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Iron Man
I caught the hype and went to see Iron Man this weekend. I enjoyed it. I would recommend it. My caveat would be: 1. it is a superhero movie; 2. see it at a matinee; 3. see it in the theatre, preferably with a lot of other people, because there is something so lovely about the communal response to these things. It's not a movie to watch alone on a small screen. It is a movie to revel in on the big screen with a full audience and a bucket of popcorn. If you can't afford the first-run, see it on Prole Night at the dollar theatre for a ton of fun. Which sounds like a pretty solid three star review to me.
Robert Downey, Jr. is fabulous, the script is okay even if it loses its political punch and doesn't really follow through it's own premise: man becomes nemesis to destroy the weapons he's created. My brother, especially, would have issues with its philosophy towards violence. Iron Man's vigilantism created by discovering the weapons he's created have fallen into the hands of 'bad guys' (could someone working in the weapons industry really be so naive? I want to ask. Then I realize that the 'smart person's dilemma' is often the fascination with the technology and an inability to see it's ramifications further down the line.) But there is no mercy. Violence begets violence, which is almost more touching than a suddenly conversion to puppy-hugging pacifism, but the film fails to recognize this point, which really irritates me. (And this is a point that is pounded home in Westerns, which is one of the reasons I've come to love them.)
Another parallel that is shown, but not really explored is that the baddies don't really need the technology to be bad. Some of the most effective forms of torture (to which this movie alludes both lightly and tastefully) require almost no technology at all except the inability to be squeamish. To be made of 'iron' and be willing to cause that kind of pain and suffering to another.
The science in this film is improbable; but it's really essential to view the film on symbolic terms, because that sort of nursery-brain is where superheroes come from. It's a 'world of dreams' kind of thing where a man has a thing where his heart is/used to be to protect it from the weapons he's created. He's created a metal exo-skeleton ("Iron Man? Well actually it's a titanium alloy, but the name's catchy: we'll go with it.") not just as a disguise his identity (other superheroes achieve the same with a bit of spandex and a mask) but to protect his delicate human-ness from the world.
In a sense this is the key to Iron Man. Like Batman he doesn't have any superpowers (aside from his fabulous brain); but he does have fantastic equipment. I thought it was interesting that other than the implant around his heart the suit and and everything about Iron Man is both completely external, and very mechanical. The bio-interface aspect was really played down in this movie, which seems unusual in this day and age, even as the movie takes a lot of its look and feel from anime-mech with giant robots fighting each other (though not necessarily in the streets of LA).
The movie's strengths are it's sense of humor and absurdity (the ending is fantastic and totally within the boundaries of the way Downey plays the character) and it's use of images on a symbolic level: a man in a fiery cave working at a forge with clay molds, a crucible and tongs, to create the first Iron Man prototype; a woman reaching into the cavity in his chest to retrieve something too delicate for him to reach. Also those moments where the glamorous movie world and Stark techno-fabulousness meets the mundane, such as a scene where two characters eat pizza in the futuristic home of our hero-genius.
Overall the movie has a number of allusions to current events: Middle Eastern bad guys (but they are terrorists made up of a sort of 'axis of evil' and not from a particular country), a military presence in the Middle East, torture, the whole military-industrial (personally, I would add 'medical' to the triumvirate) complex, certain allusions to current technology, but also ludicrous applications of the same...
but it doesn't have any follow through political or otherwise on its allusions. The film sidesteps any political ramifications and comes out pretty mild. The gov't is not implicated for warfare, war technology finds its way into the wrong hands due to corrupt individuals; the baddies are conglomerate bad guys who mostly attack other Middle Easterners; and the female roles (other than an acknowledgment of a female soldier, another allusion with no political commentary) are largely symbolic and/or decorative. If perhaps we've skipped truth and justice, we still come up with a pretty sold 'American Way' and a shot of Iron Man in front of the U.S. flag would not have been out of place.
Perhaps this is a good thing: a good superhero movie should not be too dark, too cringe-worthy, or too subversive. And yet, superheroes have been one of the places in our culture in which we can explore subversive material, and I felt that with regard Iron Man was pretty tame. Stark himself, other than a somewhat shallow pronouncement that he would no longer make weapons technology---totally overlooking the fact that a robotic exo-skeleton designed for vengeance is an instrument of warfare (a point which the villain makes his mandatory speech at the end using the world 'irony' lest the audience has overlooked that 'irony' or the terrible pun)---seems utterly untransformed by his experience being damaged by his own weapons or by the fact he now has a glowing thing embedded in his chest.
I guess if we want angst or demons we'll have to wait for Batman or Hellboy II.
A.O. Scott's review is fabulous and right on the mark, even if it's a little more generous than I would be. And despite my criticisms, I was genuinely entertained by the film.
Robert Downey, Jr. is fabulous, the script is okay even if it loses its political punch and doesn't really follow through it's own premise: man becomes nemesis to destroy the weapons he's created. My brother, especially, would have issues with its philosophy towards violence. Iron Man's vigilantism created by discovering the weapons he's created have fallen into the hands of 'bad guys' (could someone working in the weapons industry really be so naive? I want to ask. Then I realize that the 'smart person's dilemma' is often the fascination with the technology and an inability to see it's ramifications further down the line.) But there is no mercy. Violence begets violence, which is almost more touching than a suddenly conversion to puppy-hugging pacifism, but the film fails to recognize this point, which really irritates me. (And this is a point that is pounded home in Westerns, which is one of the reasons I've come to love them.)
Another parallel that is shown, but not really explored is that the baddies don't really need the technology to be bad. Some of the most effective forms of torture (to which this movie alludes both lightly and tastefully) require almost no technology at all except the inability to be squeamish. To be made of 'iron' and be willing to cause that kind of pain and suffering to another.
The science in this film is improbable; but it's really essential to view the film on symbolic terms, because that sort of nursery-brain is where superheroes come from. It's a 'world of dreams' kind of thing where a man has a thing where his heart is/used to be to protect it from the weapons he's created. He's created a metal exo-skeleton ("Iron Man? Well actually it's a titanium alloy, but the name's catchy: we'll go with it.") not just as a disguise his identity (other superheroes achieve the same with a bit of spandex and a mask) but to protect his delicate human-ness from the world.
In a sense this is the key to Iron Man. Like Batman he doesn't have any superpowers (aside from his fabulous brain); but he does have fantastic equipment. I thought it was interesting that other than the implant around his heart the suit and and everything about Iron Man is both completely external, and very mechanical. The bio-interface aspect was really played down in this movie, which seems unusual in this day and age, even as the movie takes a lot of its look and feel from anime-mech with giant robots fighting each other (though not necessarily in the streets of LA).
The movie's strengths are it's sense of humor and absurdity (the ending is fantastic and totally within the boundaries of the way Downey plays the character) and it's use of images on a symbolic level: a man in a fiery cave working at a forge with clay molds, a crucible and tongs, to create the first Iron Man prototype; a woman reaching into the cavity in his chest to retrieve something too delicate for him to reach. Also those moments where the glamorous movie world and Stark techno-fabulousness meets the mundane, such as a scene where two characters eat pizza in the futuristic home of our hero-genius.
Overall the movie has a number of allusions to current events: Middle Eastern bad guys (but they are terrorists made up of a sort of 'axis of evil' and not from a particular country), a military presence in the Middle East, torture, the whole military-industrial (personally, I would add 'medical' to the triumvirate) complex, certain allusions to current technology, but also ludicrous applications of the same...
but it doesn't have any follow through political or otherwise on its allusions. The film sidesteps any political ramifications and comes out pretty mild. The gov't is not implicated for warfare, war technology finds its way into the wrong hands due to corrupt individuals; the baddies are conglomerate bad guys who mostly attack other Middle Easterners; and the female roles (other than an acknowledgment of a female soldier, another allusion with no political commentary) are largely symbolic and/or decorative. If perhaps we've skipped truth and justice, we still come up with a pretty sold 'American Way' and a shot of Iron Man in front of the U.S. flag would not have been out of place.
Perhaps this is a good thing: a good superhero movie should not be too dark, too cringe-worthy, or too subversive. And yet, superheroes have been one of the places in our culture in which we can explore subversive material, and I felt that with regard Iron Man was pretty tame. Stark himself, other than a somewhat shallow pronouncement that he would no longer make weapons technology---totally overlooking the fact that a robotic exo-skeleton designed for vengeance is an instrument of warfare (a point which the villain makes his mandatory speech at the end using the world 'irony' lest the audience has overlooked that 'irony' or the terrible pun)---seems utterly untransformed by his experience being damaged by his own weapons or by the fact he now has a glowing thing embedded in his chest.
I guess if we want angst or demons we'll have to wait for Batman or Hellboy II.
A.O. Scott's review is fabulous and right on the mark, even if it's a little more generous than I would be. And despite my criticisms, I was genuinely entertained by the film.
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Also, I HEART Sandman Mystery Theatre.