Movie Review - Iron Man

****** MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS ************

Iron Man is the latest movie from Marvel Comic, following in the illustrious footsteps of Spiderman, X-Men, Fantastic Four, Daredevil etc. This film is a blockbuster in the same vein as the other films. It has big stars and lots of effects. Like most of Marvels films though, it still retains a good story line that manages to make the film more than just an action film.

Iron Man is about a superhero who slowly discovers his own humanity after a life changing event and decides that he needs to give back to society and help out where he can. Iron Man is actually billionaire Tony Start (played brilliantly by Robert Downey Jr), whose company makes industrial weapons for the military. He is your typicial playboy who is also a genius. His revolutionary weapons is what has helped the US win the war, or so we are led to believe at the start.

On a trip to Afghanistan to explain about his latest missile, Tony is captured by a terrorist group, who obviously are meant to be portraying Al-Qaeda. Tony wakes up to find that his heart is now this metal pacemaker type thing. His fellow inmate Dr Yinsen, who was the one who saved Tony with this electromagnet pacemaker that keeps the shrapnel from perforating his heart, are told to make the missile by this terrorist group. The first thing that Tony builds is an arc reactor to power his pacemaker and hence dispense with the heavy battery. Tony devises a plan to build a suit of armour, which will be powered by the arc reactor. Using the powerful armour, he can escape. His plan works out and he manages to escape. However, the initial plan to leave with Dr Yinsen didn't work out. Yinsen sacrificed his own life to save that of Tony's. This act makes Tony realise that he needs to do more to help others.

After Tony returns to the US, his first act was to call a press conference and state that his company would no longer make weapons. This sends his company's stock tumbling, as well as infuriating his company partner Obadiah Stane (played by a very old looking Jeff Bridges). The company puts a freeze on Tony from wokring. During his time off work, Tony starts to investigate building a better version of the suit. There is a lot of hilarity when Tony is experimenting with the suits. There is even a side gag with one of robots that go throughout the film. Tony starts to build a better and better suit, finally settling on the final version after much testing.

Tony asks his assistant Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow in an unsual supporting role) to find out where his company's weapons are going to. He learns that they are actually being sold to the terrorists. So Tony dons the suits and goes and destroys the terrorist.

The story starts to unravel about now and we learn about the link between the terrorists and Tony's company. We also learn about why Tony was captured. Needless to say, the story ends in a good versus evil battle. I won't spoil it by telling what happens. But let's just say that it isn't exactly a twist and is fairly obvious who the bad guy is. But this doesn't detract from the movie. The movie as a whole is very well done. The story has got a lot of gaping errors that we have to just believe or it won't work. But if you can let the story slide a bit, you will really enjoy this film. It is a mix of action, comedy and some drama.

I think the actors all did a good job. Robert Downey Jr is really charismatic and carries the film really well. He can do the dramatic as well possessing great comedic timing. Jeff Bridges does a solid job. Even Gwyneth Paltrow is quite good as the timid asisstant. The love interest in the movie is between Downey's Stark and Paltrows Potts. There is a on/off thing going between them during the whole feel, and it works well. Even right at the end, we're not sure if they will get together. Overall, this is a good film, up there with the other Marvel movies. The effects in this film is fantastic. The robotic effects were so intriuging for me. It tooks the Transformers robotics effectst to yet another level as there were lots of close up shots of how the suit interacts. The flight sequences were also very entertaining.

Rating: ****/5