Avengers - movie review

Avengers - movie review

I shall get to the conclusion first for this movie since it is becoming obvious to most who have come across the movie or even the trailer that The Avengers has got the ABCs of moving making right.

But The Avengers has done more than well at the box office due to a serious of factors which give it the ability, IMO to become as memorable as some of the top box office hits like Indiana Jones due to it's ability to include these few critical essentials.

One of the fun parts of recent movies has been the sustained revival of one actor, who went through early success, then dove into drugs and other vices, only to emerge like a phoenix from the ashes to propel himself back into the A-list and his attitude and swagger in this movie was one of the important reasons why Avengers has also risen above the typical summer blockbuster. Robert Downing Jr has the attitude.

And you know that a movie with half a dozen superheroes will have the obligatory Bangs, Booms and Boobs too. Here you have characters from four recent movies that have trounced almost everything else at the recent box office, so putting these characters into one movie will give anticipative fans plenty of the three Bs and more.

But the critical ingredient why I feel Avengers has risen high above the usual Micheal Bay-esque all action and little plot is in the Cast and the time spent on Characters, allowing for a wonderful mix of Chemistry between the various babes and beefcakes that populate this show. Now you can have many big action heroes in one show and it can all fail terrible if the director is unable to place a coherent story together without making it all too schizophrenic with so little time to devote to so many superheroes. But Joss Wheldon has applied the same magic he gave to Firefly and other shows and this show rocks.

Robert Downing behaves like the world revolves around him and there is no other person to play Ironman. His ego is suitably supersized to match his superhero status, and he has the ability to carry this movie. However I feel he has given himself the right balance of over the top mannerisms, and yet restrained himself sufficiently to give the rest adequate screen time to bond.

With that in mind, despite the relatively long running length of this show, it is always a challenge to showcase so many heroes without cramping their style, yet the director has been able to successfully throw even the uninitiated into the deep end of the movie and yet give screen time for most of the heroes such that you don't need a whole lesson in the Marvel comics world to get into the groove of the action and plot. It helps that only the Black Widow and Hawkeye are the relatively new players in the game, and you will still benefit from having followed the previous Marvel movies, but this dearth of new players allows the viewer to concentrate on the play of the plot, instead of having to sit through an introductory session where you have to know how the various heroes came to be.

As for the plot, it's quite simple: bad guys from other space led by the Nefarious trickster demi-god Loki seeks to invade and destroy Earth, and only the Avengers stand in their way. The only trick is that these Avengers need to understand the concept of teamwork and face the challenge of suppressing their urge to bash each other and instead concentrate on beating the daylights out of the aliens.

But in between the incredible action sequences is a lot of human play and plot. You will enjoy seeing Agent Coulsen, and for the guys, Agent Maria Hill, who IMO was way hotter than Scarlett J in her cat suit like outfit and her hair in a sheer bun.  Despite limited screen time, Cobie Smulders was a smoldering beauty, who increased the temperature in the room by 10 degrees each time she was on screen.  And how is it that EVERY female crew member in the SHIELD force looked like beauty contestants. Only in the movies, will you have supermodels, to match superheroes.

And you have moments of humor, the extra component that simply gives the movie more than muscle and explosions, and it's seamless fit into the movie gives it the extra zing that will make this movie worth many repeated viewings. When Hulk flicks Thor away playfully and nonchalantly, this sent the entire theater into stitches. Brilliant comic timing.  Ironman reciting Shakespeare whilst taking on a Norse god? Only in Avengers….

And you have the moments of fatality hitting the good guys, that scene didn't feel contrived and gave a moment of real emotion between the action sequences and again allowed this movie to rise up above the typical action fodder.

For the action aficionados, rest assured, this was no Oscar material character movie devoid of action and you will get your money's worth of huge action scenes, and you also get excellent surround effects. The sight of the Hulk going amok, doing his best "Hulk Smash!" thing was sublime destruction poetry in full song.

Plot: 5/5

Chick factor in this movie is way off the charts…. 6/5

Can half a dozen beefcakes and even more babes come together to make cinema magic?

I can't tell you in a more explicit way that you should run to the nearest good quality cinema and watch this. You will still want to own the DVD / BR disc. I can't wait for part II.