Iron Man Three

Rust Never Sleeps
or
The Hot Mess Protocol (Chaotica in Extremis)

One still finds it incredible, if not amazing, that the most popular film-series in the Marvel Universe* continues to be "Iron Man."  Don't get me wrong.  Tony Stark's character is an important one in the pulps (are they still using pulp paper?), but relatively minor next to Captain America, Spider-man, The Fantastic Four or The Hulk.  Now, Cap and Spidey're doing fine in the flickers, but the others, not so much.  And the "Iron Man" series is the lynch-pin for the "Avengers" movies Marvel is creating as major events in the film-calendar.

The secret to its success seems to be, single-handedly, the casting of Robert Downey Jr. as billionaire-tech Tony Stark, a move that was initially resisted by Marvel.  But Downey's refusal to stick to text, traditional acting rhythms, and mercurial energy makes even the most generic of roles a circus act, balancing on a tight-wire, never being predictable and finding interesting ways, by body and soul, to entertain, even when cocooned in a tin can.  He's the best special effect in the "Iron Man" series, and dominated and energized the other characters in Joss Whedon's first "Avengers" movie.

Now, out of the factory comes "Iron Man Three" (as it is presented in the titles), the third film where most film series (post-Star Wars, and excepting the films that choose to bifurcate their last chapters) seem to stop, usually because either star-salaries and their negotiations are unsustainable, a logical character arc is achieved, or the film-makers have run out of ideas, or audiences, of interest.  Three seems to be a good stopping point for super-hero movies, too.  Face it, by the third movie, it's all about the toys and the merchandising.  In this one, there's a veritable garage of Iron Man suits in enough variations that they'll be clogging toy store-shelves in a week (and bargain bins in six months).  That's not the reason to see the movie, though, as each suit has little to no screen-time, with no explanation of what they are or what makes them special in any way.

This one is a movie version of the comics' "Extremis" storyline, originally written by Warren Ellis, but changed significantly and inserting one of Gear-head's major villains, the Mandarin—(as portrayed by Ben Kingsley) but not in a way that will impress comics fans, although general audiences might find the use amusing and apt for the times.  Tony Stark is having issues with PTSD from his encounter with "Gods, aliens, and wormholes" in the Avengers movie**  Stark Industries (and it's CEO, Pepper Potts—Gwyneth Paltrow, once again) is being schmoozed by the creepy head of AIM, Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce), while Tony, sleep-deprived by nightmares, vows to deal with Mandarin-orchestrated terror attacks that have become personal—Jon Favreau's Happy Hogan is left in a coma after an attack on one of America's great industrial centers, Grauman's Chinese Theater, by creepily glowing human bombs.  Tony calls out the Mandarin, inciting an attack on his Malibu cliff-house, leaving him presumed dead and without resources, hiding out in Tennessee.  If all this isn't complicated enough, Col. James Rhodes, the "Iron Patriot," (Don Cheadle) goes after the Mandarin himself at the behest of the government, and is captured, making his combat suit a threat, as well.

That's the plot—colluding and combusting—and Tony must rely less on his established mechanical persona than his own wits and ingenuity.  Would that the filmmakers were, as well.

Favreau, who oversaw the first two movies, executive-produced this one.  The writer-director of this mess is Shane Black, who collaborated with Downey in the not-bad movie Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, and he makes the first two efforts seem brilliant by comparison.  Oh, the charm of Downey is still there—there's one particular scene between him, Paltrow and Rebecca Hall in a three-way snark-argument that's particularly nice—and concerted efforts have been made to keep him out of the suit and his own man throughout most of film.  But the movie's gears seize up every time a big action kerfluffle begins, and the only rhyme or reason for shot placements seems to be to keep the multiple cameras recording the events out of line of sight with each other.  The editing suffers from some odd inserts in the middle of the action that merely confuses, rather than informs what is going on.***  

And, it seems a little obvious to accuse an "Iron Man" movie of a deus ex machina overdose, but this one suffers greatly from it and finally breaks down in a denouement that polishes and shines everything in a nice little package and makes you wonder "that easy, huh?"  This film could have used a little Geritol, frankly, feels a little like spinning its wheels, all the while you hear a lot of grinding in the works.  The film proudly states that "Tony Stark will return."  Oh.  Wow.  Can't wait.

Iron Man 3 is a Rental

Tony Strak kinda, you, know, uh, explains it all for you.

* © Disney Corp.

** In that movie, which is only referenced as "New York," Iron Man must fly a Big Exploding Thing into a wormhole connecting Asgard's multi-verse realm to deal with an Earth-threatening happenstance.  In that other dimension, his suit gives out and he falls unconscious to Earth where he is caught by Dr. Bruce Banner's Hulk, without any of the neck-snapping consequences incurred by girl-friends of Spider-man.

*** Chris Nolan's "Batman" films have gotten flack for that, but Nolan's story-telling sense usually gets him through rough patches and "wait-a-minute" moments that this "Iron Man" entry immediately brings to mind.

Marvel's The Avengers

"We've Got a Hulk..."
or
Playing Your "A" Game


This one is The Big Pay-Off.

Back in the day (around about Iron Man) when they started doing teasers at the end of Marvel movies for the idea of an "Avengers" event, one hoped that they could pull it off.  Captain America needed to work (and it did). Iron Man II integrated other characters successfully.  They even managed to make Thor somewhat interesting.  And even though two "Hulk" movies under-performed at the box-office, there was still potential there.  Given the scenario of the "Ultimate Avengers" storyline (a revamp in the Marvel line that started everything over from Origin Story Square One with a decidedly more adult, realistic attitude...and a Nick Fury that looked like Samuel L. Jackson) a case could be made for a good old fashioned Marvel Jam story of the "When Titans Clash!" school.

The problem is all those heroes. It could turn into a mighty cluster, if there isn't a compelling story that slots heroes into appropriate scenarios, a problem with some of the "X-Men" films.  And one also hopes that there's a compelling reason for these guys to be here, that there is some character function going on, even though they have plenty of screen-time in their own series to work on those.

Will The Avengers "assemble" into a well-functioning superhero romp, and make Joss Whedon (who excels at ensembles) an A-list director that fans have been hoping for?

"Yes" to the former and "Maybe" to the latter, although pulling off this one is not an easy feat—so many particular and persnickety stars, so many owned and exploitable characters that corporations (and opposing film studios) want to manage, and so many potential minefields that it would take a superhero (with levitating powers) to rise above and negotiate them.  But Marvel's The Avengers (what they're calling this one to avoid any confusion) manages to be fast-paced, quick-witted, and, although slightly derivative (mostly of Jack Kirby's "Fourth World" series, with hints of The Andromeda Strain in sub-text, and, let's face it, most mythology and comic book tropes), and is, as one character analogizes, "a bag full of cats," fulfills its basic tenet: to be consistently entertaining, with crises every few minutes, wonders to behold (some of the sets are simply amazing), interesting pair-ups in terms of fights (Marvel heroes are always fighting each other—they're very turf-oriented, which is bad because they're all in New York) and dialogue.  

And it does two essential things: keep each individual hero definable in tone and action, and make those fights "followable"—this isn't a hodge-podge of pictures of punches, muzzle-flares and explosions, there is breathing room between sequences and shots, so an audience is allowed to register action and result, something missing from a lot of action movies, where there is either bad direction or a style-disconnect between various "units" filming.  It feels "of a piece," despite the subject of the film being about extraordinary outcasts aligning uneasily.*

In a pithy line of dialogue between "Iron Man" Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr. riffing brilliantly) and villain Loki (Tom Hiddlestone, registering far more than he did in the Thor movie)—everybody gets their Loki scene, The Hulk's being the best—the entire movie is summed up in an adamantium-encased nut-shell: "Yeah, takes us a while to get any traction, I'll give you that one but, let's do a head count here. Your brother, the demi-god; a super soldier, a living legend who kind of lives up to the legend; a man with breath-taking anger management issues; a couple of master assassins, and you, big fella, you've managed to piss off every single one of them."  

Motivation enough to form a coalition of the willing.  And the disparate styles of the players is well-evidenced-six degrees of declaration: Chris Evans is all un-ironic directness (even though he is perfectly capable of matching Downey snark-for-snark);  Chris Hemsworth is all stentorian brio done with Shakespearean force (he's so much more effective here than in his own movie); Jeremy Renner is as taut as his crossbow wire, Scarlett Johnasson's blank-stared Black Widow is well-suited for her position as a lethal scam-artist, Samuel L. Jackson manages to make even original lines sound like oft-quoted cliches; and Downey, quick and mercurial, dances around the dialogue, adding his own steps.  Each actor has their own way of working with Whedon's words, and Downey's pace has everyone playing their "A" game.

But the best here is Mark Ruffalo, playing Dr. Bruce Banner and (the first time an actor is allowed to, via motion-capture) his altered super-ego, The Hulk.  Two movies and two different actors (Eric Bana and Edward Norton, no slouches) tried to do something with the limited premise and came up short.  However, here, with less screen-time, Ruffalo manages to make Banner as interesting as his comically destructive "Other Guy," his physicist not guarded or fearful or weak (as has been the norm), but ironically bitter, resignedly haunted, the most mysterious of Marvel's "Mystery-Men."  "You really have got a lid on it, haven't you?" says Stark at one point, referring to the Doctor's self-control and the monstrous result of any lack of it.  "What's your secret? Mellow jazz? Bongo drums? Huge bag of weed?"  Maybe The Hulk is such a one-smash pony that he's at his best as a supporting character, rather than the star of a movie series.  One could argue that about all the characters here with the exception of Downey's Iron Man, who is, due to the actor's efforts, a one-man circus.

But, here it's all in the group, nobody's around long enough to drag it down, and it's the interactions that count.  The plot is MacGuffin-oriented in the Marvel-style of "I-don't-know-what-it-is-but-it-sure-is-big:" the doohickey from Captain America and the whatsit from Thor are involved so that a race of advanced aliens can take over l'il old us.  Not sure of the motivation, but who cares? Marvel's The Avengers is big, bold, brassy and breezy, and has the feel and crazy zeal of those Japanese monster movies that combined a lot of characters and smashed them together.

I don't know what it is, but it sure is fun.**


Marvel's The Avengers is a Full Price Ticket.  (Go ahead, see it in 3-D)

All the potential Avengers, assembled by George (every little detail) Perez

* Whedon shows the eventual alliance solidifying in two nicely planned shots, one—used in all the commercials—orbiting the heroes as they "circle the wagons," and a meticulously planned CGI sequence in mid-battle that is the super-hero equivalent of "going around the horn."

** There are TWO codas this time: one after the initial credits (before they get into the detail stuff) and another one that was filmed right after the Hollywood premiere that's odd...but fun.

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

Bullet-Time
or
"Forewarned is Fore-armed (and Don't Call Me 'Shirley')"

"'Well, well,' said he, at last. 'It seems a pity, but I have done what I could. I know every move of your game. You can do nothing before Monday. It has been a duel between you and me, Mr. Holmes. You hope to place me in the dock. I tell you that I will never stand in the dock. You hope to beat me. I tell you that you will never beat me. If you are clever enough to bring destruction upon me, rest assured that I shall do as much to you.'

"'You have paid me several compliments, Mr. Moriarty,' said I. 'Let me pay you one in return when I say that if I were assured of the former eventuality I would, in the interests of the public, cheerfully accept the latter.'

"The Final Problem" Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is the inevitable (and one should say quick-on-its-heels) follow-up to Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes, and as an adaptation of Conan Doyle's "The Final Problem," It has as much source-relationship as the later Bond films have to Fleming—the bare-bones structure is there, but it's pumped, plumped, and trumped-up to fulfill the needs of action, humor and modern audience identification.  Really, "The Final Problem" is enough, we don't need the world-conquering machinations of Professor Moriarty (The Napoleon of Crime, the Scourge of London, and Holmes' best match) to make him a worthy adversary.  He merely needs to be omnipresent by means of his web of chicanery, rather than an omniscient history-maker.  In fact, Conan Doyle's Moriarty would rather his bad work went undetected, as opposed to this movie's version producing a shattering World War.  Here, in the words of Robert Downey Jr.'s Holmes, the plot is "so overt, it's covert," involving twins who aren't twins, TB, the Romany, anarchists, darts for various purposes, intricate explosive devices and not-so-intricate shell-firing ones, countries that can't be named ("although they speak French and German"), and the prospect of "war on an industrial scale."

20/20 hindsight always looks like genius when set in the past.

Actually, it's pretty clever how the doom-laden inevitability of "The Final Problem" is translated into the fore-shadowing of the war-torn 20th Century (the screen-writers are the wife-husband team Michele Mulroney and Kieran Mulroney*), and its focus on large artillery and semi-automatic "machine-pistols" has a nice hard edge as opposed to the original film's emphasis on the psuedo-occult.  But, director Ritchie seems to have lost of his somewhat, the fight-sequences (there are many) are nicely fore-shadowed with flash-cut Holmsian cognitive pre-functioning, but when the fisticuffs and baritsu moves start flying, the action is hard to follow, even when the action is slowed to a crawl—there is far too much ramp-editing and Matrix-y "bullet-time" FX in the film for no good purpose other than to slow down the practical and digital effects and give us the illusion of "wow, that was close." (Thanks, we assume that fire-fights and shellings are dangerous things).  However fast the editor can manipulate images, one still gets the impression of the film being a bit too "fussy" for its own good, delaying information or simply obfuscating it for a later time, giving one the impression that one is seeing a lot of the movie twice.  Efficient, it ain't, even if the titular character is supposed to be the heighth of it.

Also, although the first of Downey's adventurings could be seen as being a nicely nuanced (if scruffy) interpretation of The Great Detective, here the character is allowed to go a little more broad, dressing in comedic drag ("I admit, it's not my best disguise") and another, which is actually taken from The Pink Panther series (mind you, Steve Martin's "Pink Panther" series), the comedy is played up and not necessarily in character, and Holmes is seen to be practically infallible—even his getting seriously hurt is all part of his plan.  

Downey, Jr. is great at playing this, even if it's a more absurd version of Holmes, and Jude Law again plays Dr. Watson (now with a severe limp and who is only now about to be married to Mary Morston, again played by Kelly Reilly) and it's one of Law's best performances, quick as Downey and capable of the slowest of "burns." Law's role is expanded somewhat and he makes the most of it.  The two are joined (briefly) by Rachel McAdams, reprising her role as "the woman" Irene Adler, but is soon replaced by Noomi Rapace's gypsy princess Simsa.  Aiding and abetting is Stephen Fry, as Holmes' smarter, drier brother Mycroft (it might actually be considered type-casting), with Jared Harris as the coolest of Moriarty's (Brad Pitt was initially considered for the role), as well as being one of the youngest.

As fun as it is, one can't help but look at it as a step down—the filmmakers are getting further afield of the Holmes characterization, and it's only a matter of time before the Downey, Jr. version is locked into buffoonery and slapstick, and it comes perilously close to teetering off the edge here.  As it is, this plot is more reminiscent of the Basil Rathbone films set during WWII, entertaining if anachronistic fluff.

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is a Matinee.

Paget's Strand Magazine illustration of the first of two Holmes-Moriarty encounters.

* Kieran is the brother of Dermot Mulroney, husband of Michele, and you may best remember him from "Seinfeld" as the fellow who gets bent out of shape at a funeral reception when he see George Costanza double-dipping a chip.

The Soloist

The Soloist (Joe Wright, 2009) The Los Angeles of Joe Wright's The Soloist is an alien landscape of clover-leaved asphalt, caves of concrete, and dwellings like jail-cells, overlain with a constant muffled roar, punctuated with neon- and police-bar-lit nights through which the homeless meander in surrealist tableaux that would give Federico Fellini pause.

In this environment, while recovering from a nasty bicycle accident Los Angeles Times feature reporter Steve Lopez (Robert Downey Jr.) is contemplating another failed idea for a column, when he hears, echoing, a high sonority piercing the white noise.  It emanates from Nathaniel Anthony Ayers (Jamie Foxx)—homeless, schizophrenic, sawing out pure tones from a violin with only two strings, the sounds of the others only imagined in Ayers' head.  It's the stuff human interest columns are made of: a Julliard drop-out, cast adrift amidst the flotsam and jetsam on economic beachrocks, whose music cuts through the din.  Soon, Lopez's column puts a face on the L.A. homeless community (numbering 90,000) and the public responds, including the donation of a no-longer-used bass-cello, Ayers' original instrument, and Ayers' simple existence gets complicated.

Joe Wright has made two rarefied films set in the English gentry (Pride & Prejudice, Atonement), but this urban tale of harmony amidst grinding chaos, propels his gifts into a new arena.  No longer able to settle on the classical symmetry of English estates, this film is jagged, off-kilter, and sonically and visually complex, both in exterior spaces and in the echoing interiors of Ayers' mind.  Music soon supplants the chattering roar of the film, softening and simplifying it, finally allowing it to soar, sometimes literally, evoking the peace that soothes Ayers' mind.  But those moments are all-too brief, as the two men are both impacted by each other's demons.  

That jagged, off-kilter quality is also necessitated by the editing rhythms Wright is forced into by his principal stars, two of the better "riffers" of the current crop of young actors.  Downey, Jr. and Foxx intersect each other, the latter, in a constant stream of focused non-sequiturs, while the former interjects whenever he can, like Ayers' music trying to find structure in the jumble of words and thoughts.  The editing of their scenes together is tight and, frankly, a little daunting to consider how difficult it must have been.  Like the rest of the film, it succeeds if, in not bringing order to chaos, it offers a respite from disorder. 

Mr. Ayers

Iron Man 2

"Stark-Raving Mad"

It seems like everybody wants a piece of Iron Man/Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.). Beyond the usual mindless herd of groupies and hangers-on, a Senate sub-committee led by Sen. Stern (Gary Shandling) wants Stark Industries to turn over the metal suit to the government, rival defense contractor Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell) wants the intellectual property for his own devices, Stark friend Col. James Rhodes (Don Cheadle) has been ordered to procure a suit for the Military, S.H.I.E.L.D head Nicky Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) wants Stark’s expertise, and discredited physicist Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke) wants Stark’s head, sans ideas or chrome helmet.

And poor “Pepper” Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow)? She just wants a little of Tony’s time and attention…strictly business, of course.

That’s easier said than done. Time is in short supply for Tony—the Palladium-powered pacemaker keeping his heart going is killing him, throwing him into a jet-powered tail-spin of narcissistic self-pity and hedonism. And it’s hard to get any elbow-room for all the people trying to set-up an intervention, tough-love or no. The one person who seems to seek nothing from the head of Stark Industries is voluptuous Natalie Rushman (Scarlett Johansson) from legal, who’s a whiz at business transition components, but can also take down Stark’s driver/bodyman “Happy” Hogan (director Jon Favreau) in the tightest skirt possible. Tony’s watching her, but not the way he should.

At this point, one should be aware that “Iron Man 2” is suffering from some serious character bloat, a traditional problem with super-hero sequels that decide to take their eyes off the hero and onto the guest-villains. Fortunately, scenarist Justin Theroux takes a story breakdown from “The Dark Knight” and integrates all the conflicts into a single story…of Tony Stark, used up and spent, finding his worth despite a life of increasingly attention-deficited indulgence, and, instead of using and being used, getting something from an unexpected source in an unlikely way that re-charges his batteries.

It's all about Tony, you see. He's always been selfish and self-absorbed, but with a ticker that's counting down his limited moments, he becomes even more internal and narcissistic, deciding to use that time in pursuit of new thrills and new highs, though they may be increasingly self-destructive. Those jets in his feet and pulse generators in his hands only show that he's burning his candle at both ends. A celebration of all things Stark at the StarkExpo in Flushing, New York provides a backdrop for his inner struggle. A "city of the future," it was the brain-child of Tony's father, Howard ("Mad Men's" John Slattery, seen in archive footage), a combination of Hughes and Disney—StarkExpo, amusingly, has a theme written by Disney-musical scribe Richard Sherman—father and son are seen in Stark contrast: Howard was a giver and Tony, a taker. And Tony's understanding of their differences is the major character arc of the movie. It takes Tony out of the self-imposed metal bubble (represented by the Iron Man suit) that he has placed himself in. It also gives him a second chance at life.

That arc, and the movie, also provide plenty of opportunities to see some of the quirkiest and quickest actors in the business sparking off each other. One of the problems with the first “Iron Man” was that no one could match Robert Downey’s energy and ability to riff in a scene. In “Iron Man 2,” almost everybody can, and it’s a particular joy to see Downey playing “Can You Top This?” with the likes of Rourke and Rockwell (at his smarmy salesman best), but also Clark Gregg (returning as S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent Coulson) and Don Cheadle. Even Gwyneth Paltrow brings her best game, never once succumbing to Downey-inspired giggle-fits (as she did often in the first film), and matching his speed. Johansson and Jackson, in a completely different tactic, merely have to dead-pan their way through their scenes with him to register. They’re supposed to be mysterious, anyway.

Are there problems? Sure. The action scenes are best when Rourke and Downey’s antagonists are spitting sparks at each other—Ivan Vanko’s energy-whips have the same animated fierceness of the Id-Monster from “Forbidden Planet”—but most of the fights are swooping flame-trails and orange explosions in their wake (not very involving). And despite starting the film fast out of the gate under the Paramount logo, Favreau indulges in some long set-ups to punch-lines with little pay-off—one of them involving his character in an extended fist-fight that drags along, increasing his screen-time. There are too many times when the film is one big TV monitor for full-frame large graphics of news reports, and there may be a couple of cameos too many.

But, quibbles aside, “Iron Man 2” might be a bit better than its predecessor, which managed to make a nice breezy transition to the screen, and sparked the imagination of its audience. A lot of the credit must go to Downey, who brought more energy than any number of “Transformers”-like Rock’em Sock’em Robot fights could muster. The stakes are raised performance-wise (and robot-wise) here, but this sequel continues to soar, fueled primarily by its lead actor.

"Iron Man 2" is a Matinee.

A shorter version of this review appears at BSCReview.

Chaplin

"Chaplin" (Richard Attenborough, 1983) Elephantine, lugubrious bio-pic of the man underneath "The Little Tramp," Charles Spencer Chaplin. If more bio-pics were this ill-serving, it would be good reason to avoid the limelight altogether. Years after sweeping the Oscar-race with his ever-so-respectful biography of "Gandhi"* (starring Ben Kingsley), director Attenborough took on his famous countryman's auto-biography and varnished it with the same extra coats of shellac (with broad strokes) that made a still-life out of his film of "A Chorus Line."

Charles Chaplin is a more-than-worthy subject for a sweeping biography that covers a huge amount of history in both the times of the U.S. and England, but also of the film industry. Chaplin was one of the rare few film-makers to make it out of the silent era alive and functioning, amassing a great fortune, becoming beloved world-wide—his Tramp character was recognized world-wide, with even more reach than Mickey Mouse—and treading the then-virgin territory of film star-dom with all its glamor, responsibilities...and pit-falls. Only thing, part of the problem was too many virgins. A clown-comedian who made his living, first by exposing the pomposity of authority, and then—as the Tramp—actively fighting it, he ran afoul of the authorities who didn't take too kindly to his irreverent side, little noting that the Tramp's triumphs were a balm for a restless public, sublimating dissatisfaction in a permanent trap on-screen, keeping it from spilling into reality. They should have thanked him. But instead, the authoritarians, be they Nazi's or J. Edgar Hoover, fought him. And Chaplin had enough hubris and pomposity himself, to think that the public would always rally to his side.

Now, that's a story. One that Chaplin would appreciate, if he wasn't living it. But, instead, Chaplin saw himself as he always saw himself—the hero. You could say of Chaplin what Alice Roosevelt Longworth said of her President-father Theodore: "He wanted to be the bride at every wedding, and the corpse at every funeral." Chaplin loved being the Clown and the center of attention, but he also wanted to be taken very seriously, as he saw himself. Quite the dichotomy. That Chaplin couldn't embrace his own pretensiousness as part of the act was what turned his reel-comedy into real-tragedy.

But don't drop any tears for Chaplin. He lived an extraordinary life...of his own creation. Well, feel bad for him for this movie, perhaps.

The problems start with the screenplay. The timeline uses his films as the spine of it, set up by little incidents that inspired them. A more fitting strategy for a film-symposium than a movie, especially a movie about a comedian: Nothing kills a joke faster than having to explain it. The films are the high-lights; they are punctuated by explorations of Chaplin's relationships with the women in his life, starting with his Mother (eerily played by Geraldine Chaplin, the person's real grand-daughter!), then his lost loves, whether by his own design or by his inability to maintain a love greater than his own. This is interrupted by the lamest of devices—going over the autobiography with his ghost-writer (Anthony Hopkins), in a kind of literary psychiatric session. They amount to repeated episodes of the aging Chaplin clinging to his fantasies and the writer calling "Bull-shit," once literally.

This may be a convenient way to film in the blanks, but it also splinters the narrative force. Are we to believe Charlie, the biographer, or what we see with our own eyes being represented? And as the subject is a film-maker, it's a bit like falling down a rabbit-hole of fun-house mirrors. Who do you trust? The end-result is taking none of it very seriously, as Attenborough can't resist speeding up some episodes in a representation of silent film techniques. Nothing is real. A little contrary for a biography.

Then, the tone is so heavy. Starting with a title sequence of Chaplin taking off his "Tramp" make-up (exposing the real man, get it?) to a melancholy score by John Barry, that would be more suited for a funeral, the film never gives up the tone of self-important tragedy that ultimately swamps the movie and any good feelings that one might have for Chaplin, the man, his work or the movie.

But, every dark cloud has a silver lining. In the case of "Chaplin," it is its star, Robert Downey, Jr. Downey was a once-removed member of "The Brat Pack," the coterie of young actors who buzzed through Hollywood in the late 70's and 80's, appearing in ensemble pieces by John Hughes and other directors. Appearances in his father's films, a couple of featured roles and a disasterous stint on "Saturday Night Live" offer no hint of the disciplined, exemplary work he brings to the title role, eerily evoking the look—especially the smile of Chaplin—and, most amazingly, pulling off the physical comedy—Chaplin's particularly physical comedy—the role required. He was honored with his first Oscar nomination (losing to Al Pacino's first Oscar win for "Scent of a Woman."), but, after "Chaplin," Downey's performances would turn more physical, quick-silvered and nuanced, paving the way for a universal respect for his craft that even an errant personal life couldn't derail. Downey's evocation is the one reason to watch "Chaplin," rather than, say, reading about him...or better yet, watching the man's films.

The immigrant looks upon the Promised Land: Robert Downey Jr. as Charlie Chaplin looks at a strip of this new medium, film, left on the cutting room floor. Of course, the footage is of him.

* "Gandhi" beat out "E.T., the Extra-Terrestrial" for Best Picture that year. I understand the Academy's hesitancy to give the statue for an alien combination of "Shane" and "Lassie," but no amount of prestige attached to a project can replace a film's status years after the fact. This one was a mistake. And short-sighted, replacing typical Awards reverence for "prestige," rather than popularity or endurance.

Sherlock Holmes

"The Lord, The Woman, the Ginger Midget and the Parisian Giant"
or
"The Peripatetic Plot of the Madonna's Husband"

The wife and I have been looking forward to the new "Sherlock Holmes" with anticipation and dread. We're both fans, though hardly "Baker Street Irregulars," and Robert Downey Jr. is always worth watching—even when he's not, able to suck nuance out of even claustrophobic camera set-ups and able to project a fiendish intelligence out of every role. Fans of the Great Victorian Detective, we've liked several incarnations—particularly Jeremy Brett's encyclopedic and eccentric interpretation, and suffered through the attempts to get another Holmes series started. Brett left a long shadow—one that not even a good choice like Rupert Everett could dispel.* And clues in the trailer led one to deduce that they would try and make Holmes more of an action figure than Conan Doyle might have intended—more like a Bourne-again Holmes than the amateur pugilist of the books.

There are elements of that here, but done cunningly by writers Michael Robert Johnson, Anthony Peckham, and Simon Kinberg; Holmes, ever the synthesizer of information-bits diagnoses his battles first using his observations of his opponents, then carries them off with judicious speed, making note of their potential recovery time, both physical and psychological. Neat touch that, as is a nice summing up of Holmes' misanthropic characteristics—sitting at a restaurant table awaiting Watson (Jude Law,** as good as Law has ever been) and his intended, Mary Morstan (Kelly Reilly),*** Homes observes every argument, every petty theft, every peculiarity of his fellow diners—without his mind disciplined in pursuit, the vagaries of the world must drive him mad. Both Robert Stephens and Brett maintained that the difficulty in playing Holmes is that there is no center to him—a brain with no heart. Bur even an unbridled intellect must react to the world, and in Downey, jnr. there is quicksilver in those reactions.

The game that is afoot is one that will challenge Holmes to his core in a battle of facts and logic against magic and the dark forces.**** When we first see Holmes and Watson in action, they disrupt a ritual sacrifice by the fiendish Lord Blackwell (Mark Strong), who is already responsible for three murders before the fourth is disrupted. Sentenced to hang, Blackwell informs Holmes he will rise from the dead to usher in a new destiny for England. Holmes is skeptical, but intrigued, especially after Blackwell is hanged, declared dead (by Watson), then escapes his coffin. At a time in History, when engineering marvels such as London Bridge are being accomplished, it seems more imperative than ever for Holmes to dispel the superstitious.

Disrupting his concentration is a visit by the one woman who has out-foxed Holmes, Irene Adler (Rachel McAdams, far too contemporary an actress for the part—one expects her to huff and say "whatever..." at any moment), in the story "A Scandal in Bohemia." Adler is an adventuress, to be sure, but she is almost a secret agent here, more in line with the fictional series of stories that been built up around her by Carole Nelson Douglas.

There is far less drawing-room discussion and far more darting about and cane-dashing than in previous incarnations. The humor is amped up considerably, and the effects of injury down-played, but for all that it's a good representation of Holmes, adrenalized and puffed up as it is. Guy Ritchie shows that he has evolved from mumbling street-thug films to something with more than empty panache. His breathlessly paced opening half of the film stumbles somewhat with an extended fight with a Parisian giant, but manages to regain its footing with some genuinely well-done sequences that manages to clue the audience in to eke out its suspense. There has been some criticism of late that Ritchie doesn't have the depth or focus to pull off a big-budget film, although he's been angling for them for years. "Sherlock Holmes" is his defiant reply.

And not only are Law and Ritchie showing their best games here—composer Hans Zimmer, long an adherent of the generically grinding over-the-top symphonic score (he supervised all three "Pirates of the Caribbean" scores, which, frankly, are hard to tell apart), his work for "Sherlock Holmes" is folk-song based, with clever rhythms and instrumentation—kudos to orchestrator Kevin Kaska—that keeps the period alive amidst the clutter of the art direction.

Fans of Sherlock Holmes can relax.

"Sherlock Holmes" is a Full-Price Ticket.



* Although I'd like to see Ralph Fiennes, or better, Daniel Day-Lewis, try.

** Law appeared in the Granada version of Doyle's "The Adventure of Shoscombe Old Place."

*** Although why Watson feels the need for Holmes to meet her in the first place is rather odd. She did, after all, hire him in "The Sign of Four."

**** Conan Doyle's stories focussed on matters that challenged the societal structures of Victorian England and elaborate plots of thievery, and rarely dealt with the occult, although some of the modern stories—like "Young Sherlock Holmes" (1985), which also featured an occult presence, as it was produced by Steven Spielberg, not long after "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom," have featured Holmes against more supernatural threats. There was always that element to Doyle—such as the monstrous "Hound of the Baskervilles"—but they were usually explained away in bursts of Holmesian fact-checking.

Tropic Thunder

"Nobody Goes Full-Retard"

There's a good idea in Ben Stiller's "Tropic Thunder," a comic story about a trio of self-indulgent actors making a Viet-Nam era war film. By a Machiavellian director's conceit, they end up abandoned in a jungle pursued by drug traffickers, with nothing but their persona's to protect them.* The film tosses in more inside jokes than a "Scary Movie" installment, and some of them turn out to be actually funny.

The trouble is the film itself is top-lined by self-indulgent actors all vying for screen-time to see how broadly they can play their parts. It's meant to be satire, and it's plenty satirical, as long as Stiller, Downey, Black and Cruise are making fun of the Hollywood excesses of...other actors.** But one is reminded of a less-disciplined, unfunny version of "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World" in the broadness of the playing, and heavy-handedness with which its presented. Imagine "Dr. Strangelove" if every performance had the wing-nut intensity of George C. Scott's. "Tropic Thunder" brays and screeches constantly, it's soundtrack thudding with an annoying loudness for scenes even taking place in the quiet of night. There might have been some worry on the studio's part about letting the movie breathe, or fear that the pace might slacken. All well and semi-good. But it gives the film the light and airy feeling of a train barrelling into a brick wall. And the frenetic style and the frequent unintelligibility of the actors makes it a frustrating movie-going experience.

Still, there are moments: the movie starts with a commercial and previews for films featuring the characters in the film, and they are inspired little mini-movies that skewer trailer-style, as well as Hollywood hype. None too subtle, but they're mercifully short and focused. Then there's the performance of Matthew McConaughey, as the distracted agent of Stiller's Tugg Speedman, a breezy graceful performance that's funny and relaxed, but just as nuanced as the other, more aggressive performances.

At the opposite end of the scale is Cruise's studio-headcase Les Grossman. Made up with a balding pate and fat-suit, it's played with a giddily vulgar intensity that's pure hyper-Cruise; one wonders if Tom can play a real human being anymore, or for that, even recognize one. Still, it's quite the artery-popping performance.

But ultimately one is left with a bunch of absurdist little off-ramps that go no where, as in the dramatic send-up typical of the testosterone-weeper when Tugg implores Lazarus, "You tell the world what happened here!"

A puzzled look passes over Lazarus' face: "What happened here?"

"I don't know" is the reply.

I found myself laughing at the vacuousness of the exchange, but now, in retrospect, I regret it. Maybe I was desperate for a laugh at that point.

At one point Speedman and Lazarus are discussing acting techniques, and the former brings up a disastrous attempt at a feel-good Oscar-bait film playing a disabled person. "Everybody knows you don't go full-retard," says Lazarus. "Autistic, yes. Imbecilic, yes. Full-retard, no."

And yet they made this movie, anyway.

"Tropic Thunder" is a cable-watcher.

*What's really funny about the script is the cribbing of the making of "Apocalypse Now." Back in the early stages of Francis Ford Coppola's American Zoetrope film factory, the plan was for screenwriter John Milius and director George Lucas to make the film "guerrilla-style" by actually dropping the actors and a skeleton crew in Viet-Nam to make the movie. Today, Lucas admits the idea was crazy. Milius still imagines it as a lost opportunity for adventure.

** It's pretty obvious who is being made fun of here: Stiller makes a wicked stab at Cruise mannerisms, Downey is tweaking Russell Crowe and heavy-method actors--his Aussie Kirk Lazarus undergoes treatments to turn his skin black and never breaks character from a dialect straight out of Amos n' Andy, and Jack Black is one of the long line of overweight, drug-addicted comedians on a short fuse. And though Cruise has cause to lampoon Summer Redstone, his movie mogul is more in the Weinstein mode (and is supposedly based on Stiller's production partner Stuart Cornfeld).

Wilhelm Alert: @ 2:25 into the film proper (if you can call it that)