From May 13, 2013
SCORE: A
No Spoilers, I swear!
This movie sort of reminds me of "Dark Knight Rises" in that Iron Man isn't really in the film all that much. Tony Stark is really the main character of this film. A reviewer from the Hollywood Reporter said that the movie is, "darker and more serious than its predecessors." I would agree, which is probably why I liked it more (I'd give "Iron Man" an A-, while I'd give "Iron Man 2" a B- ). But it is funny, too, which is apparently a staple of the new director, Shane Black.
Previously, I'd never heard of Shane Black, but he apparently been in the movie biz a long time. Check out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shane_Black. The most stunning thing I found out is that Shane Black acted in "Predator"!!! Holy shit, that made me like "Iron Man 3" even more.
"Iron Man 3" is pretty top-notch, visually speaking. It's exciting and funny, although the villains' reasons for doing things aren't ever explained. Sure we understand that they can do some crazy things based on genetic engineering (something called 'Extremis') and we find out the tie to Tony Stark (not really a surprise as the opening scene/monologue explains this), but we never find out WHY the bad guys are doing bad things. Money? I don't know.
Anywho, I liked all the scenes between Tony and a kid named Harley, although some reviewer from The Star-Ledger (whatever the fuck that is) said, "A supposedly cute kid sidekick — a true sign of authorial desperation — is introduced, and then dropped." The kid isn't dropped in the film. And is his inclusion a sign of authorial desperation? I don't see why that would be.
I really liked that they talked about the alien invasion from "The Avengers" a lot and showed that the events in that film pretty much gave Stark post-traumatic stress disorder.
There's an amazing scene involving Iron Man saving 13 people who are plummeting to their deaths.
I really liked the twist with the main villain, but I won't tell you what that twist is. Sir Ben Kingsley does a good job, of course. As does Guy Pearce, who has gone on record saying that he liked doing this movie (and "Prometheus") because it's a cameo role. Er, he's in the majority of the movie, as far as it looked to me. Hardly a cameo role.
I liked seeing William Sadler as the Pres of the US. I've liked him since he was the villain in "Die Hard 2" and "The Shawshank Redemption".
Blink and you'll miss Linden Ashby--who played Johnny Cage in "Mortal Kombat"--in a scene where he's an officer who says, "Is that Rhodes?"
