Iron Man

The Story

This is the story of Tony Stark played by Robert Downey Jnr, a genius with electronics who creates military weapons for his company Stark Industries. He is a playboy who likes to party and has lots of women seeking his attention, he has no qualms about what he does for a living and is ignorant to what his weapons do.

That is until while showcasing one of his weapons he is captured by the enemy and kept as prisoner until he agrees to make weapons for them. He wakes up in captivity with shrapnel in his chest threatening to pierce his heart and another prisoner Ho Yinsen, a physicist makes a magnetic chest plate to keep the shrapnel from reaching Stark’s heart.

While in captivity and in secret stark builds himself a flying suit made out of iron to escape his captors and then flies away after shooting up a load of soldiers to make his way out of the compound. When finally back in America he has a change of heart and decides to use his company to do some good with it which the media think is probably a joke or Stark has gone stark raving mad.

He develops a new suit of armour with help from some artificailly intelligent robots after the one he made in captivity falls apart via his escape. Now armed and ready he flies off to save some civilians from an attack on them from a enemy force carrying Stark weaponry and in doing so gets spotted by the American army who try to take Stark down flying around in his iron suit.

Cue a subplot of a friend of Stark’s played by Jeff Bridges who is not happy with his new epiphany of life and so contradicts everything in which Stark now believes in and becomes a traitor to his friend. Also a developing love interest between Stark and his secretary played by Gwyneth Paltrow occurs which brings in a bit of normality to Stark’s life.

What I liked about the movie

Since Batman Begins comic book adaptions have prospered to make their character creations more real and it is visible to see that the director and writer of this film have taken to the same path. The story isn’t just mainly action oriented and it develops Stark’s character from playboy to hero which I really enjoyed.
The love interest doesn’t over boil the movie and the story goes at a steady pace which was nice.

I had never really heard of Iron Man before watching the movie but it was as good as any of the other comic book adaptions that I had seen.

What I didn’t like

The film I feel didn’t have enough action in it and some children watching it could become bored with the movie waiting to see their Ironed hero battling the enemy and some of the effects while they were very cool seemed a bit clean but wasn’t enough to spoil the film for me and these are just minor quips.

Would i recommend this

Yes to anyone that likes comic books or the adapted movies would enjoy this film and equally anyone that loves action movies should indeed give this a watch and you won’t be disappointed.

Tropic Thunder

The Story

This is the story of a group of actors on the set of a new war movie that isn’t going too well, the movie is over budget and the actors have lost their way. The film is on the brink of being shut down as an accidental explosion angers studio executive Les Grossman Played by Tom Cruise.
The writer of the movie John Tayback’s played by Nick Nolte suggests to the Director played by Steve Coogan that he send the actors into the jungle to learn some real skills as to what it’s like to survive in the jungle.

But all is not as it seems as there is also a drug cartel in the jungle who think that the actors are real soldiers out to get them. The actors think that it’s all part of their training and go along with it also thinking that their director being blown to bits by a land mine was just some very cool special effects.

Armed with blanks and having no idea about the cartel the merry band of ‘soldiers’ played by Robert Downey Jnr as Kirk, Tugg played by Ben Stiller, Apla played by Brandon T Jackson and Jeff played by Jack Black and Kevin Sandusky playing Jay try to follow the map to their destination and unsurprisingly get lost on the way.

Cody Underwood, the pyrotechnics played by Danny R. McBride and Tayback get taken by the Cartel along with Tugg and the Actors set out to rescue them.

What I liked about the movie

Before I watched this movie I was expecting an overly budgeted, star driven disaster and was pleasantly surprised that it was the funniest film of 2008. Robert Downey Jnr played the best part as his character had undergone pigment changing surgery to darken his skin to play a black man and had me laughing throughout.

It kind of reminded me of The Three Amigos but was miles better and had only a small similarity to the film as they are also actors mistaken for the parts that they play. The effects were really good and the comedy was funny and sometimes hilarious.

What I didn’t like

There wasn’t much I didn’t like as all the elements were there for a good comedy and all the parts played themselves well and although some of it was a bit daft it didn’t spoil the movie for me.

Would I recommend this

I would definitely recommend this as it was a great movie and if you don’t laugh at least once then you need a new funny bone transplant. One of the few the good surprises of 2008.