrawler. Beyond that, most of the time I go because Mr. Shukti wants to see the thing.
Yet when I saw the trailer for Iron Man — featuring the Black Sabbath song, no less — I grabbed his arm and said I wanted to be there first showing, opening day. Most of the time when I get this excited about a movie it’s as good as I’d hoped. There are a few movies that even exceed those expectations though, and this was one of them. Nothing ruined it for me, not even the kid behind me with sugar rabies who kept kicking the back of my seat and was apparently looking for Jimmy Hoffa in his crinkly bag of Skittles. I was just that into it.
Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) is a brilliant scientist, like his father Howard before him. Tony is a handful though; he goes through women like Kleenex® and builds his incredible inventions with a scotch in one hand and music from groups like AC/DC blaring though his lab. Stark Industries made a fortune building weapons, and he and his partner Obadiah Stane (Jeff Bridges) are living the good life.
While demonstrating one of his new toys to the U.S. Army in Afghanistan, Tony is kidnapped by a group of terrorists that call themselves the Ten Rings (which should really be spelled T-A-L-I-B-A-N). They threaten to kill Tony unless he builds them their own toy, a Jericho missile. Tony pretends to comply but instead builds himself a weapon, and what a weapon it is.
This movie had a brilliant script, with lots of great quotes and a solid storyline. Downey made Tony Stark smug and likable at the same time. The acting was good from everyone but as Mr. Shukti observed, Downey nailed the Tony Stark character from the opening shot.
Four chocolate morsels. I watched it opening day; I’ll buy the DVD the day that hits the shelves too.
— Shukti
