Dumb, dull, Marvel movie

Rating: Null/10 (5 October 2011)

Chris Evans plays Captain America, a one time dweeb who, because of a scientific experiment, is reborn a super-soldier. He's America's answer to Hitler's Ubermensch, possessive of qualities which Hitler's evil henchmen supposedly don't have: honour, love, respect, morality, self sacrifice, bravery and an American accent. The film's villain is Red Skull, a stand in for Hitler.
The film goes past the proto-fascism of most comic book movies and outright salivates over American supremacy, advocates eugenics, portrays the US as virtuous because of its weaponry, and features a hero who spends most of his time earnestly expressing his adoration of patriotism, patriotic duty and ideals. The film contains a sequence in which Captain American, before he takes the fight to Germany, is reduced to starring in silly, one-dimensional propaganda pieces for TV and radio. The film pokes fun at these goofy showbiz-cum-agitprop segments, but they're exactly what the film as a whole is. Captain America's uniform – a more overt version of "Spiderman" and "Superman's" American Flag inspired garments – is itself literally the Star-Spangled Banner. Imagine a superhero wearing a Nazi Party Flag and protecting Colombians, Native Americans, Mexicans, Sudanese, Somalians, Iraqis, Afghans and Filipino's from Red White and Blue Skull. Call him Kapitan Klaus and his sidekick Herr Dreyer. I'd pay to see that.
The film's aesthetic is "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow" meets "Indiana Jones". It is poorly directed by Joe Johnson, a director who mostly specialises in trash. It is dull and contains no exciting action sequences. Tommy Lee Jones steals the show as a hard-as-nails military man.
"Captain America" comics blossomed in the 1940s, milked kill-a-Nazi mania, and then essentially turned into an anti-communist adventure series in the 1950s (during the first quarter century of the comic book industry's existence, most of the major figures within its business and creative departments were Jewish, so these stories were understandably influenced by a certain political outlook). Though Marvel Head, Stan Lee, is perceived as a kindly, gentle old man these days, his pre-code stories were often shockingly (by today's standards), sexist and racist, some now "unavailable" due to their racist portrayals (particularly of Asians). It took until the 1970s for writers like Steve Englehart to begin "Captain America's" revisionism process. But this more nuanced "Captain" is not found in Johnson's film. His film remains stuck in the 40s.
But even modern comic book tales retain proto-fascist elements. These are all stories where "might equals right", "violent goodness equals victory", and where an absurd, destructive, simple-minded world-view is espoused in which a champion of the status quo and the norms of a given era or society is pitted against and defeats the champion of some less popular ideation. Our hero, of course, always knows what is really good for the majority, and dutifully defends the terrified masses from some super-terrorist, but only so that they too may be sent to war by the good-guy leaders of his good-guy world, enslaved to the proper, righteous nation-state of mind rather than some other. And though the hero knows what is "good" and "just" and is certain that his violence is justified, it is nevertheless a Marvel trademark to have him play coy and uncertain about his violent capacities, paying lip service to "am I really doing the right thing?" for a few pages before decapitating his adversary. You know, like getting UN approval before bombing your neighbour.
3/10 – Johnson's "The Rocketeer" does this stuff better. See "Team America: World Police" instead. Worth no viewings.