Iron Man 3 (4.5/5)
For most of the world, Iron
Man 3 is the first Marvel film
following the massively successful Avengers
film. People the world over have waited
to see how Marvel will go back to focusing on a single superhero and whether it
would satisfy after last summer’s superhero binge. But for some of us Iron Man 3 is important for a very different reason. For a few movie fans, Iron Man 3 signifies not necessarily the glorious return of a
franchise superhero, but rather the reunion between star Robert Downey Jr. and
director Shane Black. You might be
unfamiliar with the name Shane Black (and honestly who could forget a name like
that), but you almost certainly are familiar with the movies he has
scripted. In the late eighties/early
nineties Black became the highest paid screenwriter of all time. He’s most famous for his work on Lethal Weapon and its first sequel and
less famous for films like The Last Boy
Scout and The Long Kiss Goodnight
(although, for my money, The Last Boy
Scout is entirely underrated). His
movies combined action elements popular in the eighties with a decidedly film
noirish cynicism. It was no surprise,
then, when, after nearly a decade missing in action, Shane Black’s first directorial
effort was a post-modern noir, Kiss Kiss
Bang Bang.
It was overshadowed by the first Iron Man, but Kiss Kiss Bang
Bang was without a doubt Robert Downey Jr.’s comeback vehicle. It may not have reached the kind of audience
that a superhero film can, but it once again proved that Robert Downey Jr.
possessed impeccable comedic timing and charisma to spare. And there’s a shared comedic sensibility
between Downey
and Black. Both seem to revel in
freewheeling and unexpected turns, quick wits and big egos. And while Iron
Man 3 is first and foremost a big budget summer blockbuster, both Black and
Downey find
enough space to fit their own oversized personalities.
There’s plenty of back story in Iron Man 3, so much in fact that a lot of information is delivered
by Downey in
the form of a voiceover. The film begins
at the turn of the new millennium when people were still worried about the Y2K
virus and Eiffel 65’s little ditty, “Blue,” was worming its way into our
hearts. One of the central themes of the
film is how decisions have long term consequences that we aren’t initially
aware of, and so early on we are introduced to Maya Hansen, a genius botanist
who is developing a procedure that could eventually help re-grow limbs. We are also introduced to Aldrich Killian,
played, at least in this part of the film, as socially awkward computer nerd
who walks with a cane and has yet to master basic grooming techniques. Killian makes his way onto the same elevator
as Tony Stark, and he proceeds to pitch his idea for a venture capitalist start
up. In order to get rid of him, Stark
promises to meet him up on the roof in a few minutes and then deliberately
forgets about it.
It should come as little surprise that thirteen years later
Killian the socially clumsy computer nerd has become Killian the suave industrialist. Killian has somehow cured his limp and is
macking on Tony Stark’s main squeeze, Pepper Potts. Meanwhile there’s a terrorist on the loose by
the name of The Mandarin who has been releasing mysterious footage of himself
decrying Western decadence while detonating bombs across the country with
impunity. It doesn’t take much to figure
out that there’s a connection between The Mandarin and Killian (but things are
either more or less than they seem at first).
While following one of Killian’s henchmen, Stark’s former body guard and
friend, Happy Hogan, gets himself blowed up real good, and in a fit of rage
Stark calls out The Mandarin on television, even providing his home address as
a challenge.
Stark’s challenge is accepted, and three heavily armed
helicopters show up at Stark’s Frank Lloyd Wright inspired mansion and proceed
to blow it up. Stark narrowly escapes,
and decides to play dead in rural Tennessee. While convalescing in a barn, Stark strikes
up a friendship with a precocious ten year old named Harvey.
Stark spends most of the film outside of the Iron Man suit, a smart move
on the part of the filmmakers. One of
the chief problems with superhero films is that the superpowers can get in the
way of the action. We’re never quite
certain how much punishment the protagonist can take and after a while watching
two nearly invulnerable people pound on each other starts to lose its
appeal. This is why it’s much easier to
build a movie around Batman than Superman.
There are a number of twists and turns throughout the film,
and I don’t really want to give them away.
Shane Black is a master at setting up expectations just so he can
undermine them. (Watching Iron Man 3 a year after the Avengers got me thinking that maybe
Black is the progenitor of Joss Whedon.
Both really want to pull the rug out from under the audience). A lot of Black’s personality really shines
through in the film. Like Lethal Weapon, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and A
Long Kiss Goodnight, the movie takes place at Christmas (this guy loves
Christmas). Much of the dialogue
consists of men exchanging quippy exchanges with one another while under nearly
fatal doses of testosterone. And Tony
Stark, like Martin Riggs before him, is suffering from mental problems, a case
of PTSD following the events of The
Avengers. Hell, the climax of the
film even takes place at the docks. Of
course, all of Black’s personality is shrouded in the wares of the Marvel
Universe, but it’s a good fit nonetheless.
The film itself isn’t perfect, exactly. The villain’s plan is ridiculously convoluted. There are also a number of moments where the
movie attempts to sublimate our collective trauma surrounding 9/11. Terrorism is used as a plot point, but it’s a
mostly bloodless kind of terrorism that’s meant to be exciting rather than
horrific. Perhaps the most troubling
moment in the film happens when Tony Stark calls out The Mandarin, claiming
that he’s out for pure revenge and not politics, as if the two are mutually
exclusive. If we’ve learned anything after
9/11, we should have learned that vengeance is an extension of the
political. So the film might read as a
piece of propaganda to some (which is true of most of the Iron Man movies) but to others it might be a fascinating depiction
of America’s
failure to fully come to grips with 9/11 even a decade out. But purely as a work of entertainment, Iron Man 3 is the most accomplished of
the series. Where Iron Man 1 and 2 worked
best during moments of comedy and only started flailing during the action
sequences, Iron Man 3 balances these
two modes perfectly. It got me thinking
that this whole superhero thing might have legs after all.