IRON MAN 2

“IRON MAN 2” (Robert Downey, Jr., Don Cheadle, Sam Rockwell, Mickey Rourke, Gwenyth Paltrow & Scarlett Johansson)

Two years ago I proclaimed ‘Iron Man’ the best comic-book movie ever – Mind you, this is coming from someone who hasn’t read a comic book in 40 years & doesn’t normally like comic book movies. When it was announced that Mickey Rourke would play the villain in the sequel, I was disappointed – I don’t like Mickey Rourke – his acting, or his personal persona. When ‘The Wrestler’ came on HBO last year, I taped it & watched it, using the FF button on my remote liberally. The one thing that stood out, viewing that awful movie in that fashion was the numerous shots of the back of Mickey Rourke’s head as he entered the wrasslin’ ring. How that film & Rourke’s performance gained critical acclaim, I will never know – it was a piece of s-peaking of bad acting; Scarlett Johansson was also added to the cast. But I don’t mind Scarlett because she is awfully easy on the eyes – but when I saw that she was costumed so that very little skin was showing, well, my expectations of enjoying ‘IM2’ plummeted even further.
Don Cheadle replacing Terrence Howard didn’t bother me nearly as much as it should bother Mr. Howard. You weren’t a major character, Terrence, you didn’t deserve a huge raise in pay to do the sequel – You take the fact that you’re in a blockbuster that will make many multi-millions & use that to further your career with ‘serious’ acting roles.
But enough of my pre-viewing thoughts – Here’s the shocker – I loved this film almost as much as the first. I came out of the theatre thinking, “That just might be the best sequel ever.”
I don’t know how much of my negative mind set going in has to do with the pleasant surprise I received (To the point were I was able to overlook some of the flaws) but ‘Iron Man 2’ is an excellent movie going experience. Still, the packed house that we viewed it with didn’t seem to react as positively as I did. Were they expecting more? I found Robert Downey, Jr.’s second take as Tony Stark to be as impressive as his first – the quips were witty, the smart-ass devil-may-care attitude intact & fully blown & the serious scenes aren’t unwelcome (Tony discovers the toxicity in his blood is rising at an alarming rate & will eventually kill him)
I like movies that give you a variety of emotions to wade thru, the only time they lost me was during a dueling Iron Man suits display between Stark & his best friend, James ‘Rhodey’ Rhodes (Cheadle replacing Howard) I thought that sequence was dumb & I feared that the film would go downhill from there – but it bounced back - & what made it successful? Well, I’m going to have to give credit where credit is due & admit that Mickey Rourke was a major factor in my enjoyment of this film. As Russian villain Ivan Vanko, Rourke was matched with the perfect character for his mumbling, unlikable acting ‘style’. His interaction with Tony Stark competitor Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell) are some of the more memorable scenes – Credit to Rockwell as well, in fact, he, aside from Downey was clearly the second best actor in the film. When he loses his temper at Vanko & yells, “In case you haven’t noticed by now, I DON’T SPEAK RUSSIAN!” I held my breath for a second wondering how the muscle bound, clearly insane mutant was going to react to such an outburst. That was the cleverness of that pairing – Two loose cannons with the same goal (Bring down Tony Stark & Iron Man) who could implode upon each other long before they come to an agreement on how to go about achieving that goal.
Garry Shandling’s cameo as Senator Stern had me concerned from the preview, but the pay off will make you smirk, at the very least.
For the most part, everything worked, & worked well, but those of you who have read some of my past reviews know that there’s going to be some nit-picking (It’s what I do best) & my biggest complaint comes from the fact that there are no human casualties. Buildings, cars & property are blasted to smithereens but not a single of the thousands of innocent bystanders are even seen being injured, let alone crushed are blasted to oblivion by the incredible firepower of Vanko’s army of Iron Men drones. Call me a sick-o, but I would have said this movie was better than the first if they had just had the drone that took aim upon the little boy in the Iron Man mask & disintegrated the tyke.
& the big confrontation near the finale where Stark & Rhodes are surrounded by drones did become a little bit silly (I was reminded of Rock’Em, Sock’Em Robots from when I was a kid) but the end result was fairly satisfying, & this is something I don’t say very often, kind of ‘awesome’.
But this franchise works mainly due to Robert Downey’s acting talents – He raises the level of ‘comic book’ movie actors - & considering that Heath Ledger will unfortunately never be able to grace us with a follow-up Joker portrayal, Downey is the cockiest rooster in the comic book movie henhouse.
Oh, & Scarlett’s annoying habit of looking like she’s trying really hard to remember her lines as she speaks, doesn’t really stand out here because she doesn’t have that many lines. Despite not showing any skin, she still looked hot as she vanquished Hammer’s security guards whilst making her way toward Vanko’s secret hideaway... But I DO prefer her as a blonde (Note to Jon Favreau for ‘IM3’)
Yes, it gives a little bit for everyone – because I so enjoyed the first half of the film – very little ‘action’ sequences but lots of Tony Stark being a smart-alec jerk – I was able to accept the mindless ‘chase’ scenes & shots of items being exploded in huge balls of fire that invaded the second half. Even my wife, who wanted me to see this film by myself, was entertained by it. Funny thing is we were going to see her pick, ‘Furry Vengeance’ but the paper printed the wrong start time, so we opted for IM2 instead...
As Tom Petty once sang, “You Got Lucky, baby!”