Avengers: Age of Ultron

While The Avengers (2012) smashed box office records, more importantly, writer/director Joss Whedon did the impossible by successfully integrating comic book superheroes the Hulk, Iron Man, Thor and Captain America from their own franchise movies into another one that saw them team-up with Black Widow and Hawkeye to stop a common threat. Whedon achieved this in an entertaining and exciting way that no one had done before. Burnt out from the endeavor and brought on essentially as a hired gun, he was understandably cautious of being courted to make the inevitable sequel. He was persuaded by being given more creative freedom, which included the addition of three new superheroes and a longstanding nemesis of the Avengers, the mad sentient robot Ultron. As a long-time comic book fan, Whedon understands that a team of formidable heroes needs to face a threat worthy of their abilities and what better one than a nearly indestructible robot and its army of drones. While it was a given that Age of Ultron (2015) would be a bigger and more action-packed follow-up to the original, would Whedon be able to juggle this large cast of characters without short-changing anyone and be able to instill the same amount of heart and humor amidst the CGI as he did with the first movie?

One of the good things about a movie like Age of Ultron is that Whedon has already established the Avengers as a team in the first movie and so he can jump right in as this one does with them already assembled in the Eastern European country of Sokovia taking down a Hydra base where Baron Wolfgang von Strucker (Thomas Kretschmann) has been experimenting with Loki’s scepter, which has resulted in two powerful beings – the Maximoff twins Pietro (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and Wanda (Elizabeth Olsen) who have superhuman speed and can manipulate minds and project energy respectively.

Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) has created a squad of automated robots utilizing his Iron Man technology to do the work he doesn’t have the time for under the auspices of the Ultron program. His ultimate goal is to create an artificial intelligence for these robots so that they can carry out his global peace keeping mission. To achieve this, he and Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) use Loki’s scepter without telling the other Avengers.

Back at the Avengers Tower, the team enjoys a little downtime and we get to see them banter with some of Whedon’s trademark entertaining dialogue. He also does a nice job of showing the dynamic between the group and certain members, like a nice bit where everyone tries in vain to lift Thor’s hammer. A crude form of the now sentient Ultron crashes the party (literally) and escapes, taking the scepter with him. He proceeds to assemble a massive army of robots to bring about the end of the human race. To make matters worse, he recruits the Maximoff twins, appealing to their anger towards the Avengers.

Whedon improves on the action sequences from The Avengers by upping the scale and intensity including a very memorable slugfest where Stark dons Hulkbuster armor to stop the rampaging green monster under Wanda’s influence. I like that during these battle scenes, Whedon shows our heroes saving people from the carnage while still engaging in the occasional witty banter – a staple from the comic books. In fact, we see the various Avengers going out of their way to save people, putting their very lives on the line because that is what superheroes do. As Whedon said in a recent interview, he wanted to “get back to what’s important, which is that the people you’re trying to protect are people … What a hero does is not just beat up the bad guy – a hero saves the people.”

One of the problems with many of the Marvel movies is that the villains tend to lack personality. Let’s face it, they all want basically the same thing – to either rule the world or destroy it. What makes them stand out is a distinctive personality and that comes in part from the screenplay and from casting. In a masterstroke, Whedon brought on board James Spader to portray Ultron. He’s an actor with an idiosyncratic personality, which the filmmaker utilizes so well throughout the movie as Spader gives a deliciously evil performance. This is even more impressive as he instills an entirely CGI character with a personality that resembles Tony Stark gone bad. Whedon makes a point of showing what motivates not only Ultron but also Pietro and Wanda. They all have deeply rooted grudges against Stark and the rest of the Avengers and for the latter two this comes from a deep, personal pain.

He also sets up the ideological battle between Stark and Steve Rogers (Chris Evans), which foreshadows the upcoming Captain America: Civil War (2016). Rogers is upset that Stark went ahead and created a sentient robot without consulting the rest of the team or thinking about the ramifications of his actions while Stark, driven by his anxiety over almost dying at the hands of an alien race in The Avengers, wants to make sure that the Earth has an army of its own should another massive threat present itself. To this end, the climactic battle between the Avengers and Ultron and his army of robots could be seen as a slyly scathing critique of drone warfare while also being a pretty cool battle to watch.

Whedon has definitely learned a lot from the first Avengers movie – not just on a technical level, but also improving on its shortcomings, like making up for giving Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) the short shrift when he was brainwashed for most of it by showing us what he’s been up to since that one ended. By doing this, Whedon also gives Hawkeye a more personal stake in saving the world this time out. It is more than just that. Whedon manages to give all the heroes a crucial part to play in stopping Ultron. As he did with the first movie, Whedon achieves just the right rhythm of downtime between actions sequences that not only moves the story along, but also develops the characters and their relationships with each other in a way he wasn’t able to do in The Avengers. He even introduces the possibility of a romance between two of our heroes.

Whedon understands that it isn’t hard creating a movie where the heroes have to take on a villain bent on world destruction. It doesn’t mean a thing if we don’t care about the heroes and aren’t invested in what they have at stake. You have to make it personal for them and the filmmaker excels at this by taking the time to providing a motivating factor for each of the Avengers. It’s a tricky balancing act because we know that none of them can be killed off – they already have upcoming movies in their own franchises or someone else’s to appear in – but you can make the audience forget that temporarily by getting them invested in an compelling story filled with witty banter, snappy one-liners and passionate speeches from our heroes and the bad guy. While Age of Ultron is somewhat darker in tone than The Avengers – lacking that movie’s overall feelgood vibe, it is more ambitious in scope and scale and a richer experience.

SOURCES

Buchanan, Kyle. “How Avengers: Age of Ultron Nearly Killed Joss Whedon.” New York magazine. April 13, 2015.

The Avengers

The Avengers (2012) is the culmination of an ambitious project that was carefully planned over several years and spans several films utilizing characters, both major and minor, from each. While the notion of a shared universe with characters from one franchise appearing in another is a relatively novel idea in film, it is nothing new in comic books where costumed superheroes cross-pollinate all the time and even contribute to a larger story (see Secret Wars II). With Iron Man (2008), Marvel Comics decided to do in film what they’ve been doing in comic books for decades. Its commercial success paved the way for subsequent adaptations of The Incredible Hulk (2008), Thor (2011) and Captain America (2011), each one featuring a scene that hinted at something bigger and it has finally arrived with The Avengers, which features heroes from all of these films banding together to form a super team of sorts.

The challenge that Marvel faced was to find a director that could successfully bring all of these wildly different heroes together and also handle the movie stars playing them. Up to that point, Marvel had employed journeymen studio directors like Jon Favreau (Iron Man 1 & 2), Louis Leterrier (The Incredible Hulk) and Joe Johnston (Captain America). But with Kenneth Branagh directing Thor, it was the first time the company had hired someone with auteurist sensibilities since Ang Lee and his fascinatingly flawed yet ultimately ill fated take on the Hulk in 2003. And so the hiring of Joss Whedon to direct The Avengers surprised some. With only one feature film on his resume – the cult film darling Serenity (2005), and known mostly for his television work on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, its spin-off Angel and sci-fi western Firefly, there was some question if he could handle a $200+ million blockbluster populated with movie stars.

Whedon got his start as a screenwriter and honed his chops over the years on T.V. sitcoms and as a prolific and often uncredited script doctor (Speed, Twister, etc.), but more importantly were his hardcore comic book fan credentials, having actually written a brief run for The X-Men, so he knew how they worked in terms of dialogue, plotting and depicting visual action – perhaps the most important criteria for The Avengers gig. It was a calculated risk that appears to have paid off as the film is racking in impressive box office results and receiving strong critical response.

The Tesseract, a powerful energy source that was featured prominently in both Thor and Captain America, has activated itself and appears to be trying to open a portal to outer space. Sure enough, exiled Norse god Loki (Tom Hiddleston) arrives with the intention of using it to take control of Earth and enslave its inhabitants. To this end, he brainwashes brilliant physicist Dr. Erik Selvig (Stellan Skarsgard) and S.H.I.E.L.D. (a top secret government organization) operative Clint Barton a.k.a. Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) to help him do his bidding. This doesn’t sit too well with S.H.I.E.L.D. director Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) and he decides to enlist Earth’s mightiest heroes to stop Loki.

This includes Russian super spy Natasha Romanoff a.k.a. Black Widow (Scarlett Johannson) who quickly finishes her “interrogation” of Russian gangsters to approach Dr. Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo), a philanthropic scientist now staying “off the grid” by working in the slums of India and trying hard not to unleash his Hulk persona, a being with superhuman strength that is off the charts. Captain America (Chris Evans) has been thawed out since being trapped in ice at the end of World War II and is still trying to sort things out with Fury’s help.  S.H.I.E.L.D. also approaches Tony Stark a.k.a. Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), interrupting his work on a clean energy source. Norse god of thunder Thor (Chris Hemsworth), and Loki’s adoptive brother, is the wild card, arriving out of no where to intervene when Iron Man and Captain America attempt to capture him resulting in an impressive skirmish. This all builds up to a spectacular climactic battle between Loki and an alien army that comes swarming out of the portal created by the Tesseract and the Avengers.

With the unfortunate exception of Jeremy Renner, the entire cast gets a chance to flex their acting chops the best they can between massive action set pieces. Mark Ruffalo, the third person to play Banner after Eric Bana and Edward Norton, really nails the human side of his character, playing him as slightly twitchy and paranoid drifter. He appears confident (because, hey, he can turn into the Hulk) yet distracted – a jumble of emotions. This is easily the best representation of the Hulk on film, both visually in terms of CGI and also how he’s portrayed – as a rampaging monster – the Mr. Hyde to Banner’s Dr. Jekyll. Not surprisingly, Robert Downey Jr. gets the lion’s share of the funny quips – he was born to spout Whedon’s witty dialogue. It is a nice return to form after the cluttered rush job that was Iron Man 2 (2010). Based on Whedon’s perchance for having prominent strong-willed female characters in his projects, Scarlett Johannson’s Black Widow gets a beefed up role and proves to be an integral part of the team. Not only does she show off a considerable physical prowess but she also holds her own against the likes of Robert Downey Jr. and Mark Ruffalo. Chris Evans and Chris Hemsworth carry on with their characters from their respective films without missing a beat, each adding their own unique flavor to the team. In particular, Evans does a good job when Captain America steps up and takes tactical control during the war in New York while Hemsworth has some nice moments with Tom Hiddleston as warring brothers who just happen to be gods.

The Avengers is chock full of eye candy for comic book fans, from the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier to actually seeing superheroes fight each other – something, oddly enough, you don’t see in most films but that happens all the time in the comics. It is pretty cool to see the likes of Thor, Iron Man and Captain America duke it out while engaging in playful superhero banter. Unlike the other Marvel films starting with and including Iron Man, Whedon creates a real sense of danger for our heroes. There’s a feeling that they might fail and this tension is thrilling because it is so rare in these kinds of films, except maybe The Dark Knight (2008). It also raises the stakes when Whedon’s film needs it because there is a real sense that the Avengers are fighting for something tangible. He gives them something personal to fight for than just the usual let’s save the world goal. This culminates in the climactic battle in New York City between Loki and his alien army and the Avengers in one thrilling sequence after another, each filled with large-scale slugfests. The choreography during this massive battle is top notch. There is never any confusion as to what is happening and where, which is quite refreshing. The end result is pure, unfiltered comic book geek nirvana.

The Avengers falls rather nicely within Whedon’s wheelhouse as it is all about a group of misfits that band together to save the world from a great evil, just like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, and so on. It doesn’t get any more disparate than a Norse god, a billionaire playboy, a World War II super soldier, a brilliant scientist, and two spies. Like much of the aforementioned work, the heroes in The Avengers bicker and fight amongst themselves but when the need to step up for the greater good arises, they put their differences aside and make a stand together. Loki continues in the tradition of eloquent Whedon villains who are incredibly confident because, well, in his case he wields great power and knows it. However, Loki isn’t just out to rule the world. For him, there is a personal component – he seeks vengeance for the slights he feels were incurred in Thor. This film is a great way to kick off the summer blockbuster season and is a potent reminder of what a filmmaker who knows how comic book works can do if given the chance. The result is a smart, witty film that is a throwback to entertaining, crowd-pleasing comic book adaptations like Superman (1978) and Batman (1989).

Zodiac

After the technically accomplished but ultimately hollow thriller Panic Room (2002), director David Fincher returned to familiar subject matter with Zodiac (2007), a dramatization of the murders perpetuated by the infamous serial killer known as the Zodiac Killer that terrorized the San Francisco Bay area in the late 1960s and early 1970s. With Se7en (1995), Fincher seems like an obvious choice to direct this film but those of you expecting a rehash of that film will be disappointed. With Zodiac, he faces the daunting challenge of making an exciting thriller that runs two hours and forty minutes long and where the killer was never caught. He does this by focusing on the people who investigated the case and how it affected them.

Based on Robert Graysmith’s two books on the subject (Zodiac and Zodiac Unmasked), the film focuses on three men who investigated the case and how each one became obsessed with solving it to the point where their lives and those of the ones close to them were affected. Paul Avery (Robert Downey Jr.) is an investigative journalist who covers the story for the San Francisco Chronicle; Robert Graysmith (Jake Gyllenhaal) is a political cartoonist for the same newspaper who takes an interest in the encrypted letters that the killer sends to the police and several newspapers, taunting them; and David Toschi (Mark Ruffalo) is one of the San Francisco police detectives assigned to the case along with his partner Bill Armstrong (Anthony Edwards).

Zodiac begins with the murders and Fincher doesn’t shy away from the brutality of them but doesn’t revel in the gore either. He shows just enough to be disturbing, resisting the urge to glorify it like so many horror films made in the past few years. From there, the focus shifts to Avery and Graysmith – how they got involved in the case and the initial legwork they did before shifting the focus to Toschi and Armstrong who are brought in to investigate the Zodiac’s murder of a taxi cab driver. There is this shift in focus because as the two detectives investigate the case, Avery and Graysmith become marginal figures. They aren’t privy to the kind of access to information available to Toschi and Armstrong. As the years drag on, the trail gets colder and they exhaust all of their possible leads and avenues and have effectively been beaten by the system. They move on to other things and this is where Graysmith picks up the ball and runs with it and the focus changes while Toschi becomes the peripheral character as does Avery who has been beaten by his own addictions and paranoia.

Mark Ruffalo really immerses himself in the role of David Toschi, the man who inspired Steve McQueen’s character in Bullitt (1968) and Clint Eastwood’s Dirty Harry Callahan. The actor adopts a specific voice and a distinctive look that sets him apart from the other characters but not enough to be distracting. It doesn’t hurt that he’s got great material to work with and rises to the challenge of playing a man frustrated by bureaucracy. Ruffalo has only gotten better with every performance and this may be his best one to date. Robert Downey Jr. tones down his sometimes scene-stealing style down so that he isn’t as flashy but delivers a solid performance as a jaded journalist. He gives Avery a certain disheveled charm and over the course of the film he does an excellent job showing the man’s gradual disintegration due to paranoia fueled by alcohol abuse and drugs that take their toll both physically and mentally. Jake Gyllenhaal is good as the eager Graysmith who becomes fascinated by the case and pursues it even when the trail goes cold and it seems like everyone else has lost interest or given up.

Fincher’s films have often been criticized for their lack of characterization and emotional detachment but this is not the case with Zodiac. The actors go a long way in providing an emotional connection to their characters and the director does give us moments in which to make that connection, like several between Toschi and his partner in the form of little exchanges but they all add up and build to the scene where Armstrong tells Toschi that he is transferring to another department. You really feel for Toschi from the disappointed expression on Ruffalo's face. There is also a gradual build-up between Avery and Graysmith. They are introduced together very early on and we see how they interact with one another and then there is a nice scene at a bar where Avery buys Graysmith a drink and they talk about why they are obsessed with the case. It is at this moment that these two characters connect in a meaningful way. These moments make you sympathize with these characters so that you care about what happens to them later on.

This is a film that shows people talking and doing research – hardly, dynamic, cinematic material but Fincher makes it fascinating with strong performances from his talented cast and a solid screenplay to anchor the film. Like Michael Mann’s equally obsessive serial killer film, Manhunter (1986), Fincher spends a lot of his motion picture showing offices buzzing with activity as the case heats up and we see people hard at work as the police, FBI, the Chronicle and even the CIA all try to decipher the Zodiac’s code and solve the case. He also shows the minutia of their methods while also reminding us of the limits of technology at the time (no personal computers, no Internet, no DNA testing, etc.). These people faced a monumental task of sifting through hundreds of false leads and crank calls from the substantial information that might have actually furthered the case.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, Toschi and his partner are hampered by maddening bureaucracy at every turn. Because several of the murders took place over multiple jurisdictions, they have to consult with the police departments in each one in order to obtain the information that they have. Naturally, some are more cooperative than others. This only slows things down and obstructs the investigation. As the case drags on, we see the hold it has on Avery, Graysmith and Toschi. Both Graysmith and Toschi spend less and less time with their families and Avery is driven to drink and displays increasing erratic behavior, due to his frustration with the case and also because the Zodiac killer contacts him directly, making him understandably paranoid.

Stylistically, Fincher claims that he was influenced by All the President’s Men (1976) and this restrained approach permeates every aspect of Fincher’s film, from the way he frames characters in a scene to the way the Chronicle’s offices are lit to the emphasis on legwork and research conducted by the protagonists in order to catch the killer. The attention to period detail is fantastic and authentic, right down to the fluorescent lights in the aforementioned newspaper office, the cars, the clothes, and the period music that never overwhelms the film or draws attention to itself. It only helps establish the mood of the times and creates the feeling that this film was shot in the 1970s. Fincher shot the entire film digitally on the Thomson Viper (the same camera that Michael Mann most of Collateral and Miami Vice with) but it certainly doesn’t look it. He makes sure that there is nothing stylistically to distract us from the riveting content and strong performances.

Zodiac presents a wealth of information and invites you to sift through it like the three protagonists. In fact, there is so much to absorb that repeated viewings only reveal more details that might not have been caught upon an initial viewing. The film’s long running time (two hours and 40 minutes) allows you to gradually immerse yourself in the film and the story it tells. However, it never feels too long because Fincher maintains a brisk, efficient pace cramming as much detail and information as he can into every scene. The killer is a fascinating enigma and his encrypted letters, his blatant taunting of the police, and the discrepancies between murders only it makes it more interesting. It is easy to see why people became obsessed with this case. Ultimately, the Zodiac case doesn’t just leave a trail of actual bodies but also collateral damage in the form of failed marriages, ended partnerships, and substance abuse. And this is just the people who investigated the case. The toll taken on the victims who survived, their families and those of the people who were killed is inconceivable. A whole other movie could be made about them. Fincher has made a smart, engaging thriller that suggests a new direction for the filmmaker, one that places an emphasis on character and story instead of atmosphere and set design.