By Jonathan Fisher, April 30th, 2010
As the climax of Iron Man 2 bore down on me, I asked myself, "Haven't I seen this before?" It seems to be becoming an unfortunate pattern of this franchise that its final battles are between two men in giant, iron, prosthetic suits. Not that I had that long to consider this, because Iron Man 2's final battle is mercifully short, and the movie goes on to tie up its loose ends faster than you can say North by Northwest (a movie that resolves its complicated plot in less than a minute... with a brilliantly hilarious final shot).
It was a nice feeling, because too often at movies these days are we subjected to overlong, tedious fights that exist purely to show off the incredible CGI that went into them. What about the people inside those suits? I liked Iron Man 2 because, even though it doesn't have the same feeling of boyish discovery about it that the first one did, I enjoyed watching these characters, old and new, talk and rush about for its duration.
Robert Downey, Jr. is back as everyone's favourite narcissistic superhero, Tony Stark/Iron Man. Iron Man 2 picks up where the first one left off, after Stark has dramatically (and casually) declared to the world, "I am Iron Man." Thus begins an opening unique to superhero movies -- a scenario in which the public knows the identity of its masked crusader. Now they know who to write out the compensation checks for all the inadvertant destruction superheroes inevitably cause.
Stark's revelation that he is Iron Man opens up several bags of worms. One is that he acts as a kind of nuclear deterrent (one amusing headline states triumphantly: "IRON MAN STABILISISES EAST-WEST CONFLICT"). Another is that the US Government believe that his suit and abilities should fall under the purview of the military. The Government's mission is led by one particularly unpleasant Senator (played by Garry Shandling, of the classic The Larry Sanders Show).
Then, inevitably, there are the people who want to tear Stark down. The first is Justin Hammer (the always engaging Sam Rockwell), a rival weapons manufacturer whose interest in destroying Stark is purely capitalistic. He doesn't really hold a grudge against Stark -- he just wants his market share.
The second villain is Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke, in his first role since The Wrestler), a physicist from the Eastern European bloc whose father worked with Tony's father, only to be screwed over and sent back to Europe after Stark discovered that he was in it for the money.
The usual suspects are also back -- Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow), the unrequited assistant to Tony Stark, Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), the head of a league of superheroes trying to keep Stark under control, and Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau, the director of the flick), who has more screen time here than in the first one, and capitalises on the extra minutes by cramming in the jokes.
The nice thing about Iron Man 2 is that its sense of humour remains intact. I laughed as much at this one as I did the first, because Tony Stark is still unashamedly misanthropic and narcissistic, and the movie is still unashamedly a piece of entertainment. It's a far more disposable piece of entertainment than the first film, which managed to mix action, laughs, and even ethical reflection in a way that was kind of brilliant. This one is a little less cerebral. Its Eastern European villain is fun and malevolent in a way that we haven't really seen since the Connery/Moore Bond films, its slimy capitalistic bad guy is topical but rather superficial, and Jon Favreau sticks to what he knows, mixing comedy with action.
Iron Man 2 lags a little in its mid-section. The jokes stall a bit, the action is non-existent, and for about 30 minutes it feels like it's just going from one point in the script to another. But all in all, Iron Man 2 does what the first one did, although not quite to the same extent. The world doesn't need another superhero movie, but we can tolerate one if the characters are funny enough. This one is funny enough.
My review of the first Iron Man
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