Four stars. Rating: PG-13, for intense sci-fi action and violence, and mild sensuality
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 5.3.13
Most people eventually develop
the wisdom to learn this lesson: Never poke the bear.
Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark is
quick-witted, ferociously smart and impressively resourceful ... but he also
seems to view arrogance and recklessness as virtues. As we’ve seen in this
series’ first two installments, such behavior inevitably gets him into trouble.
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| Stuck in small-town Nowheresville, Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) sadly regards the remnants of his Iron Man outfit, and wonders how he'll handle repairs in a community that has nothing more than a big-box hardware store. Ah, but Tony is a clever genius, donchaknow, and he's bound to figure something out. Besides, he's just made a new young friend (currently off-camera, sent to fetch a tuna sandwich). |
As is the case this time.
Giving his home address to a
scary terrorist, and then challenging the maniac to do his worst?
Definitely not something Tony
could mention when filing the subsequent insurance claims.
But it sets up a rollicking
retribution storyline courtesy of director/co-scripter Shane Black, who hasn’t
lost the touch he established so well back in 1987, with his debut screenplay
for Lethal Weapon. Black clearly understands the formula that has worked so
well for the Iron Man franchise: plenty of action, laced with equal
opportunities for Downey to get his snark on.
When it comes to cracking wise in
the face of serious adversity, Downey’s Tony Stark could give James Bond
lessons in well-timed one-liners. Veteran comic book fans may show up for the
landscape-shattering punch-outs, but Downey’s the glue that holds these films
together.
He persuasively conveys the
impatience and frustration of a genius scientist whose ideas come more rapidly
than he can act upon them. Downey can weave a tapestry of emotional conflict
from a simple sigh of exasperation. He’s the ultimate obsessive/compulsive, and
for that reason he’s an improbably endearing character: seriously flawed
emotionally, and desperately in need of a keeper.
Too frequently, in times of
stress, he turns to his A-I helpmate Jarvis — voiced with mellifluous irony by
Paul Bettany — rather than Pepper (Gwyneth Paltrow), the woman who loves him.
And puts up with him. (No small thing.)
Three films into this series,
Downey and Paltrow positively bubble with playful erotic tension. They’re one
of very few on-screen couples able to honor the deft rat-a-tat banter that
hearkens all the way back to William Powell and Myrna Loy, in the 1930s and
’40s Thin Man series. In a word, Downey and Paltrow are fun together, even as
we wonder if his self-centered attitude finally has gone too far for her to
endure.
Let’s hope that never happens.
And while this film does put poor Pepper through seriously unpleasant plot
contrivances, romantic doubt isn’t even a blip on the radar.
Indeed, the core of this
storyline — Black shares scripting credit with Drew Pearce — involves Tony’s
realization that he must always protect the one thing that’s dearest to him. With
his back to the wall, with all the chips down, he’s surprised to discover that
the choice is obvious: Pepper means far more than all the gadgets his unparalleled
wealth can allow him to build.
It must be said, however, that
this film gets a bit egregious with respect to Tony’s wealth. He doesn’t just
have more money than God; he has more money than God’s banker.
But that’s getting ahead of
things.
This adventure begins with a
flashback to Dec. 31, 1999: the dawning of a new millennium, which finds Tony
in Bern, Switzerland, several years before the events (detailed in the first
film) that will change his life. Drunk as a lord and determined to party
hearty, Tony does what he did so often in those days: He blows off a reverential
young man with a gleam of scientific potential — Guy Pearce, as Aldrich Killian
— and then turns talented genetic botanist Maya Hansen (Rebecca Hall, adding
dramatic heft to these events) into a meaningless one-night stand.
And promptly forgets both of
them.
Flash-forward to the present day,
during December’s holiday season. The American airwaves are being hijacked
every so often by a malevolent terrorist who calls himself the Mandarin (Ben
Kingsley) while claiming credit for an escalating series of atrocities around
the world. A lesson must be taught, he intones; a ledger must be balanced ...
and the account will come due when, it’s promised, something awful will happen
to the U.S. President (William Sadler) on Christmas Day.
The President puts his faith in
Iron Patriot, an armored Stark Industries guardian controlled by Tony’s friend
James Rhodes (Don Cheadle, under-utilized in this film). We can’t help feeling,
though, that the president’s confidence might be misplaced.
Meanwhile, Killian re-surfaces and
pitches his newest scientific breakthrough to Pepper, in her capacity as Stark
Industries’ CEO. She declines, concerned not only about this discovery’s
potential for weaponization, but also by Killian’s predatory fixation on her.
Tony’s best friend and Stark
Industries security chief, Happy Hogan — Jon Favreau, who directed the first two
films in this series and supplies mild comic relief here — doesn’t like or
trust Killian. Not one little bit. Happy also doesn’t think much of Killian’s
bodyguard, Savin (James Badge Dale), who behaves ... oddly.
Wanting to learn more about these
two guys, Happy trails them into a catastrophe, when he watches Savin give
something to a fellow who subsequently heats up into molten instability and
then detonates like an exposed reactor core. Given time to think about this,
Happy would realize that he’s seen this sort of reaction before — as have we —
but the explosion leaves him comatose in a hospital, unable to share this
information with Tony.
Cue Tony’s angry, challenging
outburst to the Mandarin, via international news feeds. Folks who’ve seen this
film’s preview — which, like so many these days, shows too damn much
— know what happens next.
When the dust settles, Pepper is
on the run and Tony is barely alive, his Iron Man suit an all-but-useless hunk
of metal; even Jarvis’ core memory has been compromised. Worse yet, Tony is in
small-town Tennessee, trying to chase down the last faint lead that Jarvis
helped him find, before all hell broke loose.
At which point we’re introduced
to this story’s next genius touch: precocious Harley (Ty Simpkins), a local kid
with a scientific bent, who becomes something of a young apprentice. Not that
Tony would acknowledge such a relationship; he’s not about to admit that he
actually needs help. Even though Harley knows that he is helping. A lot. Which
Tony understands, as well, which adds an engaging layer of prickly tension to
their character dynamic.
And this is crucial, because
Downey needs somebody to spar with; his laughably puffed-up behavior adds
sparkle to every scene. So, since Pepper is God knows where, and Jarvis is
off-line, Simpkins’ Ty picks up the slack. And does so with panache.
The rich entertainment value
notwithstanding, this film’s journey is far superior to the climactic
destination, which slides into wretched excess. Just as Downey always has been this
series’ strongest asset, the increasingly indestructible — and numerous — Iron
Man suits have remained the deus ex machina weak link. No matter what sort of
crisis envelops our hero, salvation arrives in the form of yet another armor
refinement.
That gimmick builds to a
ludicrous extreme during the third act battle royale on a massive, ocean-bound
oil rig: a tumultuous sequence assembled so choppily by editors Peter S. Elliot
and Jeffrey Ford — and taking place at night, which makes things even worse —
that we really can’t appreciate what’s happening to whom, or how.
Black obviously builds to this melee
because he believes viewers expect it, but that doesn’t excuse the sloppiness
or comic book overkill. It’s simply an explosive time-filler: far less satisfying
than (for example) the genuinely tense Tennessee fight between an un-armored
Tony and a hot-tempered babe named Brandt (Stephanie Szostak).
I’m also not sure I approve of an
epilogue that changes Tony’s life in another way, by removing one of his
defining characteristics. Heroes are more interesting when they’re flawed or
vulnerable, and this film already flirts with the unlikely — but no doubt
ego-boosting, for Downey — possibility that Tony can be a one-man demolition
squad without his Iron Man armor. That bodes ill for Iron Man 4, which I’m
sure is in the development pipeline.
Meanwhile, this current film may
be pure formula, but there’s no denying the success of that formula. Black
proves a worthy successor to Favreau, in the director’s chair, and I’m sure Iron Man 3 will generate plenty of repeat business. (And don’t forget to stay
put for the post-credits tag scene, which sets up dire doings in the next
Marvel Universe film.)
Hollywood’s cinema summer has
begun.
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