i like comics, but still I was never a great fan of Iron Man. To tell you the truth the few things I knew about him was anything I happened to read in “comic book encyclopedias” and whenever he teamed up with X-Men or other Marvel Comics favourites. I consider him to be a bit light and too much of a capitalist and patriot to actually understand him. I always saw him as light Batman, since Tony Stark was also a rich prodigy kid, without super powers but uses his abilities to live up to the expectations. But where Batman had this dark side and so many ghosts from the past, Iron Man seemed so easy living, working for the government etc.
Still when you have a comic film adaptation you rarely miss it, despite a first boring trailer, that actually showed no sign of Iron Man. Still the film had some unique points. It had John Favreau directing, and I have to say that I was really curious what would come up from a comedy actor (most remembered from Friends) ad his previous film was Zathura: A Space Adventure , a space version of Jumanjee. On the other hand he managed to collect Jeff Bridges and Gwyneth Paltrow, two people who had almost vanished from the scene. But still the greatest urprise was Robert Downey Jr as the lead in major blockbuster. For some reason Hollywood finallly managed to overcome its hypocrisy and decided to give a chance to some talented guy. It’s true Downey was problematic, with his drug abuse history and his unstable life, but anyone who remebers him on screen will understand that he is one of the rare. Without being too cute, or sexy he has the aura that make him shine. Only for him I would have gone to see the movie, even if I hadn’
t seen the second and improved trailer.
And I was right, he was the perfect Tony Stark. He managed to lift the burden of a one-man show blockbuster. Without the script trying to be more than what it should be a comic book adaptation, Downey manages to make the whole thing tick. Jeff Bridges follows him as well, Gwyneth and Terrence Howard are just doing the job ok, and Favreau makes the whole thing work accurately. Beautiful scenes, nice effects, fan trivia, a love for Iron Man’s armor that is actually the whole magic of the comic. It proves what talented fans can do when given their dream project. Still I am so afraid of a sequel that won’t have as many things to work on as the first one, that introduced us so perfectly to Iron man’s world.
What else is left for us to do, after that? We have to wait for the next promising comic adaptations like The Dark Knight
Or maybe Hulk 2, despite we have no Ang Lee and the sexy Eric Bana, we have Edward Norton!
The story is about Michael Smith, a compulsive, late 20’s, phon repairman living in Pacific City, California, having sex with his girlfriend only on Tuesdays. When Michael was young loved a short lived comic book series called Enigma, created by Titus Bird, an openly gay writer. 25 years after the end of the series different characters of the book start to appear in the city. The mysterious hero Enigma “a man in a mask and a cloak” was a major part of Michael’s tragic life, whose father wa skilled in an earthquake and whose mother abandoned at the age of nine. Now it’s the time for Michael to meet his childhood hero in flesh, in many ways…
