Iron Man
Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Terrence Howard, Jeff Bridges, Gwyneth Paltrow
Director: Jon Favreau
Runtime: 126 minutes
Rated: PG-13
Release Date: May 2nd, 2008
Reviewed by: Len Berger (ConNotations Film Editor)
The start of the summer movie releases is off and running with Iron Man and it's a blockbuster. Robert Downey Jr. (Charlie Bartlett, A Scanner Darkly) is superb as Tony Stark (Iron Man). Tony is the chief weapons developer at Stark Industries during the day and is quite the ladies man and lush at night. All is going quite well in Tony's life until he is captured by Raza after a missile weapons demonstration in Afghanistan. Raza is the leader of a local terrorist group. Raza insists Tony build him the same missile system that was being demonstrated and Tony agrees. Of course Tony sets out on a different course with the help of the doctor who saved his life. Tony uses Raza’s massive weapons inventory (strangely build by Stark Industries) to build a large suit of armor (Hmm – could this be the reason we call him Iron Man ?). Anyway, when Raza first gazes upon the suit he declares “WOW, Tony must shop at the Big and Tall Store” (just kidding).

After Tony's life changing experience he realizes he must fight for good instead of developing weapons of war but others at Stark Industries do not agree.

Rounding out the cast are Pepper Potts played by Gwyneth Paltrow (Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow) who is Tony Stark’s confidential secretary, Jim Rhodes played by Terrence Howard (Awake, The Brave One) who is an officer in the military and Tony’s friend and Obadiah Stane played by Jeff Bridges (Seabiscuit) who is the top executive in Stark Industries.

The film's CGI and special effects are quite impressive. The sequences where Tony is developing and testing his newer version of the Iron Man suit are something to behold.

The film has nice touches of humor throughout. After Tony crash lands with his first Iron Man suit in Afghanistan he says "Not Bad".

I dare say that Iron Man is director Jon Favreau's (Zathura) biggest gig yet and he nailed it. Let's hope to see him in the director's seat on future films.

I highly recommend this film and rate Iron Man an A-.