IRON MAN 2: The Stark Reality
The following review contains some MINOR SPOILERS, friends.
Summer blockbuster season always brings with it at least one big disappointment. This year's comes right up front - and what a disappointment it is. IRON MAN 2 is a classic sequel in the worst sense: we've got more villains, more heroes, more money in the budget, and none of it amounts to an experience that comes even close to that of its predecessor, which stood out in 2008 as smart, effervescent counter-programming in the summer dominated by the dour DARK KNIGHT.
IRON MAN 2 picks up six months after the end of the first film, establishing its villain up-front. Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke,) a Russian ex-con and former nuclear engineer, has a score to settle. His and Tony's fathers developed the original 'arc reactor' together, and while old man Vanko has since died in impoverished obscurity, (is there any other kind?) Howard Stark made billions before his own passing. So with some ancient blueprints in hand, Vanko builds his own Iron Man suit, and comes after Tony. Why only get around to this now? Eh, don't ask.
The problems with IRON MAN 2 are bone deep, but they manifest themselves everywhere on the surface. While the first film focused neatly on Tony and his development from careless cad to honorable hero, this sequel gives him nowhere to go, and at some point in the filming/editing, director Jon Favreau must have realized this; hence, his new movie's many secondary characters and subplots receive a disproportionate share of screen time here. Tony is all but discarded as a dynamic character - and it becomes very clear very early that without the original's central arc (and I ain't talking arc reactor, hiyo,) there's really not much novel about this franchise. The same can be said about BATMAN BEGINS when compared to THE DARK KNIGHT - with Batman playing boring backup to his rogue's gallery in the sequel.
With Tony going nowhere, Favreau whiles away two hours with Vanko and his relationship with Tony's competitor, the unscrupulous businessman Justin Hammer, played by Sam Rockwell. Rockwell, who was once up for the role of Stark himself, essentially becomes the Tony Stark of IRON MAN 2; he gets the funniest lines of the film, and is the best part of the film - though he's not exactly up against stiff competition. Rourke, as Vanko, is uninteresting from moment one, and brings not one whiff of the WRESTLER's soul to the part. (But then, it's not much of a part.) The other performers don't fare much better: Don Cheadle, replacing Terence Howard as Stark's pal Lt. Col James "Rhodey" Rhodes, is given more to do in the role than Howard was - but that doesn't mean he puts anything like a personal stamp on it. Gwyneth Paltrow's Pepper Potts, in spite of a promotion to CEO of Stark Enterprises, remains more-or-less a damsel in distress for use in the climax. And Scarlett Johansson... wait, was Scarlett Johansson in this movie? Hold on, let me check IMDB.
Holy shit, she was. Wow, I'd completely blocked that out.
As for Robert Downey Jr., well, you've got to love him, but this sequel sure don't make it easy. The rambling free-association that became his trademark in part one here plays as aimless and grating. Take an early omen - ahem - scene in which Tony appears before a Senate sub-committee. It just goes on and on... until it begins to feel like what it surely is - 100% improvisation. By its end, the committee chair Senator Stern (Garry Shandling) and Tony are just hurling four-letter words at one another... And in the film's interminable second act, whole scenes go by without purpose or payoff, just prattling. I haven't seen this much cross-talking in a movie since Robert Altman died; is this IRON MAN 2? Or Dogme 95?
The sequence of the film takes place in Monaco, with Tony forced to fend off Vanko in the middle of a Grand Prix race. It's hot stuff - that is, until you start parsing its logistical details. I'll skip the breakdown here, because chances are, you'll be seeing IRON MAN 2 anyway. Suffice it to say, basic motive questions, like 'who knows what when, and how would they know to do what they do?' are better left unasked. It's nifty to look at, but it requires a brain vacation to truly enjoy; in other words, standard summer movie fare.
Sadly, Monaco's already in the rearview early in the film, and what follows is formless and poorly-paced (not to mention full of gaffes; the first meeting of Vanko and Hammer is a scene in which wine glasses disappear and re-appear several times over, and Rockwell's uneven fake tan gets the big laugh.) Most galling, though, is that in the midst of all the filler, the producers find time to set up future Marvel movie spin-offs, with the assumption that anyone seeing IRON MAN 2 will be left wanting more. Samuel L. Jackson reprises his cameo role from part one as Nick Fury, agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., and proposes that Tony Stark join THE AVENGERS - but only as a consultant.
Take that any way you like, but it struck me as a vote of 'no confidence' in the future of Marvel movies from Robert Downey, Jr. After this bust, I can't say I blame him.
