REVIEW: The Avengers

The Avengers (2012): Written and directed by Joss Whedon. Story by: Zak Penn and Joss Whedon. Based on The Avengers comic books by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Tom Hiddleston, and Samuel L. Jackson. Rated PG-13 (Crash, bang, boom). Running time: 143 minutes.

2 stars (out of four)

In The Avengers, we finally learn what happens when Thor’s mighty hammer comes crashing down on the impenetrable shield of Captain America. (Spoiler alert!) There is an explosion.

This is just one of many spectacles The Avengers offers, including an aircraft carrier soaring into the sky, a massive metal space worm demolishing Manhattan and the heaving bosom of Scarlett Johansson. If the idea of seeing Iron Man, The Hulk, Thor and Captain America sharing the screen excites you beyond belief, then The Avengers is not just the best movie of the summer, or even the year; it is the greatest movie ever made.

Earth is once again in trouble and the head of the top-secret organization S.H.I.E.L.D., Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), at last has an opportunity to assemble the team of superheroes he has been recruiting over the course of five movies. There is the tech-savvy playboy Tony Stark a.k.a. Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.); Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo), the scientist who turns into the not-so-jolly green giant The Hulk when enraged; the extraterrestrial Norse god Thor (Chris Hemsworth); and Steve Rogers (Chris Evans), the cryogenically preserved WWII patriot Captain America.

Not that their personalities matter much in this film; the heroes only appear in diluted form in The Avengers. After all, with so many exciting things happening here, can you blame the film for skimping on something as inconsequential as characters? Loki (Tom Hiddleston), the greasy-haired estranged brother of Thor, has procured a magical blue cube that he will use to open a portal to a distant corner of the universe where a few of his alien cronies wait. He plans to enlist their help to decimate, and presumably take over, our planet.

As you can imagine, The Avengers will need all the help they can get, so Nick Fury has signed up a few more recruits for the forces of good. Jeremy Renner plays Hawkeye, an assassin whose marksmanship with a bow and arrow gives Katniss Everdeen a run for her money. Another invaluable member of the team is the sultry Russian agent, Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson). Ms. Johansson, who excels at playing coy and aloof, need not worry here about her limited range as an actress. As it turns out, her body excels at wearing leather, and it is this skill that is called upon in The Avengers.

The clash of these titans of comic book lore is presented in several plodding action sequences, including an especially mechanical one on the aforementioned aircraft carrier-turned-aircraft. Another takes place on the streets of Manhattan, where product placement conveniently doubles as the mise en scène of billboards and taxicab ads. Just as Thor did, The Avengers gives itself up to corporate uncreativity; it is loud, flashy and fleetingly entertaining but ultimately hollow and pointless. The special effects are absolutely spectacular and utterly soulless.

The film was written and directed by Joss Whedon, who is considered a demigod in some nerd circles (with all due respect to Thor and his Asgardian brethren). Those expecting something witty or cheeky, however, such as Mr. Whedon’s recent horror movie mash-up The Cabin in the Woods, will be disappointed. Any semblance of cleverness in The Avengers is limited to what material Mr. Whedon supplies Robert Downey Jr., who struts around in a Black Sabbath tee shirt, spitting out snarky comments and poking fun at the other heroes. These spare kidding moments are all but drowned out by the deafening assault of the film’s pursuit of blockbuster colossality. Even Samuel L. Jackson’s usual verve feels muted by his busy surroundings.

What a shame, since many of the movie’s jokes are genuinely funny. The very concept of this movie is totally absurd, so why not embrace that silliness and allow the humor to carry over into more than a handful of one-liners?

The movie is also surprisingly boring at times. The first third, which is bogged down with an excess of incomprehensible exposition, is particularly dull. We are expected to wait patiently though, because a lot of cool stuff will surely follow all this tedious jabbering. It must be said though that Mr. Whedon does handle some of this cool stuff pretty well. When the camera whizzes around the streets of New York in a computer-animated frenzy, capturing all our heroes in a single, unbroken shot, it is hard not to momentarily get caught up in the movie’s love of awesomeness for the sake of awesomeness.

Joss Whedon does not include anything unexpected in The Avengers but, to make up for that, he includes a wealth of things we fully expect, and even demand, to see: superheroes smashing superheroes, superheroes smashing supervillains, monologues delivered in monotone, Earth in peril and (spoiler alert!) Earth saved. To try to do anything else would be to risk the film’s status as the greatest ever made.

- Steve Avigliano, 5/7/12

REVIEW: Iron Man 2

Iron Man 2 (2010): Dir. Jon Favreau. Written by: Justin Theroux. Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Mickey Rourke, Scarlett Johansson, Sam Rockwell, and Samuel L. Jackson. Rated PG-13 (sequences of intense sci-fi action and violence, and some language). Running time: 124 minutes.

3 stars (out of four)

Iron Man 2 is a sequel that takes everything that made the first enjoyable and, with freewheeling fun, revels in its own cartoonishness. This is a film where characters ask for music before they fight and Samuel L. Jackson is given an extended eye-patched cameo. Director Jon Favreau pushes the Iron Man universe into over-the-top territory, but we stay with him every step of the way because he does so with the cool confidence of Tony Stark himself.

The film picks up where the first left off, with Tony Stark revealing himself to the public as Iron Man and enjoying the increased media attention. News clippings in the opening titles inform us that Stark has used his Iron Man suit to end war in the Middle East, becoming an international icon. Stark hoards the suit for himself, however, resisting the U.S. government’s insistence that he turn over the technology, though his decision to do so seems to be as motivated by boastfulness as it is by political caution. These scenes are used more as plot devices than anything else, and the film largely abandons the first film’s tongue-in-cheek depiction of Stark’s all-American pro-gun stance. Still, Robert Downey Jr.’s charismatic performance owns the film. Even after learning that the chemicals that power his suit are slowly killing him, Stark is his usual cocky self, throwing himself a birthday bash and drunkenly using his suit for some pretty exciting party tricks.

Stark’s self-confidence comes into question when Ivan Vanko, a burly Russian played by Mickey Rourke, proves capable of recreating the arc reactor technology that makes the Iron Man suit so powerful. Vanko, whose father was an unsung co-developer of the arc reactor, seeks to take down the Stark family name by picking a fight with Stark at the Monaco Grand Prix car race, the first and most exciting action scene in the film. Vanko’s backstory and scheme are less important, however, than his size and attitude, and Rourke has a lot of fun grunting his way through his lines in a thick Russian accent, doing more grimacing than speaking.

Sam Rockwell, who plays the film’s secondary villain, a fast-talking rival weapons manufacturer named Justin Hammer, continues to prove himself one of Hollywood’s finest character actors, bringing his usual quirkiness and humor to the role. Hammer recruits Vanko to help build an Iron Man suit of his own, and the interplay between Rockwell and Rourke recall the strange relationship between Steve Buscemi and Peter Stormare’s characters in Fargo. Favreau uses their scenes to emphasize the film’s lighthearted tone, but remains focused on Stark, utilizing Rourke and Rockwell as colorful side characters.

The remaining characters in the film, however, lack the zest and charm of the main players. Gwyneth Paltrow is charming enough as Pepper Potts, but her character’s origins remain a disconcerting mystery to me. I was willing to accept her in the first film as the Moneypenny to Stark’s Bond, existing to serve the dual purpose of helping the hero and providing some sexual tension, but this becomes difficult to believe when Stark appoints her CEO of the company. She makes a fine assistant to be sure, but where are her business credentials? Don Cheadle is a serviceable replacement for Terrence Howard as sidekick James Rhodes, but there is little Cheadle can do though to change what was, and remains, a dull supporting character.

While many recent superhero films have pretensions of grand drama, Iron Man 2 succeeds because it embraces its comic book origins and allows itself to go over-the-top with larger-than-life characters, plenty of pyrotechnics and a self-aware wit. Late in the film, Stark remarks to Rhodes, “I thought you were out of one-liners,” poking fun at the film while sneaking in another laugh. Then there’s Samuel L. Jackson as the mysterious Nick Fury, whose role is apparently just a setup for the Avengers crossover movie that’s coming out in 2012. The tie-in might have come off as an annoying marketing scheme if Jackson wasn’t so much fun in the role. He brings his typical relish to his lines and almost veers into self-parody (one scene in a donut shop seems a deliberate reference to Pulp Fiction), but he manages to keep the audience in on the fun. Scarlett Johansson shows up too as Stark’s new assistant and undercover agent, Black Widow, who Wikipedia informs me, is another tie-in to the upcoming Avengers film. Johansson’s role here confirms my suspicions about her as an actress. Most of her scenes consist of Stark ogling her until the end when she gets to do some sexy fighting, but nothing in the way of real acting.

Iron Man 2, much like Stark himself, is all about style. There are plenty of inventive action sequences and explosions to fit the summer blockbuster bill, but enough winking at the camera to remind everyone that it’s all in the name of fun. Like its predecessor, the rather complicated plot gets reduced in the end to an action scene, which is the norm for most superhero movies, but keeps Iron Man from reaching the bar Christopher Nolan set with the new Batman films. Still, this is a worthy sequel that, by celebrating the over-the-top nature of its comic book origins, becomes every bit as entertaining as the first.

- Steve Avigliano, 5/12/10