Thank you, Hollywood, for not keeping Robert Downey Jr’s smolder hidden behind a helmet for the entire Iron Man trilogy. That would definitely be a crime worthy of an Avengers-style beatdown. Let’s celebrate the latest chapter in the blockbuster series with some vintage RDJ cuteness.
He was an N.Y.C. baby
Robert John Downey Jr. was born in Manhattan’s trendy Greenwich Village neighbourhood on April 4, 1965. He got his great looks from his showbiz parents, director Robert Downey Sr. (Lion King-ing RDJ above) and singer Elsie Ford.
His film debut is adorable
Daddy Downey gave RDJ his first film role in his 1970 film Pound. Lil Downey has a very, erm, naughty line for a five-year-old! You’ll see what I mean . . .
He helped his director dad
RDJ moved to L.A. with his dad and kept up acting in his dad’s films. Two years after playing this muddy soccer kid in the 1980 comedy Up The Academy, RDJ got his dad’s blessing to try to make it as an actor back in N.Y.C.
He made bullies lovable
At 20, RDJ got his first break in Weird Science, a 1985 nerd power movie about two high schoolers whose experiments somehow turn a doll into the babe of their dreams. RDJ may be the bully of film, but how could you say no to those eyes?
He was on Saturday Night Live?!
Need some superhero-sized motivation? Then look no further. Mike Helm’s newest remix takes clips from all three of the hugely successful Iron Man films to create a KILLER song that would be perfect for feeling unstoppable while running, boxing, lifting weights…any sort of intense physical activity (which for me these days is getting out of bed). No matter what you need to get pumped up for, this is definitely worth the listen.
So who else is excited for Iron Man 3?! You don’t have to be a comic book nerd to know that it’s going to be one of the biggest summer movies of the year.
While Iron Man typically likes to roll solo when he’s not with the Avengers, we wouldn’t mind being his sidekick. I know, I know, these heroes are too mighty to need help, but hey, better a sidekick than nothing else, right? We would have done love interest quiz but we decided that being a butt-kicking sidekick was more fun.
Take the quiz below and let us know who’s sidekick you would be!
Image Courtesy of Walt Disney Canada
RATING: 3 clever Tony Stark quips out of 5
Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Ben Kingsley, Don Cheadle
Let me just start by saying how tempted I was to rate this movie 5/5 simply because it begins with the beloved (by me) 90’s classic “Blue (Da Ba Dee)” by Eiffel 65, and I have a depp affinity for the truly terrible music of my youth. This was definitely the best of Marvel’s Avengers universe movies with a stellar cast and a director/writer (Shane Black) who creates a much tighter superhero movie than Joss Whedon, in my opinion.
In Iron Man 3 movie, the genius billionaire playboy philanthropist Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) is back in his So-Cal pad, but he’s still a shaken after The Avengers‘ New York City alien invasion. Stark’s case of post-traumatic stress disorder leaves him tinkering away in his workshop at night instead of sleeping and puts a strain on his relationship with Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow). Lo, there’s no rest for the weary as a new global terrorist known as the Madarin (Ben Kinsley) sets his sights on the United States of America and it’s up to Stark to save the world. Again.
Let’s start with the good. Paul Bettany as Tony Stark’s computer/butler/best friend JARVIS continues to be my favourite thing about this series; he’s the perfect straight man to the always over-the-top Stark. The action sequences were also really enjoyable. My internal monologue during them consisted mostly of frantic OMGs! which are usually reserved for Game of Thrones episodes. They were much shorter than the ones in The Avengers (which is a good thing), and helped to push the plot forward rather then just having things blow up in vain.
The villains were also very cool. I feel like I can’t say anything bad about them should Stan Lee suddenly appear and have me killed. Just take my word that they are refreshingly different from the aliens and Tom Hiddlestons we have seen in Marvel movies past. One last thing that always made my nerdy heart smile was watching Tony Stark become Iron Man. Sure, he puts on the suit about 50 times in the movie, but it never stops being cool (and every time he does it I wish my own wardrobe could do the same thing).
So what knocked two stars off my perfect Blue-related score?
Unfortunately, if Iron Man was a low budget B-film, I don’t think many people would see it for the special effects. The once sleek and technologically savvy Iron Man suit would be limited in construction to cardboard.
Maybe the unintentionally bad acting and horrible action scenes would boost the film to a black comedy, but I’m suspecting even the underground theatres wouldn’t hop on board. YouTube duo DumbDrum created this hilarious low budget trailer for the Marvel film and uploaded it to their account Bryan Harley. In the past they’ve made low budget trailer for The Avengers and Dark Knight Rises.
Considering the second Iron Man pulled in a domestic total gross of $312,433,331, I don’t think we have to worry about them cutting back on special effects anytime soon.
Watch it here
It all comes down to this movie. Over the past few summers we’ve been watching some bearable and some insufferable superhero movies so Marvel could slowly build up to their gigantic mega-movie muscle The Avengers.
Though the newest trailer doesn’t tell us much about the plot, we know the superheros are called to save the world and catch a quick glimpse of the Transformers-esque aliens. I’m not huge into some of the more recent superhero movies but this one looks pretty epic. The music alone is reminiscent of Inception.
The superheros are Iron Man, Captain America, Thor and the Hulk — who were successful in recent summer blockbusters. Then we also get the Black Widow, Hawkeye and Nick Fury who have made appearances in in Marvel films.
The film, which is directed by “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” creator Joss Whedon, will be out on May. Will you see it?
Marvel Entertainment Inc., home of famed comic book characters such as Iron Man, Spider-Man, X-Men, Captain America, Incredible Hulk and Fantastic Four, was purchased by Walt Disney Co. today.
The deal did not come cheap – Walt Disney Studios shelled out $4 billion in cash and stock to own the comic book catalogue consisting of more than 5,000 characters, some of which were created by legendary Stan Lee.
“This transaction combines Marvel’s strong global brand and world-renowned library of characters . . . with Disney’s creative skills, unparalleled global portfolio of entertainment properties, and a business structure that maximizes the value of creative properties across multiple platforms and territories,” said Robert A. Iger, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Walt Disney Company in a press release.
Robert Downey Jr. has signed a deal with Marvel Studios that will have him playing Tony Stark and his alter ego in two more Iron Man films. According to E! Online, Downey will also star as Tony Stark in the upcoming film The Avengers, featuring an all-star cast of Marvel superheroes.
The first Iron Man earned close to $580 million worldwide, along with mostly positive reviews.
The tentative release date for the first sequel is May 7, 2010, and July 15, 2011 for The Avengers film.
In his upcoming film The Soloist Downey plays a journalist who tries to helps a schizophrenic homeless musician (Jamie Foxx) from Skid Row, Los Angeles accomplish his dream of playing at the Walt Disney Concert Hall.
Downey was recently in the summer hit Tropic Thunder along with Ben Stiller and Jack Black, and is currently in London shooting Sherlock Holmes, costarring Jude Law and Rachel McAdams. The flick will be directed by Guy Ritchie.
Don’t feel bad if you didn’t realize that Paul Bettany was the voice of artificial intelligence Jarvis in “Iron Man” – he didn’t know either!
Bettany said he got a call from pal Jon Favreau, who was fuzzy on details, but convinced Bettany to do a bit of voice work for his upcoming film.
“I didn’t know I was in a superhero movie,” Bettany told SuperheroHype.com. “[Favreau] rung me up and was really funny on the phone. I said, ‘Yeah, alright.’ I genuinely didn’t know. I’m really naive, but it’s the f**king truth. I really didn’t know what I was going in for because it was two hours in a recording booth. I went in and recorded with Jon Favreau, doing all the lines, recording them and went home and now I’m a f**king hero to my children. I haven’t even seen it yet. I haven’t had time because I’ve been working for 17 hours [a day].”
Bettany is currently filming “Legion” with Dennis Quaid.
I’d like to rub the face of anyone who dared to defend last year’s Transformers as a good movie in at least one frame of Iron Man. The first few seconds of its final battle alone are more engaging than the entirety of last year’s giant robot blockbuster. More coherent, too.
This is quality entertainment. This deserves to be a worldwide smash. Critics are not curmudgeons (not all of us anyway). We are not adverse to summer movies made primarily to sell popcorn. But there’s a difference between a good popcorn movie and a bad popcorn movie. In a bad popcorn movie, unbelievable things happen to unbelievable characters. In a good popcorn movie, unbelievable things happen to believable characters. I did not expect Transformers’ Sam Witwicky to be the second coming of Ferris Bueller. I did, however, have every right to expect a protagonist who was more than a collection of teen movie cliches.
Like the Star Wars prequel trilogy, Iron Man is technically an indie – it was financed by Marvel Comics’ new film division, which doesn’t answer to the studios. After putting it in the hands of filmmakers with actual talent (unlike George Lucas… the screenwriting half of him anyway) the company wisely took a hands-off approach, knowing that a good film would bring in more repeat business than a mediocre one.
If IMDB is to be believed (and let’s pretend it is) then Jon Favreau, a fine comic actor and the director of Iron Man, deserves a raise:
- He’s crafted a superhero movie, like Batman Begins (a conscious influence), that doesn’t feel like a superhero movie. He does this by making the first action sequence involve nothing out of the ordinary: it’s a military assault in Afghanistan.
- He establishes a character who could plausibly exist in the real world. Granted, Tony Stark, a gambling, boozing, womanizing arms dealer who also happens to be a brilliant inventor and shrewd businessman, is second only to Peter Parker in Marvel’s considerable stable of terrific protagonists. But the film wisely presents him as a character who could have easily been the villain in another movie, until he witnesses firsthand the destruction his weapons have caused.
- Favreau has created a film that is neither a message movie nor an insult to the audience – Stark’s dealings appear to be on a legitimate world stage, and while they doesn’t hold up to comparisons with Lord of War, they’re a solid introduction for viewers who don’t know the first thing about arms dealing. Yes, there are people who design weapons and profit off war, yes, those profiteers often hail from rich countries, yes, they usually profit off regions said countries are trying to protect, and yes, the enemy often gets their hands on those weapons, resulting in additional income for the profiteers.
- In a nod to Robert Altman (another influence) Favreau turns the dialogue between Stark and his long-suffering assistant, Virginia “Pepper” Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow – it’s saying something when one of Stan Lee’s trademark alliterative names is the most unrealistic thing about the movie) into flip exchanges worthy of a 1930s screwball comedy. The pair frequently talk over each other and provide some of the film’s most memorable lines (“Face it, this isn’t the worst thing you’ve caught me doing,” says Stark when Potts sees him removing his suit). While they don’t quite have a Mulder-and-Scully chemistry that doesn’t (or shouldn’t) turn into romance, you can’t exactly call Potts a love interest either. And she’s far more involved than the typical non-heroic female lead in such movies.
- And Favreau was responsible for casting Robert Downey Jr. in the lead. This simultaneously matches the perfection achieved by Kelsey Grammer as Beast in the lastX-Men movie (an otherwise execrable affair) and Jerry Bruckheimer’s genius when casting an offbeat and respected actor like Johnny Depp in the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Hiring Downey, a talented actor once known for his substance abuse problems more than his performances, to play a substance-abusing superhero meant the potential payoff was enormous. And yes, he is that good. Iron Man’s chief weakness is its two-dimensional supporting characters; by turning Stark into such an engaging hero Downey more than makes up for it.
In the other supporting roles, Terrence Howard and Jeff Bridges shine as usual (though Howard’s character, Jim Rhodes, doesn’t become Iron Man’s sidekick, War Machine, until the next film). If I hadn’t known Bridges played the main villain going in, I wouldn’t have known he was the main villain until halfway through (my one gripe: for no apparent reason he turns out to be involved in more of the proceedings than I would have liked).
Make no mistake, Iron Man is not groundbreaking. It’s formula done well. Anyone directing a “smart” movie would have killed for this cast, and yet I think in no way, shape or form can you call Iron Man dumb. When it was over (stick around for an extra scene), I realized something: for the first time since Spider-Man, the prospect of a sequel felt less like a punishment and more like a treat.
The people behind “Iron Man” certainly are efficient. A sequel to this weekend’s box office smash already has a release date: April 30, 2010.
Not all of the details are ironed out yet, however. It’s unclear as to what members of the cast will be back and what the plot will be.
“Iron Man” isn’t the only franchise Marvel is excited about. Its film adaptation of “The Avengers” is set for a July 2011 release.
Until they, they have such heavy hitters as “The Incredible Hulk,” Punisher: War Zone,” and”X-Men Origins: Wolverine” to keep the money rolling in.
“Iron Man” has already made more than $200 million worldwide.
Already a summer blockbuster, “Iron Man” grossed $100.8 million, per studio estimates compiled by Exhibitor Relations Co., making the film second only to “Spider-Man” for comic-book movie debuts. The estimate, however, does not include the movie’s Thursday night sneak preview which could include about another $4 million.
The Marvel comic adaptation had an opening bigger than those of “Batman Begins” ($48.7 million), “Superman Returns” ($52.5 million), the first two “X-Men” movies and “Spider-Man”.
This is quite the success for lead actor Robert Downing Jr., who has never fronted a movie that grossed $100 million during its entire run.
Among any kind of movie, “Iron Man” posted the 10th biggest and best three-day opening ever. It is the No. 2 debut of all time for a non-sequel, behind only Spiderman’s $114.8 million.
