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May 10, 2008

Under the Peg - Iron, Jets, and Plasma

It's simple alchemy: Take space-age and beyond technology, mix with a man who was building advanced robots when he was sixteen, heat until a plot to take over the world can be scooped out, sprinkle in a healthy dose of sci-fi special effects (taking extreme care at this point to avoid any sparks thrown off), and the result is: Iron Man.

The movie starts with Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) being given a military escort out of somewhere in the middle east where he had just finished showing his company's latest weapon (The Jericho Missile) to the US army. Just as he was making friends with the stern faced soldiers the convoy comes under attack by a group of terrorists who call themselves the Ten Rings. As Stark is about to call for help, a missile labled "Stark Industries" explodes next to him and knocks him unconscious. The movie then jumps backwards in time about 36 hours to establish Stark's character. He comes across as a stereotypical rich playboy: he can turn any situation into a party, he can get the most straight-laced person to loosen up, and he even gets a reporter to go from accusing him of being a soulless mass murder to mauling him in the bedroom. We get the impression personal responsibility has never really been his forte. If it weren't for his personal assistant Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) he'd fall apart at the seams. He rushes over to the middle east accompanied by his military liaison Jim Rhodes (Terrence Howard), which brings us to where we were at the start of the movie. The Ten Rings have stockpiled Stark's weaponry, and they want Stark to build them their own Jericho missile; however, with the help of a fellow captive (Shaun Toub) he designs a suit of powered armor that lets him fight his way free of the terrorists, and make his way home where he dedicates his life to righting the wrongs caused by his weapons.

This movie is very percussive: lots of explosions, lots of heavy impacts, and a respectable amount of collateral damage. The music fits the action perfectly, and the decision to stick to heavier metal and rock tunes was a very appropriate choice^{[see disclaimer]}. Robert Downey Jr. manages to pull off a wonderful mix of dead-pan smart-alec-ness and iron-hard sincerity that really drives home the character of Tony Stark and his alter ego. I can't really say how close the movie stayed to the comics, not having read them myself, but the story in and of itself is compelling and suspenseful without keeping the audience waiting too long. I was a little disappointed by Stark's decision to stop all weapon production within his company after he got back from the middle east, but it did seem like the right choice after a while.

Overall: Soul-searching and character development will lure in that one highbrow friend, with plenty of hard-core action for the rest of us.

# At Sat 8:18 PM | Permalink | Trackback URI | Comments (0) | More Under the Peg | Tags: comic books Gwyneth Paltrow Iron Man movies review Robert Downey Jr. Terrence Howard

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