Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Death Of Irony, And A Bunch Of Brown Characters
I saw "Iron Man" last week. Sometimes I like an action movie. Sometimes I like Robert Downey Jr. Lukewarm reviews be damned, I thought. I trusted the reviews on "The Piano" and look where that got me.
When he then devotes himself to building the biggest, baddest weapon EVER, I was confused.
¶ 4:32 PM 
I saw "Iron Man" last week. Sometimes I like an action movie. Sometimes I like Robert Downey Jr. Lukewarm reviews be damned, I thought. I trusted the reviews on "The Piano" and look where that got me.Well I was just as horrified and disturbed by "Iron Man," but in a different way. First of all, its treatment of international issues was about as complex as "I don't know how but they found me. Run for it, Marty!" Much of the plot, much to my surprise, revolved around our boy Robert kicking ass and taking names in various terrorist caves and sandy villages. I like my dick-swinging to take place in fictional dark metropolises, not simulations of contemporary war-torn countries, thank you very much.
Oh, if you don't want any of the crappiness spoiled for you, don't read the rest of this post.
When the movie opened with RDJ and a bunch of American soldiers getting ambushed in the desert by a group wielding complex American weaponry, I thought: this is manipulative, but perhaps the filmmakers have shocked us with soldier deaths in order to make a point later.
When the movie opened with RDJ and a bunch of American soldiers getting ambushed in the desert by a group wielding complex American weaponry, I thought: this is manipulative, but perhaps the filmmakers have shocked us with soldier deaths in order to make a point later.
When RDJ escaped his captors by building a suit with arms that are part machine gun/part flame thrower, and torched the shit out of the whole camp, I thought: that seems unnecessary.
When his character returns home and announces that his profitable weapons manufacturing company will no longer manufacture weapons, I thought: right on!
When he then devotes himself to building the biggest, baddest weapon EVER, I was confused.When he then uses said weapon to kill a bunch more people to superhero rock god guitar music in the background, I waited for the ironic twist.
When he looked through the viewfinder of his suit and it identified people in the village as "Civilian" or not, then automatically shot the non-civilians dead, before leaving the one non-civilian to the hands of the angry mob, walking away stoically and saying, "He's all yours," I thought: holy crap this is blockbuster violence porn.
He might as well have been GWB in a bulging flight suit announcing Mission Accomplished. He was Cowboy-Kill-Em-All. The audience absolutely loved it. And Gwyneth? Really?
