I Personally Beckon a Masterpiece; Mr. Swinger Just May Have The Juice
As a huge Marvel (I.e., Larry Lieber, Don Heck, Jack Kirby, Stan "I'm the Man' Lee) fan, I was especially drawn to Tony Stark/Iron Man. The flawed and broken down genius who to me, even as young kid, was an obvious send-up of Howard Hughes, right down the pencil thin mustache and strapping height. Howard cut quite a heroic and dashing figure breaking aviation records and beautiful woman's hearts as a young swashbuckling daredevil aviator/genius industrialist in the mid 30's early 40's. Stan Lee has admitted the homage, nothing wrong with mythologizing contemporary characters if they warrant such folklore permeation, Hughes of course does, John McCain, just as an off the cuff example, would never warrant such fantastical imaging. I really like Favreau, both as an Artist and a person, and I believe Iron Man, next to X-Men One, was probably one of the best Marvel Superheroes renditions yet. (Their secret: Singer and Favreau for the most part respected the material.) Not to say IM was a masterpiece, there has never been a masterpiece film based on a Marvel, DC, etc characters. Sure Iron Man was good, so were all the X-Men (more on Brett the Jett Ratner at a later date). Superman One as well, was decent back in 78 but hugely overrated as is the Dark Knight. Critics are always just salivating for something new and stirring. (Or outright greenmailed.)
Christopher Nolan is probably one of the few filmmakers that could ring anything out of the tired Batman Franchise, which is so far beyond a dead horse it defies a label. Why then, you might ask, near a Billion dollars in Mojo? Good question. Without charts and pointer sticks, my best summation; A powerful, informally connected, global, yet mostly North American based foundation of nerdy, culty, obsessed and employed fan boys who are as starved for something noir as the critics and God bless them, absorbing it as is with repetitive viewings and event planning and gatherings ala Rocky Horror Picture Show as a stirring praise of the now legendary Ledger's haunting Joker turn. (The accolades are completely warranted for his performance.) The film's frothing critical support composed with the zealous fan-boy base is usually all that's needed for a crossover to main stream success to occur, and presto; the recipe for a billion dollars in box office. In fact, in my view, overall, from an originality and entertainment merit perspective, Iron Man was superior to Dark Knight and don't even get me started on Spiderman and Toby McGuire.
As an observer and old school Marvel fan, I challenge Favreau, Singer, Rami, Cameron, Leterrier and anyone else who positions a classic superhero character(s) movie deal in to play, to create a masterpiece. Favreau has a good chance to do this with his take on the Avengers. If Terminator One had come after the comic instead of before, we may have already had our masterpiece, so our (my) criteria is not too lofty I imagine. Even Transformers comes darn close, but not quite. Just one word of advice, based on personal tastes; there doesn't always have to be that all out battle on top of the landmark in the near final scene between the hero and his arch enemy. Just because these superheroes originated in comics that doesn't mean you have to succumb to weak and cliché plot devices. Maintaining loyalty to an original storyline is fine unless it is too dated and predictable. Say what you want about Ang Lee's underrated Hulk, at least he made a feeble plotline of a transformative gamma ray explosion into a more relevant and compelling DNA testing monster mutation.
Kudos to Favreau for his multi-picture deal. Now bring us a masterpiece, tell us a magnificent epic story that just happens to have Steve Rogers, Tony Stark and the Scarlett Witch as our protagonists and maybe femme fatal. Iron Man was a very good film because it was almost tangible but you can break even higher ground for the genre if you are not restricted by pre-ordained sensibilities.
Tony Ballejos
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