Solid gold “Iron Man 3” setting sales records
Want to know what kind of metal covers Iron Man?
Solid gold.
Director Shane Black’s “Iron Man 3,” starring Robert Downey Jr. in the title role, ranks as the No. 1 summer box office hit with an incredible global gross of $1.2 billion.
On Sept. 24, Marvel’s “Iron Man 3” ($29.99, DVD; $39.99, Blu-ray/DVD combo; $44.99, Blu-ray 3-D, Blu-ray/DVD combo; Sept. 24) arrived at outlets.
In my May 3 review of the PG-13 epic, I wrote: If a Charles Bronson revenge-hungry screen character teamed with a Stan Lee pure-at-heart superhero, the result might resemble “Iron Man 3.”
In the third installment of the hit Marvel franchise, Downey’s Tony Stark/Iron Man displays two sides of his personality as he launches a no-holds-barred vigilante attack on the Mandarin (Ben Kingsley). The evil character, who says he is “a teacher, not a terrorist,” appears to be leading a lethal assault against the people closest to Stark.
The billionaire industrialist quickly decides to use any means necessary to stamp him out. That’s not as simple as it seems.
Stark is dealing with anxiety issues, sidestepping ethical questions surrounding his lust for battle, and coming to terms with a changing world.
He’s also destroying his enemies, especially during the final scenes that seem to trigger explosions every time the camera pans in one direction or another.
There are a surprising number of twists and turns, none of which will be revealed here.
Talented Black, who wrote the “Lethal Weapon” franchise and helmed the terrific mystery “Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang” (also with Downey), directed and co-wrote the picture. It lacks the warmth and humor of the first one, which also provided Marvel fans with a thrill as 2008’s “Iron Man” enjoyed a global gross of $585.1 million, which was topped by 2010’s “Iron Man 2” with a worldwide gross of $623.9 million.
Certainly Black and Downey provide touches of fun in the third outing and even expand the romance between Stark and his assistant, Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow), who gets in on a surprising amount of the action.
Although the film sometimes seems slightly tired, it does make good use of cast members. They include Don Cheadle (“Flight”) returning as Stark’s military friend Col. James Rhodes; Guy Pearce (“The Hurt Locker”) as a genius matching wits with Stark; and Rebecca Hall (“The Town”) as a geneticist developing a process that’s called Extremis and has the power to alter a human body.
In the film’s production notes, producer Kevin Feige notes how the story provides an arc for Stark but is also in alignment with previous events in the Marvel cinematic universe.
“The exciting thing about ‘Iron Man 3’ is that it’s not only the culmination of the first two films, abut it’s also a follow-up to ‘Marvel’s The Avengers,'” Feige says. “It’s one of the first situations where you have a movie that is the sequel to two different films and in a way that liberates it to be more unique than anything that has come before it, which is what we’re most excited about.”
I’m sure fans of the series shared that excitement and transformed “Iron Man 3” into the summer’s first sizzling blockbuster, one that seems destined to keep Marvel fans enthralled through Thanksgiving.