Stunning Craftsmanship if a little rusted inside

Rating: 6/10 (25 May 2008)

There's no doubt Iron Man is an entertainment machine and a stunning one at that but it's a damn shame it takes so long and at so much expense to get there. Sure the pacing's not great and both the beginning and the end flitter with dodgy CGI and a underwhelming feel but there's no denying that the central parts of Iron man is the very best of marvel. It's lead man Robert Downey Jr. Who shines the most. He has just the right amount of dry Witt and charm to carry the film through even its patchiest moments.
From Marvel Studios and Paramount Pictures comes Iron Man, an action-packed take on the tale of wealthy philanthropist Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), who develops an invulnerable robotic suit to fight the throes of evil. In addition to being filthy rich, billionaire industrialist Tony Stark is also a genius inventor. When Stark is kidnapped and forced to build a diabolical weapon, he instead uses his intelligence and ingenuity to construct an indestructible suit of armor and escape his captors. Once free, Stark discovers a deadly conspiracy that could destabilize the entire globe, and dons his powerful new suit on a mission to stop the villains and save the world.
Gwyneth Paltrow co-stars as his secretary, Virginia "Pepper" Potts, while Terrence Howard fills the role of Jim "Rhodey" Rhodes, one of Stark's colleagues, whose military background leads him to help in Whose military background leads him to help in the formation of the suit. Jon Favreau directs, with Marvel movie veterans Avi Arad and Kevin Feige producing. Paltrow provides some much needed flavour to the otherwise dry script and Terrance Howard adds to the humanity that is often forgotten in super-hero movies. Fortunately while Iron Man does deliver on the humanity level when needed it doesn't allow humanity and realism to bring down the overall fun of the film as it is in Spider-Man 3.
Iron Man isn't perfect, it's riddled with ultimately forgivable flaws but flaws none the less. Flaws witch most of the world seems to be able to over look considering its high rating and a place on IMDb's Top #250. For some though the flaws are too huge to simply ignore.
Most eyes remain of Downey Jr. Throughout the whole show and quite rightly so. He is charming, sophisticated and best of all very funny. Its clear he was the right choice for this role. The CGI is a tad strange, flitting from computer graphics reminiscent of the original spider-man all the way to last year's transformers, there often bad there mostly good.
Not too light, not too dark a bit grey, then? Not at all: this is buoyant, bright, a constant breeze. But still it hovers somewhere on the superhero-adapt spectrum between the good and the great. Not as flyweight as Fantastic Four or Daredevil or Ghost Rider, but just missing the myth-spinning splendor and heft of a Spidey 2 or X2 or Batman Begins.