Black Widow (2021)

A year without Marvel movies is hard to fathom, but that’s what 2020 gave us. Two years is even more impossible to imagine, and yet Black Widow is, finally, the first foray into Phase Four of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (Spider-Man: Far From Home was, improbably, the coda to Phase Three). Positioned at this odd juncture in moviegoing history, and slotted into the MCU timeline of five years ago, Black Widow is something of an odd duck, and it is for my money the first MCU disappointment in a long while.

Set after the events of Captain America: Civil War, Black Widow finds Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) on the run when a coded message from her erstwhile sister Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh) summons her to Budapest. The two Black Widow spies agree to take down the Red Room training program that created them, but they’ll need the help of their two former foster parents (David Harbour and Rachel Weisz) to defeat the spymaster (a ludicrously un-Russian Ray Winstone) who molded them.

 

After thirteen years of Marvel movies, television shows, and short films, the MCU has become almost entirely unwieldy, all but inaccessible to newcomers. I thought about this as I watched Black Widow, precariously positioned in a continuity that expects you to know when and why William Hurt is wandering around the periphery of the plot as Secretary Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross. For the true believers (or, as they’ve also been dubbed, “Marvel Zombies”) who haven’t missed a moment, it’s a frisson of continuity glee to see how Black Widow slots into the chronology, but it’s truly groan-worthy when the film reveals – surprise! – the secret origin of the vest Natasha was wearing in Infinity War. Not since Solo felt the need to explain Han Solo’s surname has a prequel bent so far over backwards to explain something no one asked.

 

Hurt aside, there aren’t many opportunities for the film to include any of the major MCU cameos we might expect, and this is actually for the better. A Black Widow movie, especially if it is indeed Johansson’s swan song in the franchise, ought to expand the title character’s world beyond what we already know about her. And on this count, the film both succeeds and fails. We do get a family of sorts for the orphan Natasha, who we learn spent formative years deep undercover in Ohio with a phony family. Then again, where were they this whole time, and where have they been since? (The easiest answer – that they were all “blipped” off-screen – is somewhat dramatically inert.) Rachel Weisz is intriguing but entirely humorless as Melina Vostokoff; unfortunately, she’s given very little in the film to do because so much oxygen is taken up by David Harbour’s excessively hammy performance as Alexei Shostakov, the Red Guardian. I didn’t read many reviews of the film during its hybrid theatrical/streaming release, but it seemed audiences were mostly enamored of Harbour, though I found his acting broad, cloying, and a little desperate.

 

With Johansson sleepwalking through the film, just about the only performance that caught my attention was Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova, ostensibly the “new” Black Widow. Pugh is fun, believable, and layered in a way most Marvel fan-favorites are (think The Falcon or Wanda Maximoff, even before they got their own shows). It’s a delight to hear that Marvel has further plans for Pugh, including a stint on the upcoming Hawkeye show, because Yelena could ably fill the void left by Natasha or create her own space entirely in the MCU (however that pesky lawsuit shakes itself out). When Pugh’s on screen, the film really seems to work, however dodgy all the so-called Russian accents might be.

 

I like Marvel movies more than most, and it’s not that Black Widow is wildly incompetent, a theatrical mess like whatever Batman & Robin was trying to be – or, more recently, the tonal hostage situation that was The Suicide Squad. Black Widow has an internal logic, a clear narrative, and a different set of stakes that the Marvel movies don’t always see. It works; it’s fine. But it was the first Marvel movie in years – perhaps ever – where I almost fell asleep. Granted, it was late, and all the lights were out, and I was alone; yet while the movie never lost me, nor did it ever really have me. The plot is predictable and without nuance, a kind of vanilla apology for the second-stringer position formerly occupied by Natasha Romanoff.

 

Then again, Natasha has been so much better in other, better films. She managed to make perfect sense among demigods and super-soldiers in The Avengers, and she was emotionally compelling in Endgame. And she was an absolute vision in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, still the best Marvel movie, hands-down, in part because it left her past as shadowy and oblique. Here, the truth about her childhood ends up making her a supporting character in her own film. In fact, maybe that’s the key. Black Widow doesn’t grow over the course of the film, having already reckoned with her past in other Marvel entries. All we get is a little padding around the edges, which may or may not come to bear on future projects.

 

At the end of the day, Black Widow is one of the lesser Marvel movies, about on par with Thor: The Dark World but never quite as engaging as, say, an Ant-Man or two. The Dark World was fine enough, but it’s never been something I sought out to rewatch. Throughout Black Widow, I found myself wishing I were instead watching The Winter Soldier. Natasha had an arc there, a purpose, and she was darned fun to watch too. Black Widow feels a bit like homework, obligatory for any true believer who’s come this far. Maybe brew a pot of coffee before you dive into this assignment.

 

Black Widow is rated PG-13 for “intense sequences of violence/action, some language, and thematic material.” Directed by Cate Shortland. Written by Eric Pearson, Jac Schaeffer, and Ned Benson. Based on the Marvel Comics. Starring Scarlett Johansson, Florence Pugh, David Harbour, O-T Fagbenle, Olga Kurylenko, William Hurt, Ray Winstone, and Rachel Weisz.

Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

Avengers, assemble – Avengers: Infinity War brings together ten years and eighteen movies’ worth of stories to pit Earth’s Mightiest Heroes against the strength of Thanos (Josh Brolin) as he gathers the six Infinity Stones in order to impose his will on the universe. From Wakanda to Scotland, from New York to the moons of Jupiter, the Marvel Universe has never seen a threat quite like this one, and so it will take the gathered forces of the Avengers, the Guardians of the Galaxy, and more to repel Thanos and his forces to save all of existence.

I don’t know if it’s possible to give a full review of Avengers: Infinity War without spoiling at least something (I’ll certainly try), but I do want to take a moment to applaud the “spoiler culture” of 2018, which has done a fairly remarkable job of not ruining the film. It’s a critic’s burden that a film this big carries with it the necessity of preserving at all costs the sanctity of narrative surprise; then again, I do have a sense that my main audience here will have already seen the film at least twice. Mum is, however, the word here; I can’t, for example, talk about my only major critique of the film because it’s a mammoth spoiler. Reserving a fuller take for later, I’ll say only that I think the absolute ending of the film doesn’t quite accomplish what it sets out to do, both for reasons that are extratextual and because the film doesn’t quite position the last character we see on screen as the film’s protagonist in a way that would make that figure’s journey the center of the film. (It does, however, stick the emotional landing, in an extraordinary way.)

What Avengers: Infinity War manages to accomplish very deftly – and very quickly, I’d say, within the first ten minutes – is establish the stakes of the film with remarkable precision and weight. For a film that assembles eighteen other films and umpteen million cast members, this is a film that feels amazing well-balanced, and it rises to the gravity of the occasion by presenting a story where it truly feels that anything can happen: not just that X favorite character will meet up with unlikely ally Y, but that any important character could die before this is all said and done, that this story will matter more than we might have been led to expect. At one point, Thor says something like, “It feels like it’s going to stick this time.” Despite all the fakeouts, both within this film and within the Marvel Cinematic Universe at large, Infinity War achieves what I call the “Indiana Jones in peril” moment, where – despite knowing that Indiana Jones won’t actually die – we gasp in shock as his car fritters near the edge of a canyon; only in Infinity War, that car might veer off the road and take a hero or two out with it.

As a film that is more a collision of stories than a singular narrative – Iron Man’s addiction to his technology, Captain America as a man out of time, Black Panther opening his kingdom to the world, etc. – the film very nearly buckles under the sheer weight of what it’s called upon to do. And yet the only characters who don’t get a fair shake are the ones who don’t appear at all; everyone else is placed in subplots that use them to their full range, bouncing them against unlikely but pitch-perfect foils. I wasn’t left wanting more of any one character; I was just left wanting more, period. In this way, Infinity War is almost a new ur-blockbuster, mashing together a decade’s worth of blockbusters to create a super-film that was, as early as Sunday morning, already the biggest opening of all time.

Infinity War is such a roaring success because it understands both its core audience and the audience who may not have caught all the preceding films. We don’t necessarily need to have seen Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2, for example – though Star-Lord fills us in, just in case – because the film is much more invested in its characters than in their continuity. That’s the reason that each character’s arrival (and in at least one particularly electric case, a re-arrival) is such a crowdpleasing moment; regardless of where we left Captain America in Civil War, we’re just so glad to see him again because the Marvel folks have put the “care” back in “character.” From major players like Rocket Raccoon and Spider-Man to supporting cast like Wong and Okoye, Infinity War remembers why we love these characters and wisely keeps them to their strengths while nudging them out of their comfort zones. To review the performances in the film would require a scorecard – and maybe that’s a feature for another time, once the spoiler-warning reins have loosened – but suffice it to say that no one phones it in, treating each scene like just one more installment in their own films. Part of the electricity of the film, then, is the unforeseen chemistry between characters who might otherwise be poles apart (though, once more, it’d be terribly rotten to give all that away just yet), and on this count the filmmakers have continued to do the largely admirable work of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Aside from the popular appeal this film is likely to have, the ultimate “good time” popcorn flick, it represents the apotheosis of the very idea of the franchise – we now know that the largest film franchise can spawn the largest film of all time (dethroning The Force Awakens, which is really saying something in terms of hype), but what next? Avengers 4 seems poised to remind us one last time why we started down this journey back in 2008 and why we kept coming back for more, but it seems equally likely that it’ll set up the next ten years. If you don’t believe me, turn to the Marvel Zombie in your life after you see the post-credits sequence. The fullness of the universe is a major theme of this film, but the film is equally a reminder of the fullness of the Marvel Universe – and not just the Cinematic one. There’s always more, as the “_________ will return” credit acknowledges, and so too will the audience – return, that is, for the as-yet-untitled Avengers 4, for the two films (Ant-Man and the Wasp this year, and Captain Marvel the next) in the interim, for another viewing of Infinity War, and for whatever your personal favorite Marvel movie has been (for me, it’s still the masterful Winter Soldier). The Infinity Stones have been with us since the dawn of creation, and the success of Infinity War seems to promise that Marvel will be with us until the end of it.

Avengers: Infinity War is rated PG-13 for “intense sequences of sci-fi violence and action throughout, language and some crude references.” Directed by Anthony and Joe Russo. Written by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely. Based on the Marvel Comics by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and Jim Starlin. Starring Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Benedict Cumberbatch, Don Cheadle, Tom Holland, Chadwick Boseman, Paul Bettany, Elizabeth Olsen, Anthony Mackie, Sebastian Stan, Danai Gurira, Letitia Wright, Dave Bautista, Karen Gillen, Pom Klementieff, Zoe Saldana, with Josh Brolin, Bradley Cooper, Vin Diesel, and Chris Pratt.

The Jungle Book (2016)

Why Disney is remaking their animated features as live-action films is, quite honestly, beyond me. Last year I had a “Why does this exist?” reaction to Kenneth Branagh’s Cinderella, finding that it didn’t distinguish itself enough from the original. Now it’s Jon Favreau’s turn to adapt an animated film, The Jungle Book, and I have to say that the end result is much more successful for the tightrope act it performs between fidelity and innovation, to say nothing of the frankly fabulous special effects.

The Jungle Book introduces Neel Sethi as man-cub Mowgli, banished from his adopted wolf pack after his life is threatened by tiger Shere Khan (Idris Elba). With panther Bagheera (Ben Kingsley) at his side, Mowgli travels through the jungle in search of man’s village, encountering a menacing snake (Scarlett Johansson), gigantopithecus King Louie (Christopher Walken), and omnivorous bear Baloo (Bill Murray).

One of the real delights of Cinderella was getting to see Cate Blanchett chew the scenery as the wicked stepmother Lady Tremaine, and it’s as if Favreau decided to turn up the volume to eleven by selecting an all-star voice cast for his remake. The voiceover work is arguably the most compelling aspect of this Jungle Book; Elba is perfectly menacing as the mean-spirited tiger, and there’s something uncanny about recasting Kaa’s slithery speech for Johansson’s husky notes. And as much as I’ll always love Louis Prima and Phil Harris, in their respective roles Walken is sublime and Murray is freshly definitive.

Wisely, and strikingly, the film preserves many of the original songs from the 1967 cartoon, in a way that feels organic to the film. “The Bare Necessities” comes on the heels of Bill Murray’s recent Netflix Christmas special, which allowed the comic actor to flex his crooning muscles, and Murray’s natural charisma comes through clearly, even behind the CGI fur of Baloo. And let’s just say that there will be few moments of pure cinematic ecstasy this year to rival Walken’s recitation of “Ooby-doo, I wanna be like you-oo-oo.”

King Louie himself is a real treat, reimagined from a hepcat orangutan into a colossal ape straight out of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (like Kipling, wrestling with the legacy of imperialism in India). Behind the computer effects we can discern some of Walken’s own distinctive tics, facial gestures and hand movements as well as his non-pareil intonations. And here’s where Jungle Book really mesmerizes me – like Kaa’s hypnotic eyes, I’m captivated by the fact that all the animals are animated by computers, not by motion capture or animating only the mouths. This is really remarkable stuff that the Disney animators have managed to cook up, and the fact that it never looks phony is perhaps justification enough for updating the 1967 animated film into live action.

Quietly, Favreau has become one to watch, demonstrating an incredible versatility between this, Iron Man, and Chef (and, though it wasn’t as well received, Cowboys & Aliens). Jungle Book proves my hypothesis that Chef was good for Favreau in the sense that it gave him time to find his own voice again after working on blockbuster corporate products for several years in a row. There is something of the same personal vision from Chef balanced by the unabashed wonder that ought to belong to a Disney picture.

News spread like man’s red flower that Jungle Book 2 had already been greenlit. I can only imagine where the narrative will go – unlike the original film, this Jungle Book doesn’t end with a coquettish water girl at man’s village – but more like this will be a welcome addition to the Disney canon.

The Jungle Book is rated PG for “some sequences of scary action and peril.” There are growly animals that chase and menace our protagonists, and scenes in which fire ravages the jungle might intimidate younger viewers.

Heads up, True Believers – we’ll continue to Make Yours Marvel this Wednesday with another installment in “The Grand Marvel Rewatch,” so check back then for 2015’s Ant-Man. Or subscribe above, and receive those missives right in your inbox. Nuff said!

The Grand Marvel Rewatch: Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Face front, true believers! Welcome to the next astonishing addition to “The Grand Marvel Rewatch,” designed to get us all sufficiently amped up for Captain America: Civil War, which comes out May 6, 2016. Each Wednesday, The Cinema King casts his eye back upon the twelve films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and offers five salient observations about the caliber of the films and the way they might play into Marvel’s latest installment in America’s favorite franchise.

Today’s fantastic feature film takes us to 2014 for Captain America: The Winter Soldier, maybe the most important film thematically in the run-up to Civil War.

1. The fall of SHIELD. Thinking in terms of narrative developments in the unfolding MCU, SHIELD has been a constant presence, helping to assemble the Avengers, monitor and assist their respective endeavors, and police the world. With Winter Soldier, all that falls apart – SHIELD has always already been Hydra, and those ambitions of world protection have been revealed to be naught but hollow. It’s an exceedingly bold move, and it reorients the world of the Avengers to suggest to them that they might now be earth’s last line of defense. We’ll still see assists from Nick Fury here and there, but we don’t have a faceless government agency ostensibly serving good. 
2. What about Agents of SHIELD? I remember being a little disappointed with the first season of Agents of SHIELD, in part because it felt divorced from the MCU and perhaps overly procedural, despite the mystery of Phil Coulson’s post-Avengers resurrection (long story short, alien DNA mixed with shady science). But I can recall the booster shot of enthusiasm for the show after seeing SHIELD fall in Winter Soldier and musing, “Well, how’s that going to affect Agents?” It’s transmedia storytelling at its finest that the show beats lined up perfectly with the film – Jasper Sitwell leaves Agents to board a boat on Tuesday, he’s in Winter Soldier on Friday, and next Tuesday’s episode hits the dead center of Winter Soldier. It makes me all the more excited for any possible tie-ins with Civil War. 
3. Who the hell is Bucky? We all knew Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) didn’t die in The First Avenger, but I certainly didn’t expect him to resurface quite so soon. The film introduces this shadow narrative of Bucky’s cryogenic life as the Winter Soldier, reshaping the century for Hydra from behind the scenes. He’s been scooped and hollowed out, reprogrammed within an inch of his life. The conclusion to Winter Soldier suggests that he’s regaining his memory – but is he? How much of Bucky is still in there? And the question of Bucky’s allegiances will be front and center in Civil War. Who is this guy, really, and can he be trusted? (Trailers suggest Cap says yes, Iron Man nay.) 
4. It’s Cap’s world; we all just tear it down. Major kudos to Chris Evans for nailing the part of Captain America to the wall – you really feel for Cap as a man out of time in this one, maybe more than we did in The Avengers, as he struggles to adjust to losing his generation but still have time to find a date (hat-tip to “neighbor” Sharon Carter [Emily VanCamp], returning for Civil War). But I’m much more heartbroken by the realization that Cap’s narrative arc has been a series of losing everything he has – first, his time and world at the end of The First Avenger, then his sense of the fabric of reality in The Avengers, and now losing his best friend a second time when he recognizes that Bucky might not be the kind of man you save. And with Civil War foreboding the loss of the friendship of at least half the Avengers, poor Steve Rogers just can’t catch a break. 
5. Really, though, I just love this movie. I’ve made no bones about the fact that Winter Soldier is my #1 favorite MCU film, and it’s probably my #2 superhero film of all time (just behind Fant4stic). It’s airtight, clips along without a wasted moment, kills it on sound editing, and creates a wonderful trio between Cap, Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson at her most endearing), and fan-favorite newcomer Falcon (Anthony Mackie, who steals the film wholesale). The Russo brothers at the helm of this and Civil War portends magnificent things for the fate of the MCU, and I couldn’t be more excited that they’re at the helm of Avengers: Infinity War. If anyone can balance spectacle, narrative, character, and fun, Winter Soldier is the smoking gun for the Russos.

There’s so much more to be said about Captain America: The Winter Soldier, so be sure to check out my original review. Join me in the Grand Marvel Rewatch over the coming weeks, and hit the comments to share your thoughts about the MCU. And don’t forget to tune in next Wednesday for the next installment, in which we take a closer look at 2014’s Guardians of the Galaxy. Excelsior!

The Grand Marvel Rewatch: Iron Man 2

Face front, true believers! Welcome to the next astonishing addition to “The Grand Marvel Rewatch,” designed to get us all sufficiently amped up for Captain America: Civil War, which comes out May 6, 2016. Each Wednesday, The Cinema King casts his eye back upon the twelve films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and offers five salient observations about the caliber of the films and the way they might play into Marvel’s latest installment in America’s favorite franchise.

Today’s fantastic feature film takes us to 2010 for Iron Man 2, our first sequel and the only MCU film to feature prominently a cockatoo.

1. Better than its reputation. Iron Man 2 is usually ranked among the MCU’s lowest points (it has the third lowest ranking on Rotten Tomatoes, ahead of The Incredible Hulk and Thor: The Dark World), but there’s still plenty of fun to be had here. As before, Robert Downey, Jr., is the big attraction here, beginning with a giggle-inducing opener in which Tony Stark makes an appropriately dramatic entrance, extols his own virtues, and in a wonderful bit of metacommentary applauds himself and says, “Oh, it’s good to be back!” With RDJ on-screen it certainly is. 
2. On the other hand, however... There is a chunk of Iron Man 2 that is astonishingly boring. You’ll remember this as the moment right near the end of Act Two, when both Tony and Whiplash (Mickey Rourke) are engaged in some high-tech shenanigans in their own montages. Maybe it’s just that I’ve seen these movies a thousand times by now, but there’s a feeling of treading water while there’s so much other interesting stuff going on in the movie. The film recovers in time for the climax, but I had the distinct feeling of not missing much if I had to get up for more popcorn. (You bet your arc reactor I was noshing.) 
3. The cast explodes as the universe expands. It might be to the detriment of the main plot, but Iron Man 2, but the Marvel Cinematic Universe takes an enormous leap forward with a closer look at SHIELD, a peek into the past of Tony’s father Howard, and the introduction of Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson). While these are all fascinating additions in hindsight, deployed to much greater effect later in the MCU, here these beats feel a little like intrusions, corporate presences without narrative arcs. The MCU has more successfully navigated that line between franchised product and standalone entertainment than Iron Man 2 might lead one to believe.
4. New Rhodey. I like Terrence Howard as much as the next man, but it’s really hard to imagine anyone other than Don Cheadle as War Machine. The film hangs a delightful lampshade on the casting change with Rhodey’s opening line, “Look, it’s me. I’m here. Deal with it.” But it ends up not being a big deal because Cheadle has fantastic charisma with RDJ, brings the critically palpable enthusiasm for the role, and fits into the suit in a way that is difficult to define. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that Rhodes pops up in Captain Marvel (assuming he makes it out of Civil War alive), based on the relationship he has with Carol Danvers in the comics.
5. Continuity detritus. It’s hard to say how much of this stuff is planned out in advance and how much is improvised, but there’s a surprising amount of retrospective continuity that ends up making Iron Man 2 more enjoyable almost by accident. Agent Coulson’s (Clark Gregg) discovery of the Captain America shield prototype makes wonderful sense, given the fanboy devotion we discover in The Avengers. Then there’s Senator Stern (Garry Shandling), whose dogged pursuit of the Iron Man technology squares nicely with the character development we get during his cameo in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. At the same time, however, there’s a question to be answered about Howard Stark – what turns him from the carefree playboy (Dominic Cooper) of Agent Carter into the sobered Disneyesque futurist (John Slattery) we meet in this film? It’s all connected... and tracing out those connections is half the fun.

There’s so much more to be said about Iron Man 2, so be sure to check out my original review. Join me in the Grand Marvel Rewatch over the coming weeks, and hit the comments to share your thoughts about the MCU. And don’t forget to tune in next Wednesday for the next installment, in which we take a closer look at 2011’s Thor. Excelsior!

Hail, Caesar! (2016)

Hail, Caesar! tickles a lot of my moviegoing fancies: it’s a dark comedy farce courtesy of the Coen Brothers, in which an all-star cast of buffoons blunders their way through old Hollywood while the plot twists and turns like a postmodern poodle chasing its own tail. That may not be everyone’s cup of tea, recalling the plotless meandering of The Big Sleep and its successors, but for me it’s the most fun I’ve had at a movie in a long while (yes, maybe even more fun than Deadpool).

Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin) has the unenviable job of being the chief “fixer” for Capitol Pictures; when something goes amuck, it’s Eddie’s task to make sure the motion picture shows go on. The latest catastrophe he’s tasked with suppressing is the abduction of Baird Whitlock (George Clooney), Capitol’s number-one star, though somewhat of a lush and a dim bulb. Of course, the Capitol lot is busy with numerous other crises, including a disgruntled mermaid (Scarlett Johansson), a highstrung director (Ralph Fiennes) and his twanging lead actor (Alden Ehrenreich), twin newspaper columnists (Tilda Swinton and Tilda Swinton), and a chipper musical star (Channing Tatum).

I’m reviewing Hail, Caesar! as someone who has very much partaken of the Coen kool-aid, so if The Big Lebowski was never your cup of tea or if Burn After Reading left you feeling parched, this is really more of the same, and you’d be better off watching something else. I say “more of the same” not as a negative, because I’m personally delighted to see more of the madcap mania the Coens have turned into a personal brand because it’s not something I get anywhere else at the cinema. No one does horseplay like Joel and Ethan Coen.

As for the plotlessness of Hail, Caesar!, the film is akin to an indoor amusement ride in which the audience shuffles from film set to film set to peek in on a day (27 hours, to be precise) in the life of 1950s Hollywood, and each of these individual setpieces is an exercise in the line between straight-face and satire. The Coens are masters at straddling this line, allowing the characters’ idiocy to penetrate to the foreground without the need to resort to caricature or signposting. On the surface, there’s nothing intrinsically funny about Tatum’s song-and-dance routine, but there’s something about the deadset sincerity, coupled with the amazingly insightful small nods to clichés of the era (such as taking the bartender’s dish rag and polishing his bald dome with it), leave the audience rolling with laughter – a continuous giggle punctuated by bursts of glee. Which is not to say there aren’t jokes; the moment when an Eastern Orthodox priest dismisses a chariot stunt as “fakey” is as funny as anything in a comedy special, and the moment when Hobie finds it difficult to drop his accent when saying “Would that it twere so simple” gets funnier the longer the gag goes on.

Then there’s the ever-present Coen delight of seeing a team of A-listers perambulating through the spectacle. Brolin is engaging as the over-hardboiled fixer, gritting his way through exaggerated Catholic guilt, and his interactions with the other cast members carry the film on his tensed shoulders. As ever, it’s a delight to see George Clooney playing the quintessential Coen idiot, who here scratches his head at his own kidnapping while being naively dazzled when his captors introduce him to the writings of Karl Marx. Even Coen mainstay (and spouse) Frances McDormand pops in for a vignette as a film editor whose scarves get caught in the projection reels. Delightfully madcap cameos like this one make Hail, Caesar! a standout.

At the conclusion of Hail, Caesar! everything wraps up fairly quickly and tidily. Whether this is a ending far too pat for the demands of realism, or whether I simply didn’t want the film to end, is up for debate; or is it, as the film suggests, a commentary on the function of films in society, as illusory dreams constrained by their own rules, entirely divorced from reality? It’s the final indication that Hail, Caesar! is something much smarter than it might initially present. The joke is on the characters, not on the audience, and the steadfast refusal of the Coens to pander is a tremendous credit to us and to them. Hail, Caesar! indeed!

Hail, Caesar! is rated PG-13 for “some suggestive content and smoking.” There’s a quick mention of an unwed pregnancy and one unelaborated mention of sodomy.

Heads up, True Believers – we’ll continue to Make Yours Marvel this Wednesday with another installment in “The Grand Marvel Rewatch,” so check back then for 2010’s Iron Man 2. Or subscribe above, and receive those missives right in your inbox. Nuff said!

Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)

The world is a darker place in the wake of the news that Joss Whedon won’t be helming the two-part Avengers: Infinity War (due out in 2018 and 2019). To wit, Avengers: Age of Ultron is a darker, moodier installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe than its predecessor. But if this truly is Whedon’s swan song in the world of The Avengers, it’s a damned good note on which to end, better than the original and a close contender for the MCU’s finest hour.

After a knockout opening sequence that doesn’t waste any time getting to the action, all your favorite Avengers have assembled. When Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) develop an artificial intelligence project that goes awry, the other Avengers – Captain America (Chris Evans), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) – face the threat of annihilation when the AI builds itself a body and becomes Ultron (James Spader). Along the way, the Avengers are threatened by superpowered twins (Elizabeth Olsen and Aaron Taylor-Johnson) left in the wake of the fall of Hydra.

It seems clunky to type with all those parentheticals, but the Joss Whedon trademark has always been gracefulness when it comes to large ensemble casts. As in the first film, there is an organicity to the assembling of these Avengers, but where The Avengers spent the better part of its first half in assembly-mode (a really lovely first half, actually, perhaps stronger than the action-heavy climax), Age of Ultron throws the group into a cauldron already boiling with tension and camaraderie. The script is well-crafted as ever, with distinct arcs for its characters (which ought to be the norm but, sadly, isn’t) and a tight narrative focus that finds a way to expand the universe without dithering and losing focus.

I don’t want to say more about expanding the universe for fear of spoiling the film, so on the occasion of May the Fourth – Star Wars Day – I’d like to comment on Age of Ultron being ostensibly the franchise’s “Empire Strikes Back” moment, the middle and darkest entry in a trilogy. The mood in Age of Ultron is considerably grimmer than in The Avengers, though it’s by no means unbearable; in fact, what’s surprising about the film is just how much humor it includes among all the foreboding. The Avengers was funny, but Age of Ultron seems to have imported the raucous tempo of Guardians of the Galaxy’s punchlines. “Keep ’em laughing” seems to be the word of the day here, to the point where I began to wonder, amid all the franchise’s one-liners and character resurrections (Nick Fury, Phil Coulson, Pepper Potts, Bucky Barnes, et al), whether Age of Ultron would actually pull the emotional trigger and give us something truly tragic. Suffice it to say, Age of Ultron does go there, and in a way that works better than it actually ought to.

I could lather up the performers, as I usually do, but you’ve seen it all before. The cast continues to do that at which they are best while also successfully navigating through their respective character evolutions. Ruffalo, for one, is still doing the exposed-nerve timidity, but the romantic wrinkles given to his character equally compelling and don’t feel the least bit out of Bruce Banner’s rhythm. Renner gets the closest thing to the film’s center stage (an apology, perhaps, for spending much of The Avengers under Loki’s mind-control) with a development so surprisingly unanticipated that a pin drop would have deafened the audience on opening night.

The true surprises are in the incoming cast, who distinguish themselves quite nicely while also integrating into the ensemble without that feeling of intrusion. Spader in particular stands out as one of the MCU’s better villains, very well-developed and extremely menacing in a creepy sort of way – in other words, exactly the kind of character you’d expect from James Spader. The twins, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver, work very well in the context of the film, and they’re the sort of people you’d like to see more of in future films.

One final note must be made of the way that Age of Ultron very consciously engages with the superhero film genre overall. We all have this sense that the bubble is going to burst at some point (with four superhero movies coming out in July 2018 – one a week!), but Age of Ultron never feels overfull or weary. Instead, there’s an interesting way that the film comments on the trend of superhero movies toward ungrounded violence, by which I don’t mean the odd tendency of Marvel films to end with airborne combat and explosions galore. No, there seems to be a very clear commentary on Man of Steel’s ignorance (willful or otherwise) of civilian casualties. At many points in Age of Ultron, The Avengers take great pains to guarantee the safety of the innocent, at the point of risking their own lives to save the citizenry. While I’m one of the few who maintains that Man of Steel’s carnage will actually be a motivating factor for Superman in the sequels, Age of Ultron tackles the issue head-on to demonstrate that the sanctity of life ought to be the hero’s first prerogative.

Is Age of Ultron a bid for a kinder, gentler superhero film? I’m not sure that’s the message, but it is certainly a bid for a more thoughtful one. And while I’m not ready to say it’s dethroned The Winter Soldier at the top of my MCU power rankings, I will say that Whedon had made an indelible stamp on the superhero genre, and the future would do well to take its cues from him – particularly the well-crafted yet innovative juggling act of Age of Ultron.

Avengers: Age of Ultron is rated PG-13 for “intense sequences of sci-fi action, violence and destruction, and for some suggestive comments.” The action scenes are standard superhero fare, with all the punching, explosions, and gunfire you’d expect. Most of it is bloodless, as you’d expect from fights with robots, but some of the more personal action beats include blood. The film also includes the standard amount of innuendo and a few scenes of flirting.

By the way, today is May the Fourth – Star Wars Day! – so flashback to 2014 and take a look at my reviews of the Star Wars saga!

Chef (2014)

As much as I love a good big-budget popcorn summer movie, I have the sense that a lot of smaller films are lost amid the explosion-heavy hype surrounding the tentpole franchises and blockbuster features.  Case in point – Chef flew very low under the radar, but those who find it are in for a treat.

Chef Carl Casper (Jon Favreau) faces a midlife crisis after a social media meltdown against a mean-spirited food critic (Oliver Platt).  On the advice of his ex-wife (Sofia Vergara), Casper seeks true happiness by opening a food truck with his son and his sous chef (John Leguizamo) and embarking on a road trip.

That is, essentially, opening shot to closing shot, a complete synopsis of the film, but it doesn’t seem like a spoiler, and not just because the trailers have given away as much.  Chef feels very much like a film that proceeds along a clear path from the beginning, without a need to try to surprise the audience or pull one over on it.  Instead, Favreau – who also wrote and directed – clearly wants to make a very straightforward film with a very simple message.

For me, knowing that Favreau is wearing every creative hat in the film, it seems like a very authorially guided project, Favreau’s own statement about himself.  What’s interesting to me is the way that Chef reads like a treatise on why Favreau isn’t directing Iron Man movies anymore; like Favreau, Casper attained fame quickly for his indie work before settling into a critically derided routine with “the man,” embodied here by an overbearing Dustin Hoffman who demands sameness from Casper’s menu.  Instead of staying with the lovely Scarlett Johansson (in Chef, a maître d’ seduced by Casper’s prowess in the kitchen), Casper/Favreau breaks off and does his own smaller thing, finding greater success and fulfillment than ever before.

Whether or not Chef is a manifesto on why Favreau has left big-budget Hollywood (for now), Chef is exceptionally entertaining, feel-good in the least derisive sense of the word.  I can honestly say that I had an embarrassingly wide smile on my face for much of the film, even between the punchlines.  That’s because Chef plays like a passion project, which makes the food truck plotline feel very metaphorical – one senses that Chef is Favreau’s food truck.  In fact, it doesn’t seem accidental that the man who sells Casper the truck is played by Robert Downey Jr., in one of the film’s funniest scenes; without the RDJ-sponsored success of Iron Man, we might not have a Chef.

This is all very beneath the surface, and I don’t think the moviegoing public at large are meant to focus on the metaphorical content the way I have.  But it does emphasize the degree to which Favreau’s heart is in the film, an emotional investment that carries over to the audience, who can’t help but fall in love with Casper, whether he’s playing sad sack or genuinely content.  While Favreau has that everyman charisma that one would need for this role, he surrounds himself with a fantastically talented supporting cast of scene stealers who all possess a deft comedic timing that sells lines like “You’re trending, bro.”

Chef is a classic story told very well, without the burden of overwhelming ambition or franchised expectations.  It’s both narratively and literally a back-to-basics piece for Favreau, a kind of (appropriately enough) palate cleanser for him and for the audience.  With an emphasis on simplicity and substance, Chef is a sweet dish wholly recommended for anyone seeking a bit of lighthearted fun at the box office this summer.

Chef is rated R for “language, including some suggestive references.”  There are a surprising number of F-bombs (at least, surprising based on the trailer), though it feels organic for the characters.  There are verbal fisticuffs and an occasional crude remark about romantic partnerships.

Under the Skin (2014)

Under the Skin is one of the most disturbing and simultaneously perplexing movies I’ve ever seen.  I don’t mind being disturbed by a film – indeed, every once in a while, I actively seek out such a moviegoing experience – and there is something quite haunting about the film.  But Under the Skin is ultimately too thin on narrative to be truly effective.

Scarlett Johansson stars as a being (alien?) who drives around in a van picking up stray men and luring them back to her place with the promise of sex.  The abject loneliness of the road and the emotional distance when she eventually kills these men begins to wear on her, and she begins to look for human emotion within herself.

At least, that’s what I think the film is about.  Director Jonathan Glazer and screenwriter Walter Campbell, in what other sources are calling a very loose adaptation of Michael Faber’s eponymous novel, have given us a film that is very highly stylized (and quite engagingly so) but is otherwise compromised by its inability to tell a story that requires the full runtime to tell. 

I would like to commend Glazer and Campbell for not writing a film solely based around the premise of Scarlett Johansson taking her clothes off.  I sense that this is the kind of film that Under the Skin could have become had filmmakers with less interest in filmmaking actually been at the wheel.  I don’t put Glazer in that camp, because it’s apparent that he has something to say about a lot of different themes, but I don’t think he handles these themes especially well.

There are moments in the film that work spectacularly.  The densely metaphorical seduction/murder sequences convey quite imaginatively what is happening through the intense use of visual language, and while we never quite know why Johansson is abducting these men, these sequences communicate in horrifying dread a sense of their ultimate fate.  Indeed, Glazer is ostensibly a master of visual language, able to convey weighty ideas without the use of dialogue. 

Take, for instance, what I see as the pivotal turning point in the film – the interaction between Johansson and a man with neurofibromatosis, in which nothing but Johansson’s performance indicates that her burgeoning compassion for him forces her to spare his life.  It’s a masterful sequence, made all the more powerful by the fact that the actor in question, Adam Pearson, is in fact not an actor at all.

It’s scenes like that one (or the genuinely funny moment when Johansson’s character attempts to eat chocolate cake for the first time) that suggest Glazer has something to say, but in the end Under the Skin never really says anything substantial.  He’s obviously commenting on the nature of sexual predators – the moment when Johansson meets a shady forest patrolman, who asks her the same questions she asked of her prey, indicates as much – but it’s quite unclear what the comment is.  Similarly, the film never quite acknowledges the purpose – or, really, the existence – of the man on the motorcycle who drifts in and out of the film, with some unspoken link to the main character.

I don’t regret seeing Under the Skin, but I’m on the precipice of regret because the film is very nearly incomprehensible.  It does contain several arresting moments, but it isn’t as enjoyably surreal as, say, the work of David Lynch.  While Glazer is a master of silences, the pacing of Under the Skin is more glacial than it needs to be, though it will lodge someplace in the back of your skull for a few days after seeing it as you puzzle through just what it all means.

>Under the Skin is rated R for “graphic nudity, sexual content, some violence and language.”  Several men and women undress fully and are seen naked; though the lighting and cinematography are quite dim, the nudity is unmistakable.  Furthermore, the film deals with themes of seduction, rape, and sex killings, which are seen in disturbing metaphorical visuals with no blood.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)

If Skyfall was the closest to Christopher Nolan’s James Bond we’ll ever get, Captain America: The Winter Soldier is the Marvel film that most clearly embraces that Nolan-level realism and its accompanying political significance.  For this reviewer, that’s a good thing – melding the financially successful Marvel method of filmmaking with the style of the most creatively successful comic book films (the “Dark Knight” trilogy) means a film that is considerably darker than Thor: The Dark World or even the retro fun of Captain America: The First Avenger but one that is no less compelling.

The Winter Soldier stars Chris Evans as Steve Rogers, better known as Captain America, the country’s leading super-soldier coming to terms with the world after being thawed out from 70 years on ice.  Captain America is partnered with Natasha Romanoff, the Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), but he’s growing suspicious of the secrets she and SHIELD are keeping.  After ghost-story assassin The Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan) attacks SHIELD director Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), Cap faces life on the run from Alexander Pierce (Robert Redford), a SHIELD exec who’s convinced Cap is keeping secrets of his own.

Taking its cue from Ed Brubaker’s immensely popular run on the character, The Winter Soldier runs in its own direction without adhering slavishly to the source material.  There are a ton of fun shout-outs to the comics, but Winter Soldier continues the Marvel process of realigning classic stories for the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  Here SHIELD plays a much larger role than in the comics (which, really, I can’t recommend highly enough), opening a gateway to very exciting territory once Avengers: Age of Ultron rolls around.

On that note, one senses that the film suffers just the tiniest bit – as did the first Captain America film – from establishing plotlines for use further down the road, be it in Avengers: Age of Ultron or a third Captain America movie.  The difference between this and Prometheus (still the gold standard for audience frustration), though, is that Winter Soldier gestures toward future installments in the “to be continued” tradition of comics without failing to resolve its own central issues.  There’s one significant plot thread that doesn’t quite wrap up as neatly as it ought to – you’ll know it when you see it, since it’s right at the end – which I think is to the film’s detriment, as it deprives two members of the cast from having a very emotionally charged moment.

That’s all in the film we didn’t get, though (and, I’m sure, in the sequel we will).  The film we did get is anchored by another convincing performance by Evans as the soldier out of time, wrestling with fish-out-of-water issues and the more standard superheroic fare.  Meanwhile, Johansson continues to become a better actress after getting stronger material in The Avengers, and newcomer Anthony Mackie is a welcome addition as The Falcon.  The action sequences stand out as being first-rate, especially in a power-packed franchise like the Marvel Cinematic Universe; driven by Henry Jackman’s killer score, the shoot-em-ups and explosions crackle off the screen, especially in 3D.

I mentioned the tone at the top of this review, because it seems to be what sets Winter Soldier apart from its forerunners.  The humor here is certainly more restrained, surprisingly so considering that directors Anthony and Joe Russo are perhaps best known for their work on sitcoms like Arrested Development and Community.  But rather than paint the comedy broadly as in Thor: The Dark World, Winter Soldier opts for a more restrained tone in line with the conspiracy thriller genre to make a shrewd political point about the tradeoff between security and freedom.  It’s this venture into more substantial terrain that indicates, I hope, a shift in Marvel’s approach.  While some of the other Marvel films have been criticized for being insubstantial or mere teasers for future films – not from me, mind you, I love these things, even Iron Man 2 – Winter Soldier’s willingness to tackle pressing issues in current events might mark a sea change toward greater cultural relevance beyond merely making a literal ton of money.

As long as these movies keep being as entertaining as Captain America: The Winter Soldier, make mine Marvel.  (At least, until Batman vs. Superman lands.)

Captain America: The Winter Soldier is rated PG-13 for “intense sequences of violence, gunplay and action throughout.”  Plenty of gunfire, car chases, explosions, fistfights, et cetera.

Monday at the Movies - June 3, 2013

In honor of last month's stellar first season finale of Bates Motel, the A&E show I ended up loving more than I ever thought I would, we take a look at the myth behind the filming of Psycho before turning to the film itself.

Hitchcock (2012) – One of our finest actors portrays one of the greatest directors of all time, yet somehow the results leave something to be desired.  Sacha Gervasi’s directorial debut follows the corpulent Alfred Hitchcock (Anthony Hopkins) during the making of his ostensible masterpiece, Psycho.  It sounds like a recipe for success, but something’s missing; my vote is that, engaging though they all are, there are far too many subplots going on in the film.  We’ve got Helen Mirren doing fab work as Alma Reville, but it’s a performance dulled by a lifeless tease of adulteries (Danny Huston, usually equally compelling, is uninteresting here).  The bits where Hitch hallucinates encounters with Ed Gein are wacky in a Tim Burton kind of way, but these scenes are mere sidebars to other narratives.  And the making of Psycho itself, which was the major draw for me, gets short shrift – a shame, since it’s Hitch/Hopkins at his liveliest, and we have solid turns from Scarlett Johansson and James D’Arcy (as Janet Leigh and an uncanny doppelganger of Anthony Perkins, respectively).  On top of all that, though Hopkins is divine as always, his own star power sometimes overshadows the role, so it’s difficult to see him just at surface level; his Hitch voice is killer and his mannerisms accurate, but Hopkins still bleeds through.  All told, there’s nothing wrong with the movie, but it teases so many fascinating movies within itself that nothing feels fully fleshed out.  If nothing else, you’ll be itching to rewatch Psycho when all’s said and done.

Psycho (1960) – What do you say about a movie which the universe has already agreed is a landmark classic?  Alfred Hitchcock, the undisputed master of suspense, directs the hell out of Robert Bloch’s pulpy novel about the shady Bates Motel and its troubled proprietor Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins), burdened with his own unique brand of mother issues when Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) arrives with a bundle of stolen cash.  Though it’s part of the air we breathe, the rest is criminal to spoil just in case, and I can only say that what Hitch does with the material is nothing short of golden.  He’s helped by a more than able score by the legendary Bernard Herrmann, who crafts no less than three unforgettable themes for the film (including those unmistakable violin screeches); indeed, Herrmann’s compositions are almost characters in themselves, governing the mood almost as much as Hitch’s own deliberate direction.  But oh, those directorial decisions:  the black and white, the montage (Eisenstein’s idea of montage as violence never felt so appropriate), the angles, the shadows, even the color of Janet Leigh’s underwear – all are the marks of an obsessive genius lending all his skill to a real project of passion.  Each visual is a treat unto itself, the shots of Norman’s taxidermy lending a beautiful horror to his calm conversation.  And from an industry standpoint, much about the film is delightfully innovative, making twist endings and arriving on time part of the moviegoing lexicon.  In short, it’s not crazy to love Psycho.

That does it for this week’s edition of “Monday at the Movies.” We’ll see you here on Friday for the Double-Oh-Seventh of the month!

The Avengers (2012)

If you had any question about when the summer movie season begins, seeing most of your favorite summer movie icons assembled in one film should assuage your confusion.

We’ve been waiting since 2008 for The Avengers to assemble, and under the direction (and script) of fan favorite Joss Whedon, they’ve done just that.  Iron Man (Robert Downey, Jr.), The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Captain America (Chris Evans), Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) – the gang’s all here.  (Even Clark Gregg, who manages to make Agent Coulson even more likeable, as he has with each successive appearance of this great character.)

And when The Avengers assemble... it’s amazing.

Taking little threads from each of the existing Marvel Cinematic Universe films, The Avengers finds the team gathering for the first time after Thor’s brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston) steals a weapon of unimaginable power from S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters.

That’s it.  That’s the premise.  But without spoiling any of the film’s delightful surprises, it’s a deceptively simple plot which allows plenty of room for character interactions.  So while the story won’t surprise anyone, the relationships will; we’ve been fantasizing about a time when Iron Man and Thor would meet Captain America, and here we get to put them all in the same room and see what’s shaking.

Joss Whedon’s greatest strength here is in balancing an enormous cast of characters, something he does far better here than he ever did on the abbreviated Firefly.  Pulling double duty on scripting and directing, Whedon never loses focus on any of the heroes – even the unpowered Black Widow and Hawkeye, who highlight how out of their league they are in a key emotional scene.  Rather, each gets a moment to shine, a line or action that’ll elicit applause or hooted cheers from an audience which is already glad to be there.

Even better, these are the same characters we’ve already met in other films – excepting, of course, Ruffalo’s Hulk, a vast improvement over lackluster predecessors.  By “same,” I mean that Whedon has kept their voices intact; Iron Man still possesses the same narcissistic wit, Thor seems to have walked straight off a Shakespearean stage, and Captain America hasn’t lost any of his 1940s flair despite being more than 70 years out of his time (better yet, we’re not asked to laugh at him for it).

What makes The Avengers a hit is that it’s a successful whole built on successful parts.  Marvel has made a string of delightful films in the lead-up to The Avengers, and if even one of those had fallen flat, this whole enterprise would have been fruitless.  If Thor had floundered or if Iron Man had missed the mark, we’d be stuck with a dud in a team of winners.  Instead, what we have is grade-A comic book movie.

And I say “comic book movie” with no derision in my voice.  Where The Dark Knight took comics and applied filmic realism to spectacular effect, The Avengers translates perfectly to film the experience of reading a comic book.  Flashy colors, exorbitant explosions, clever angles, and costumes that ought to look out of place but don’t (I’m looking at you, Loki) – these are what we’d expect on the newsstands, not in a post-Nolan world.  But it works here.

It works because the movie is so infectiously fun that it quickly sweeps the audience into its world and recruits us into the superteam.  The Avengers isn’t a team of demigods like the Justice League (an updated Greek pantheon in Grant Morrison’s 1997-2000 comics run), it’s a cluster of (mostly) human characters with human foibles.  Tony Stark’s attempts to provoke Bruce Banner into changing into the Hulk isn’t something you’d ever see Batman doing to Superman, but here it’s perfectly in line with what a group of misfits do when they’re assembled in a tight space.

It’s also extremely entertaining to watch.  Whedon singles out each character’s defining traits and pits them against each other; take Downey’s playful lack of sincerity and Ruffalo’s tortured repression, and you’ve got sparks.  Blast Nick Fury’s dedication to the task against Thor’s sense of cosmic perspective, and you’ll be chuckling right alongside Thor. 

Honestly, I can’t sell short just how fun this movie is.  See it with a full house, if you can.  But see it.  It’s the kind of film that makes my cheeks numb from smiling all the time.  Well, not all the time.  There’s a moment – true believers will know it – when the film hits a surprisingly heartfelt beat, but it sweetens, not sours, the film.  I’m already eagerly awaiting the DVD – and a second showing before that.

The Avengers is rated PG-13 for “intense sequences of sci-fi violence and action throughout, and a mild drug reference.”  It’s more of the same comic book violence we’ve come to expect from Marvel’s stable, often not bloody (with one notable exception) but dominated by explosions.  I think the aforementioned drug reference is Tony Stark’s continued abuse of alcohol, which would have been a disappointing omission.

 

Welcome back to the summer of full reviews, true believers – we’ll see you next week!

Iron Man 2 (2010)

If you're expecting a negative review, turn around now. Iron Man 2 combines three of my favorite things: summer blockbusters (a sure sign that my summer review series has kicked off again), comic books (whose adaptations I review all too often) here, and Robert Downey, Jr. (whose movies aren't reviewed often enough here). And it does so successfully.

Iron Man 2 picks up literally right where the first one left off: Now that Tony Stark (Downey) has outed himself as the metal-suited superhero Iron Man, he has to face new sharks in the water. A bevy of enemies accost him, including the smarmy looter Senator Stern (Garry Shandling) and business rival Justin Hammer (the underappreciated Sam Rockwell). The real foe here is Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke, blending elements of Iron Man foes Whiplash and the Crimson Dynamo), who possesses technology similar to Iron Man - tech he plans to use against Stark. Along the way, Tony Stark is off-again with secretary/love interest Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) and buddy Lt. Col. James Rhodes (Don Cheadle, replacing Terrence Howard), on-again with new aide Natalie Rushman (Scarlett Johannson), and on-the-fence about S.H.I.E.L.D. Director Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson and his eyepatch) and his Avengers-related offer.

Fans of the first movie will have plenty to smile about here. Iron Man, you'll recall, came at a time when "The darker, the better" was the order of the day in the comic book adaptation world. Enter Tony Stark, sauntering into the comic book world with a drink in one hand and a punchline in the other. Iron Man 2 continues that tradition, with the one-liners coming as fast as machine gun fire. There's only one scene that borders on over-the-top, comedically speaking, and that's Tony Stark's birthday party, which he hosts while in full Iron Man gear and while completely intoxicated. But the scene survives - and the film thrives - because of Downey's personality; he's impeccably cast here in a character who's larger than life, just like his personifier. If there are such things as roles one was born to play, this is RDJ's.

The rest of the cast is in fine form, too. Paltrow and Johannson, both of whom have been known to turn in less than stellar performances, have real chemistry with RDJ, and the action scenes with which Johannson's tasked are pulled off with Alias-style sangfroid. It's always a delight to see Sam Jackson, and Cheadle does such a solid job as "Rhodey" that you'll almost forget about Terrence Howard. While Rourke and Rockwell aren't on the level of Heath Ledger's Joker, as far as villainy goes they're as good as the best of the Marvel baddie crew (i.e., Willem Dafoe in Spider-Man and Ian McKellan in X-Men), though Rockwell is a bit campier than some may care for. Even director Jon Favreau steps in front of the camera for a fun turn as gregarious driver/bodyguard Happy Hogan, who gets a terrific action sequence of his own.

The movie, though, is rightfully Downey's, and Iron Man's by extension, and so fans will be relieved to know that - despite this film having a much larger ensemble cast than its predecessor - the focus is still very much on Tony Stark and that metal suit of his. Even shout-outs to Captain America and Thor (that is, other Marvel films in the pipeline) are done in the context of their meaning to Tony (it's not spoiling anything to say that they mean absolutely nothing to the narcissistic playboy). Action sequences revolve around him, too - and, boy, are they dazzling. The effects are top-notch, and the aerial combat scenes will have you on the edge of your seat.

But in spite of all the razzle-dazzle, Iron Man 2 is just plain fun, with as much to enjoy, if not more, as the first film offered. And that's really the best review I can offer for the movie. I could go into a lengthy "Tony Stark as John Galt" analogy, or I could spend paragraphs oohing and ahhing over how great Scarlett Johannson looks in black spandex (but seriously...), or I could even ruminate on the significance of the film's praise of a privatized military-industrial complex. But I'd be overlooking the fact that the movie makes the popcorn taste a little better. It's a summer blockbuster with a sense of humor and an intelligence beyond a high school graduation equivalent. It's well-done, made by people who know what they're doing - and, more importantly, who know how to entertain an audience.

Iron Man 2 carries an MPAA rating of "PG-13 for sequences of intense sci-fi action and violence, and some language." Lots of robotic beings blow up, and guys in metal suits fight a lot, menacing each other along the way. Language -and the assumed innuendo - is pretty tame.

As Tony Stark says, "Oh, it's good to be back!"