On 25th April, Disney released theย firstย post-Avengers movie, โIRON MAN THREEโ, and wouldnโt you know it, it went and made nearly as much money again!
Wracked by bad dreams after the events of โThe Avengersโ, Tony Stark (Downey Jnr) is struggling to stop making new suits of armour for any eventuality (an alien invasion will do that) and therefore his relationship with Pepper Potts is suffering. Enter biotech charmer Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce) to sway Pottsโ head, and the terrorist known as the Mandarin (Ben Kingsley) to turn Starkโs head the other way with murderous bombings. When the Mandarin attacks Stark head-on, itโs time for the billionaire genius to tap into that vast intellect if heโs going to stop everything he loves falling apart.
Writers Shane Black and Drew Pearce constructed a tale of genetically-enhanced warfare which really is a worthy cinematic challenge forย Iron Manย and his โRobinโ, Rhodesy (Don Cheadle), now nicknamed Iron Patriot rather than the โaggressiveโ sounding War Machine. The bad guys haveย super-strength brought about by genetic tampering, so they put up a good fight against Starkโs tin cans.
The biggest plus that Black and Pearce really bring to the table though is a cracking script. Like Joss Whedonโs laugh-a-minute โAvengersโ script, Tony Stark delivers more zingers and wisecracks than most comedy movies, although thereโs still a bright blue heart beating at the centre of his performance. A sequence in the middle of the film where Stark gets stranded in a small town is hugely entertaining thanks to the repartee between Downey Jnr and a young fatherless kid (โInsidiousโ Ty Simpkins). These scenes donโt advance the plot much, but theyโre fun.
The supporting cast are all top-notch, with Guy Pearceโs mysterious charmer a very real threat to Stark and Potts, and Ben Kingsley gets to ham it up in a deliberately OTT performance.
I do think the movie needed to be twenty minutes shorter, as it seemed to drag a bit, and the big set-pieces underwhelm. Modern effects may be getting better but the regularity with which an un-suited Tony Stark leaps huge distances and comes away with barely a scratch bothers me somewhat. You wouldnโt expect James Bond to jump around like Tony Stark does.
IF โIron Man Threeโ ends up being Robert Downey Jnrโs swansong in the series (his contract is up for renewal, and the โfinest momentsโ end credits suggest it may be), then he goes out on a rousing high, the world safe once more.