Coming Soon: Quarantine

Quarantine is set to hit theaters on October 17th 2008, and it looks to be one of only a handful of scary movies in the horror movie “season.” (Basically all of October). It’s a remake of the Spanish horror film “Rec,” and if the American version is anywhere near what the Spanish version was, it looks to be on that next level of horror film, and REALLY deliver some chills. A preview of the film is below:

Iron Man

Iron Man officially begins the summer movie season, and it does it with a bang. The film starts with Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), begin captured by terrorists somewhere in the vast desert mountains of Afghanistan. We then rewind to 36 hours prior to that event, and learn that Stark is the leading advanced weapons designer/manufacturer in the world. Fast forward back to the capture scene, where the terrorists command Stark to build for them his famous missile “Jericho.” Stark instead builds the first Ironman suit, giving rise to the superhero. How can he build such things? A. Because he is a genius, (Graduated Magna Cum Laude from MIT), and two, the terrorists have all of Stark’s necessary equipment.

Stark builds the suit, escapes from the camp, and returns home. When he does return home, Stark calls a press conference and announces that the weapons division of his multi-billion dollar company is being disbanded. His top adviser, (played by Jeff Bridges), and the board of trustees for the company do not take lightly to this decision, and Bridges character locks Stark out of the company.

Stark then wages a one man war on world terrorism and his company. Destroying all of the weapons that were sold to terrorists (without his permission), and dealing with the corrupt company he once led, in his own…special way.

C’mon, I’m not gonna give away the ending to you, that would be bad blogging! To find out the rest of the plot line, go spend the nine bucks to see it, and believe me, its worth full price. Oh, and you’ll definitely want to stay until after the credits. My analysis of the film is below:

The casting company who worked on Iron Man did the BEST job of casting that I have ever seen. People can talk about the casting for James Bond or Superman all they want, but Robert Downey Jr. is the ONLY man who could play the somewhat narcissistic and overconfident superhero. Robert Downey Jr. is simply excellent at portraying a man who thinks and acts with conviction. Tony Stark knows who he is, and is completely comfortable with the man that he becomes in the film. He realizes that he can’t just sell weapons, he has to make sure his company sells them to the right people with the right intentions. Terrence Howard, Jeff Bridges, and Gwyneth Paltrow make valuable additions to the film and make this an all-star cast. Some screen shots from the film are below:

Jeff Bridges and Gwyneth Paltrow in Ironman (2008)

Robert Downey Jr. in Ironman (2008)

Robert Downey Jr. in Ironman (2008)

Terrence Howard and Gwyneth Paltrow in Ironman (2008)

Ironman clocks in 2 Hours and 6 Minutes. I give it 4 out of 5 stars. Overall it’s an extremely solid movie with which I was pleasantly surprised. At the end of the summer I will rate the movies in this exciting summer season, but so far, Iron Man is definitely in the running for my award for Best Movie of the Summer. Of course, this is May. We’ve still got blockbusters such as Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, The Strangers, Get Smart, Wall-E, Wanted…you get my drift. It’s gonna be a great summer to go to the movies folks, so take advantage of it!