Captain America: The First Avenger Review

*WARNING! Major Spoilers ahead*

In the past week I’ve been to see two films at the cinema, Captain America: The First Avenger on Saturday, and finally after two weeks of waiting, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 on Tuesday.

Now pretty much everyone who wants to see Harry Potter has seen it at this point, so I wasn't sure whether a review was necessary. After all, the film has been out over three weeks now. 

However, I have decided to do a post looking back on the entire Harry Potter film series that will incorporate my thoughts on Deathly Hallows Part 2. So that will be posted sometime next week.

So back to Captain America.

I shall once again do my review in bullet point form because people actually enjoyed my Transformers 3 review when it was done like that. I feel that it makes it easier to read and also hopefully conveys my enthusiasm or lack thereof for the particular movie i'm focusing on.

Also I prefer doing it this way as it hides grammatical errors and paragraph issues a lot more. Clever, I know.

So without further ado, here are my thoughts on the final superhero movie of 2011 and the last Marvel film before the big team-up...

• First of all, this is a very good movie. Not perfect, but very good. Captain America to me is a much harder superhero character to put on screen, even more so than Thor. The character was essentially created as a propaganda tool during the Second World War and certainly has that element of cheese to them. Also in this current climate, it’s not exactly easy to market a character worldwide called Captain America. However, this is far from a cheesy movie and is very well made.

• The whole style of the movie felt very reminiscent of Steven Spielberg. It doesn’t surprise me that Director Joe Johnston was art director on the first two Indiana Jones flicks. This film almost feels like it’s a spiritual cousin.

• One thing I really enjoyed about this movie from a technical standpoint was that it wasn’t full of quick edits that plague most Hollywood blockbusters today. Johnston gives room for scenes to breathe and it helps establish the plot and the characters far better for it. It also adds to the old-school feel the movie has.

• The CGI for reducing Chris Evans into the small, skinny Steve Rogers is brilliant. There was maybe once in the entire film where it actually looked computer-generated. Other than that it was exceptionally done. In fact overall, the CGI was good in this film. It wasn’t too obvious (save for one scene with a high-speed train), and wasn’t as jarring as it can be.

• That being said, the prosthetics for Red Skull were also excellent. It managed to make Red Skull look intimidating and not silly, and was done so that you could still tell it was Hugo Weaving under there. This in turn humanised the character a lot more.

• Chris Evans is a very good Captain America. I can’t really think of anyone who would have been a better fit for the role and Evans captures the good, wholesome nature of Rogers very well. I'm very much looking forward to seeing how Joss Whedon and Chris Evans play with the whole fish-out-of-water scenario in The Avengers. I’m also looking forward to seeing Steve Rogers and Tony Stark clash egos.

• Hayley Atwell was by far the best thing is this film for me. She was not only super-hot; she was exceptionally fun to watch and made every scene she was in far more interesting. I thought she had good chemistry with Evans and had her badass moments too. A great performance.

• Hugo Weaving was well, Hugo Weaving. He’s always reliable as a villain and gives a solid performance. With it being an origin movie, the feud between himself and Captain America is rushed, but hopefully he’ll appear in a sequel so we see the two clash once more.

• Tommy Lee Jones and Stanley Tucci. I’ll lump them together because they are both terrific actors and play their respective roles well. It’s always a bonus to see either of these two in a movie and to get both really adds to the integrity of the picture.

• I was surprised when they first announced Dominic Cooper was going to be playing Howard Stark. However, he manages to channel both Robert Downey Jr. and John Slattery to give an entertaining performance. Now we know where Tony Stark got all that charisma from.

• The film suffers once again like all other on-screen origin tales in balancing the origin story within an overall narrative. The first half of the film is excellent but the second-half, once we get Captain America, does feel rushed in places in a bid to resolve the plot. Set-pieces move at fast pace from one to another, rattling along at full steam until the climax. It doesn’t make it bad by any means, it just means we don’t get to see the rivalry between Red Skull and Captain America develop fully.

• The Captain America costume actually looks good. It could have been so much worse but they tone down the colours and it does look like military attire spruced up for the Capt. I’ve also seen Comic Con pictures of the modern-day costume Rogers will be wearing in The Avengers and that looks even better.

• The cosmic cube is the mcguffin of the movie and is not something I know a lot about, and the film never really explains what it does. Were told it harnesses great energy, and it powers all of Hydra’s high-tech weaponry, but to those not privy to its history in the comics, it was a bit confusing. However, it relates back to Asgard and we see that S.H.I.E.L.D has it at the end of Thor, so it seems like it’s going to play some part in The Avengers.

• I get highly disappointed now whenever I watch a film and Samuel L. Jackson doesn’t turn up at the end. I really hope Nick Fury gets his chance to shine in The Avengers amongst all the heroes, because it’s Samuel L. Jackson, the man’s entire career has been based on the fact he is a total badass.

• I think it makes sense to have Captain America be in present day at the end of the film, ready for The Avengers next year, but it could have just as easily have been the prologue at the beginning of next year’s superhero team-up.

• I’ve mentioned The Avengers about six times so far and it’s hard to ignore it. However, Marvel has toned down the references to next year's all-star team-up in both Thor and Captain America, and it's clear they've learned from the fact it impeded the overall plot of Iron Man 2. The Second World War setting for the majority of this film also helped.

• The Marvel Cinematic Universe is shaping up very nicely indeed. Marvel is treating the source material with great respect and it’s a reason why The Avengers will be the big blockbuster of next summer other than The Dark Knight Rises. I personally can’t see how they can mess the film up with all the heroes (other than Hawkeye) already established and with Joss Whedon directing. Although I am quite intrigued in the role the Hulk will play because he’s probably harder to make work in this universe than even Thor.

• Overall, if I were to rank the Marvel Universe movies to date it would go: Iron Man, Thor, Captain America: The First Avenger, Iron Man 2 and The Incredible Hulk.

Verdict:

Of the two Marvel movies this year, I still prefer Thor, but Captain America: The First Avenger is a very good entry into the universe. It feels like an old-school Spielberg action romp and pretty much delivers on making Steve Rogers a relatable superhero. Suffers from the origin syndrome and feels rushed in the third act, but overall a very good and most importantly, entertaining, summer film.

4/5

By ChoccyR with No comments