Comic Book Popcorn Tripe

Rating: 6/10 (11 May 2008)

Okay. I confess I am not a fan of comic book movies. Comic books were great but they were just that - comic books. But I guess fans of the genre want to see them brought to life on the big screen. And with today's technology too many of the movie today are just that. Comic books brought to life.
Maybe it is because I am older and grew up in an age when there was something to really lose yourself in on the big screen. There is very little subtlety to these films as they are often just a lot of noise signifying nothing. There is no social commentary like we saw with many of the films of the late 60's and early 70's and there is even in my opinion little of the unknown of blockbusters of the early days like Star Wars and Jaws.
Okay they are reasonably well done. I am a fan of Robert Downey Jr. and have enjoyed before in films Gweneth Paltrow, Terrence Howard and Jeff Bridges. But Gweneth is largely eye candy and pleasant while Terrance seems to wasted in a vacuous role. I can only hope that he doesn't end up like Cuba Gooding Jr. who started out good and these days seems to wind up in films that are trite comedy films that are usually not even funny. Jeff Bridges was appropriately over the top and evil. I barely recognized him behind the beard and the shaved head.
In a $200 million film I would fully expect some great special effects and there it didn't disappoint. I say this even though for example the final battle (now wasn't that predictable) between Iron Man and Iron Monger was pretty good. But that is just the problem - the entire film was almost completely predictable. No subtlety's, no nuance nothing to keep me guessing. Just vacuous entertainment. But then as a producer friend of mine said "just entertain them".
Oh is that to say ones like last year's No Country for Old Men or There will be Blood were not entertaining? Of course they were. But then maybe the fans of Iron Man might not enjoy them. And Jaws was thoroughly entertaining but it also kept you guessing.
But what really put me off is the unabashed America raw raw that pervaded the movie. I might as well have been watching a Rambo or Chuck Norris flick. Or even an old John Wayne movie. Okay John Wayne made far better pictures then either Rambo or Chuck Norris could even dream of.
The Afghan war lords were just a cartoon joke. Why did they have to be Afghans? Are all war lords in Afghanistan animals like these people were? Well they may not be exactly good guys but these guys were a bad joke. On the other side the Americans while not perfect they were portrayed as the good guys fighting the evil war lords. What was presented was that this was supposed to be the reality of Afghanistan today.
What crap. As bad as the war lords are the big problem with the war lords is that they are actually in the Karzai government and hold important positions as Governor's of provinces and cabinet minister's in the Karzai government.These war lords were not Taliban fighters as they don't dress like that and are completely different then the ones portrayed.
Indeed the war lords are the US allies. And the terrorists are often the Americans themselves bombing villages from the air killing primarily civilians. Oh don't get me wrong not all the Americans are evil in Afghanistan but then they are not earnest nice guys as portrayed by Terrence Howard either.
Okay maybe you are going to tell "hey its just a comic book. Lighten up". But that is not the point. Thousands of people watch this stuff and come out believing that evil war lords of Afghanistan are what the Americans (and Canadians - yes I am Canadian) are fighting over there. There are not. What they saw was pure utter unadulterated propaganda spouted by Hollywood whore masters.
And for that the film is a complete failure for me even though I was kind and gave it a 6.