May

10

Scarlet Johansson in Iron Man 2I R O N M A N 2

Directed by Jon Favreau

You start with a comic book hero. The first flick in the new franchise is a runaway hit. So you go whole hog on Iron Man Deux, including casting a compendium of crème de la crème stars: Gwyneth, Scarlett, Samuel Jackson, Don Cheadle, Gary Shandling, Sam Rockwell, even Jon Favreau himself, doing a few self-mocking comic turns. Plus the 'Russian' Mickey Rourke, who is outstanding as a villain to die from, in a part tailor-made for his post-WRESTLER mastery, physique (and dissoluteness). Stan Lee, the originator (along with Jack Kirby) of Spider-Man, The Fantastic Four and X-Men classics during the 1940s and '50s, makes a cameo appearance. (We met him last year at Comic Con at the Javits. He was gracious, kind and personable.) You have units in Monaco, Washington, Moscow and snazzy loci in California.

The crashes, explosions, anti-gravity take-offs and landings, battle royales between adversaries and friends are straight out of Marvel, but they are pitched to the 'tweens, the Gen X, Y and Z's, as well as to actual adults. The SFX and CGI are unbelievable, but fun. War Machine, IM and Rhoadey fight Ivan Vanko's creatures. Flashing. Lasers. Broken plate-glass walls cascade.

Making it all more digestible and fun is the deadly serious demeanors of all the characters toward Stark, Mr. Iron Man, versus the easy sarcasm and offhand debonair sotto voce raffishness of Robert Downey, Jr. RDJ is the inheritor of the mantle of Sean Connery's ne plus ultra Bond, except that Downey gets bashed, smashed, scary-toxic blood levels and ruffled with desire.

What's the plot: Does it really matter? Billionaire Tony Stark, now outing himself as the epic Iron Man from round one, contends with deadly issues involving the avid US government, demanding his impervious weaponized suit for defensive purposes, his dubious friends, as well as unexpected enemies accreted by his superhero persona ego.

Snippet of dialogue: Tony Stark (consulting ScarJo's resume): Look, she speaks Yiddish, Arabian, Russian, Latin… Latin? Who speaks Latin? Pepper Potts (a classy Paltrow): No one speaks Latin. It's a dead language.

Film cost the aggregate of a really good small-town hospital or the national debt of a modest third-world country. It provides a seamless mesh of eye-candy, great lines, gorgeous aerial shots of the Monaco races, and funky phoenix-like rehabilitated protagonists. Sleek Gwyneth is charm and responsibility. Johanssen is amazingly enigmatic, wackily lethal, and the instruments of death-dealing are a hoot. (We went with our Second Amendment expert firearms pro.)

The midnight show, and the theatre was almost completely full. Usually people flee as soon as the credits roll, but for some reason, the audience stayed put, excitedly discussing the film until the last logo tag-end. The credits are long, but don't leave until they are done, because there's a teaser you don't want to miss.

Is it Kierkegaard or Wittgenstein? Uh, no. But there are very few expletives, a modicum of blood, zero sex or nudity, and it's not terrible for kids. Rourke keeps a toothpick nocked into his lip-corner, but nobody smokes.

Every meal is not high-nutrition vitamin-enriched super-acai berry broth. Sometimes you just like a dollop of high-fructose junque. You could certainly do worse.


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