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Iron Man (film)
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Iron Man is a 2008 superhero film based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name. Directed by Jon Favreau, the film stars Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, a billionaire industrialist and master engineer with a plethora of playboy vices who builds a powered exoskeleton and becomes the technologically advanced superhero, Iron Man. Gwyneth Paltrow plays his personal assistant Pepper Potts, Terrence Howard plays military liaison James Rhodes and Jeff Bridges plays Stark Industries executive Obadiah Stane.
The film was in development since 1990 at Universal Studios, 20th Century Fox, and New Line Cinema, before Marvel Studios reacquired the rights in 2006.
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Iron Man is a 2008 superhero film based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name. Directed by Jon Favreau, the film stars Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, a billionaire industrialist and master engineer with a plethora of playboy vices who builds a powered exoskeleton and becomes the technologically advanced superhero, Iron Man. Gwyneth Paltrow plays his personal assistant Pepper Potts, Terrence Howard plays military liaison James Rhodes and Jeff Bridges plays Stark Industries executive Obadiah Stane.
The film was in development since 1990 at Universal Studios, 20th Century Fox, and New Line Cinema, before Marvel Studios reacquired the rights in 2006. Marvel put the project in production as its first self-financed film. Favreau signed on as director, aiming for a naturalistic feel, and he chose to shoot the film primarily in California, rejecting the East Coast setting of the comics to differentiate the film from numerous superhero films set in New York City-esque environments. During filming, the actors were free to create their own dialogue because preproduction was focused on the story and action. Rubber and metal versions of the armors, created by Stan Winston's company, were mixed with computer-generated imagery to create the title character.
Marvel Studios and Paramount Pictures, the distributor, planned a $50 million marketing campaign for the film, which was modeled on Paramount's successful promotion of Transformers; Hasbro and Sega sold merchandise, and product placement deals were made with Audi, Burger King, LG and 7-Eleven. Reviews were mostly positive, particularly praising Downey's performance. Downey, Favreau and Paltrow will return in the sequel, scheduled for release on May 7, 2010. Downey also made a cameo appearance as Stark in The Incredible Hulk.
Plot
Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) gambles at a Las Vegas casino, leaving his deceased father's friend and business partner, Obadiah Stane (Jeff Bridges), to accept a prestigious award for him. As Stark leaves the casino with his entourage, he is approached by reporter Christine Everhart (Leslie Bibb), whom he charms into a one-night stand at his Malibu house. When she awakens the next morning, Stark is gone and she is coldly greeted by Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow), his personal assistant.
Stark flies off to war-torn Afghanistan with his friend and company military liaison, Lieutenant Colonel James Rhodes (Terrence Howard), for a demonstration of Stark Industries' new weapon, the "Jericho" cluster missile. On the way back, however, his military convoy is attacked. In the firefight, his escort is wiped out and Stark himself is knocked unconscious by one of his own company's bombs.
Waking up in an Afghan cave, he discovers an electromagnet embedded in his chest, placed there by fellow captive Dr. Yinsen (Shaun Toub). Powered by a car battery, it keeps shrapnel from working its way to his heart and killing him. Stark has been captured by a terrorist group known as the Ten Rings, whose leader orders him to build a Jericho missile for him.
Instead, during his three months of captivity, he and Yinsen begin secretly building a crude suit of armor, powered by a miniature "arc reactor" invented by Tony's father, Howard. Finally, the terrorists grow impatient and give Stark 24 hours to finish. Unfortunately, the deadline expires before the suit is fully activated, so Yinsen makes a suicidal attack in a desperate bid to buy time. Once the armor is ready, Stark charges through the caves. Near the entrance, he comes across a dying Yinsen, who tells him not to waste his life. Forever grateful to Yinsen, Stark burns all the munitions the terrorists have accumulated and then flies away, only to crash in the desert. Stark survives, but his suit is in pieces. After being rescued by Rhodes, Stark announces at a press conference that his company will no longer manufacture weapons. Stane tells him shortly thereafter that his decision is being blocked by the board of directors of Stark Industries.
Stark focuses his energies on building a better version of his power suit, while making an improved arc reactor for his chest. Potts gives Stark a gift: his first miniature reactor encased in glass and bearing the inscription, "Proof that Tony Stark has a heart". During Stark's first public appearance since his return, he spots Potts wearing a sexy dress and realizes that he has romantic feelings for his assistant. As they are about to share a kiss, Potts interrupts by asking for a martini.
While ordering the drinks, Stark is accosted by Everhart, who shows him pictures of Stark Industries weapons, including Jericho missiles, recently delivered to Taliban insurgents. He realizes that Stane has been putting profit before the common good, by supplying both the Americans and their enemies and that Stane has been attempting to remove Stark from power. Enraged, Stark dons the power suit, flies to Afghanistan and rescues a village from insurgents. During the operation, Stark attracts the attention of the United States Air Force, which dispatches two F-22 Raptors to try to identify the mysterious flying object. Rhodes wants to investigate, but is overruled and the fighters are ordered to destroy the target. During the resulting dogfight, Stark has time to call Rhodes to reveal that he is the unidentified target. One of the planes is accidentally destroyed when it collides with Stark. The pilot ejects, but his parachute will not deploy, so Stark rescues him before escaping.
Stark sends Potts to hack into the company computer system. She discovers that Stane hired the Ten Rings to kill Stark. The group reneged on the deal upon discovering who the target was. She also learns Stane has recovered the pieces of the original power suit and reverse-engineered his own version, but his engineers are unable to construct a small enough arc reactor to power the suit.
After she leaves, Stane discovers what she has done. He ambushes Stark in his house, using a Stark Industries device to temporarily paralyze him. Stane removes the arc reactor from Stark's chest and leaves him to die. However, Stark manages to get to Pott's gift and re-install his first reactor.
Although his original reactor is underpowered for his latest armor, Stark races to rescue Potts from Stane. A battle erupts. Finding himself outmatched, Stark lures Stane atop the Stark Industries building. With no power left, Stark instructs Potts to overload the full-sized reactor in the building. This unleashes a massive electrical surge that knocks Stane unconscious, causing him to fall through the ceiling into the reactor itself, incinerating him.
The next day, the press has dubbed Stark's alter ego "Iron Man." Rhodes gives reporters a false explanation of what happened. Before speaking, Stark briefly makes an attempt to establish a romantic relationship with Potts, but is rejected. During the press conference, Stark starts to tell the cover story given to him by S.H.I.E.L.D., a government agency, but then announces that he is Iron Man.
In a post-credits scene, Stark is visited by S.H.I.E.L.D. Director Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) who notes that Stark is not "the only superhero in the world", and states he wants to discuss the "Avenger Initiative".
Production
Development
In April 1990, Universal Studios bought the rights to develop Iron Man for the big screen. Stuart Gordon was to direct Universal's low-budget film. By February 1996, 20th Century Fox acquired the rights from Universal. In January 1997, actor Nicolas Cage expressed interest in being cast for the lead role, and in September 1998, actor Tom Cruise had expressed interest in producing as well as starring in the film debut of Iron Man. Jeff Vintar and Iron Man co-creator Stan Lee co-wrote a story which Vintar adapted into a screenplay. Jeffrey Caine (GoldenEye) rewrote Vintar's script. Director Quentin Tarantino was approached in October 1999 to write and direct Iron Man. With no deal made, Fox eventually sold the rights to New Line Cinema the following December. By July 2000, the film was being written for the studio by Ted Elliott, Terry Rossio, and Tim McCanlies. McCanlies's script used the idea of a Nick Fury cameo to set up his own film. New Line entered talks with Joss Whedon, a fan of the character Iron Man, in June 2001 for the possibility of the director taking the helm. In December 2002, McCanlies had turned in a completed script.
In December 2004, the studio attached director Nick Cassavetes to the project for a target 2006 release. After two years of unsuccessful development, and the deal with Cassavetes falling through, New Line Cinema returned the film rights to Marvel. Screenplay drafts had been written by Alfred Gough, Miles Millar and David Hayter, but they were not retained. New Line's script pitted Iron Man against his father Howard Stark, who becomes War Machine. In November 2005, Marvel Studios worked to start development from scratch, and announced it as their first independent feature, as Iron Man was their only major character not depicted in live action.
In April 2006, Jon Favreau was hired as the film's director, with Arthur Marcum and Matt Holloway writing the script. Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby worked separately, with Favreau compiling both team's scripts, and the script received a polish by John August. Comic book staff Mark Millar, Brian Michael Bendis, Joe Quesada, Tom Brevoort, Axel Alonso, and Ralph Macchio were also summoned by Favreau to give advice on the script.
Favreau had wanted to work with Marvel producer Avi Arad on another film after the Daredevil adaptation. Favreau celebrated getting the job by going on a diet, and lost seventy pounds. The director found the opportunity to create a politically ambitious "ultimate spy movie" in Iron Man, citing inspiration from Tom Clancy, James Bond, and RoboCop. Favreau also described his approach as similar to an independent film, "[i]f Robert Altman had directed Superman", and also cited Batman Begins as an inspiration. He wanted to make Iron Man a story of an adult man literally reinventing himself, and realizing the world is far more complex than he believes. Favreau changed the Vietnam War origin of the character to Afghanistan, as he did not want to do a period piece.
Choosing a villain was difficult, because Favreau felt Iron Man's archnemesis, the Mandarin, would not feel realistic, especially after Mark Millar gave his opinion on the script. He felt only in a sequel, with an altered tone, would the fantasy of the Mandarin's rings be appropriate. The decision to push him into the background is comparable to Sauron in The Lord of the Rings, or Palpatine in Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. Favreau also wanted Iron Man to face a giant enemy. The switch from Mandarin to Obadiah Stane was done after Bridges was cast. Stane was intended to become a villain in the sequel. The Crimson Dynamo was also a villain in early drafts in the script. Favreau felt it was important to include intentional inside references for fans of the comics, such as giving the two fighter jets that attack Iron Man the call signs of "Whiplash 1" and "Whiplash 2," a reference to the comic book villain Whiplash, and including Captain America's shield in Stark's workshop.
Music
Composer Ramin Djawadi is an Iron Man fan, and still has issues of the comic from the late 1970s. While he normally composes after watching an assembly cut, Djawadi began work after seeing the teaser trailer. Favreau clearly envisioned a focus on "heavy" guitar in the score, and Djawadi composed the music on that instrument before arranging it for orchestra. The composer said Downey's performance inspired the several Iron Man themes (for his different moods), as well as Stark's playboy leitmotif. Djawadi's favorite of the Iron Man themes is the "kickass" because of its "rhythmic pattern that is a hook on its own. Very much like a machine." The other themes are "not so much character based, but rather plot based that carry you through the movie". Guitarist Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave, who has a brief cameo in the film as a guard, contributed additional guitar work to the movie's soundtrack.
Release
The premiere was held at the Greater Union theater at George Street, Sydney, on April 14, 2008. The film was released worldwide except for Japan between April 30 and May 7, 2008, with Japan to receive the film in September 2008.
Marketing
Marvel and Paramount modeled their marketing campaign for Iron Man on that of Transformers. Sega released a video game based on the film, which included other iterations of the character. A 30-second spot for the film aired during a Super Bowl XLII break. 6,400 7-Eleven stores in the United States helped promote the film, and LG Group also made a deal with Paramount. Hasbro created figures of armors from the film, as well as Titanium Man (who appears in the video game) and the armor from the World War Hulk comics.
Worldwide, Burger King and Audi promoted the film. Jon Favreau was set to direct a commercial for the fast-food chain, as Michael Bay did for Transformers. In the film, Tony Stark drives an Audi R8, and also has an "American cheeseburger" from Burger King after his rescue from Afghanistan, as part of the studio's product placement deal with the respective companies. Three other vehicles, the Audi S6 sedan, Audi S5 sports coupe and the Audi Q7 SUV, also appear in the film. Audi created a tie-in website, as General Motors did for Transformers. Oracle Corporation also promoted the film on its site. Estimates for the cost of marketing Iron Man ranged from US$50 to $75 million.
Reception
Iron Man received highly positive reviews from film critics. On May 1, 2008, the film was identified as the "best-reviewed film of the year so far" by Jen Yamato of review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, with the site reporting that 93% of critics had given the film positive reviews, based upon 218 reviews and this rating has held its place as of November 2008. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film has received an average score of 79, based on 38 reviews.
Among the major trade journals, Todd McCarthy in Variety called the film an "expansively entertaining special effects extravaganza" with "fresh energy and stylistic polish", while Kirk Honeycutt of The Hollywood Reporter praised the film while nonetheless finding "disappointment [in] a climatic [sic] battle between different Iron Man prototypes [...] how did Tony's nemesis learn how to use the suit?" In one of the first major-daily newspaper reviews, Frank Lovece of Newsday lauded the film's "emotional truth [...] pitch-perfect casting and plausibly rendered super-science" that made it "faithful to the source material while updating it – and recognizing what's made that material so enduring isn't just the high-tech cool of a man in a metal suit, but the human condition that got him there". A.O. Scott of the New York Times called the film "an unusually good superhero picture. Or at least — since it certainly has its problems — a superhero movie that’s good in unusual ways."
Among the specialty press, Garth Franklin of Dark Horizons commended the "impressive sets and mechanics that combine smoothly with relatively seamless CG", and said, "Robert Downey Jr., along with director Jon Favreau [...] help this rise above formula. The result is something that, whilst hardly original or groundbreaking, is nevertheless refreshing in its earnestness to avoid dark dramatic stylings in favor of an easy-going, crowd-pleasing action movie with a sprinkle of anti-war and redemption themes". IGN’s Todd Gilchrist recognized Downey as "the best thing" in a film that "functions on autopilot, providing requisite story developments and character details to fill in this default 'origin story' while the actors successfully breathe life into their otherwise conventional roles".
Among major metropolitan weeklies, David Edelstein of New York magazine called the film "a shapely piece of mythmaking [...] Favreau doesn't go in for stylized comic-book frames, at least in the first half. He gets real with it — you’d think you were watching a military thriller", while conversely, David Denby of The New Yorker put forth a negative review, claiming "a slightly depressed, going-through-the-motions feel to the entire show [...] Gwyneth Paltrow, widening her eyes and palpitating, can't do much with an antique role as Stark's girl Friday, who loves him but can't say so; Terrence Howard, playing a military man who chases around after Stark, looks dispirited and taken for granted".
Roger Ebert and Richard Corliss named Iron Man as among their favorite films of 2008.
Box office
In its opening weekend, Iron Man grossed $98,618,668 in 4,105 theaters in the United States and Canada, ranking number one at the box office, giving it the 11th-biggest opening weekend, ninth widest release in terms of theaters, and the third highest-grossing opening weekend of 2008 behind Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and The Dark Knight. It grossed $35.2 million on its first day, giving it the 13th-biggest opening day. Iron Man had the second-best premiere for a non-sequel, behind Spider-Man. It had the fourth-biggest opening for a superhero movie. Iron Man was also the number-one film in the United States and Canada in its second weekend, grossing $51.1 million, giving it the 12th-best second weekend and the fifth-best for a non-sequel. On June 18, 2008 Iron Man became the first movie of 2008 to pass the $300 million mark for the domestic box office.
As of February 5, 2009, Iron Man has grossed $582,030,528 worldwide — $318,412,101 in the United States and Canada and $263,618,427 in other territories.
Home media
The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray Disc on September 30, 2008, in North America. In Europe, the scheduled release date was October 27, 2008. The image on the newspaper Stark reads before he announces he is Iron Man was altered because amateur photographer Ronnie Adams filed a lawsuit against Paramount and Marvel using his on-location spy photo in the scene.
A Wal-Mart-exclusive release included a preview of Iron Man: Armored Adventures. DVD sales were very impressive, grossing $93 million in the first week of release. As of October 31, 2008, DVD sales (not including Blu-ray) have accumulated total sales of $129,239,671.
Awards
Iron Man was nominated for Best Visual Effects and Best Sound Editing at the Academy Awards, but lost to The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and The Dark Knight.
Sequel
A sequel, entitled Iron Man II, is scheduled for release on May 7, 2010. Justin Theroux is writing the script, which is based on a story written by Jon Favreau and Robert Downey Jr., and Genndy Tartakovsky is storyboarding. Filming will primarily take place at Raleigh Studios in Manhattan Beach, California. The story will deal with Stark's alcoholism, which was set aside from the first film for the sequel, but Favreau said it will not be "the Leaving Las Vegas version". Shane Black has given some advice on the script, and suggested they model Stark on J. Robert Oppenheimer, who became depressed with being "the destroyer of worlds" after working on the Manhattan Project. Downey said Stark would probably develop a drinking problem as he is unable to cope with his age and Pepper getting a boyfriend.
Favreau revealed their version of Iron Man's comic book nemesis the Mandarin "allows us to incorporate the whole pantheon of villains"; Mickey Rourke is in talks to play either the Crimson Dynamo, or Whiplash, according to varying trade reports. Sam Rockwell, who was considered for the role of Stark in the first film, accepted the role of Justin Hammer without reading the script. He had never heard of the character before he was contacted about the part, and was unaware Hammer is an old man in the comics. Emily Blunt was Favreau's first choice for Black Widow, but she is planning to film a new version of Gulliver's Travels around the same time as Iron Man II, and Marvel have met with potential replacements, including Scarlett Johansson. Adi Granov will return to supervise the armor designs. S.H.I.E.L.D. will continue to have a major role, and Samuel L. Jackson was informed that Nick Fury will have more screentime.
Paul Bettany will return to voice Stark's computer, JARVIS.
Don Cheadle will replace Terrence Howard as War Machine. Howard said, "There was no explanation [...] apparently the contracts that we write and sign aren't worth the paper that they're printed on, sometimes. Promises aren't kept, and good faith negotiations aren't always held up." Entertainment Weekly stated Favreau had not enjoyed working with Howard, often reshooting and cutting his scenes; Howard's publicist said he had a good experience playing the part, while Marvel chose not to comment. As Favreau and Theroux chose to minimize the role, Marvel came to Howard to discuss lowering his salary – Howard was the first actor cast in Iron Man and earned the largest salary of the cast. The publication stated they were unsure whether Howard's representatives left the project first or if Marvel chose to stop negotiating. Theroux denied the part of the report stating "the role of War Machine was scaled back and then beefed up". Cheadle only had a few hours to accept the role and did not even know what storyline Rhodes would undergo. He commented he is a comic book fan, but felt there are not enough black superheroes.
Gameloft will publish the Iron Man II mobile game.
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