As I watched Iron Man 2, one phrase went through my head. It’s the compliment the male characters paid to one another in director Jon Favreau’s first film, Swingers: “You’re so money.”
Iron Man 2: You’re so money.
I don’t mean garish or gaudy or without a sense of humor. But in all the superhero leagues in all the world, Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark has the swankiest pad: a cliffside Malibu mansion that would make Bruce Wayne drool with envy. In his cool, low-lit lab, a computer with a smooth British voice supplies his needs, while sexy A-list foils like Gwyneth Paltrow and Scarlett Johansson sashay in and out.
Viewers might ask: Can money buy a good movie? Not always — but in this case, yes. Iron Man 2 is a smart piece of work; it doesn’t have the emotional heft of Superman 2 and Spider-Man 2, those two twos that outclassed their ones. But Favreau and screenwriter Justin Theroux have paced it like a screwball comedy, with fast-talking dames and ping-pong zingers that show off Downey’s expert timing. After promoting Paltrow’s Pepper Potts to CEO, he needs a new assistant — and Johansson’s Natalie Rushman, from the legal department, looks super promising.
Iron Man 2 does have a plot, and it’s functional. It starts where the first film ended, with Stark admitting publicly to being the guy in the metal suit flying around battling baddies. Iron Man peddled a bogus but appealing fantasy: that an American from a family that made its fortune selling weapons to kill people in far-off countries could himself become a weapon — for peace! So you could, if inclined, applaud the anti-military-industrialist-complex message but also cheer for a superhero who’s the product of military-industrialist ingenuity. Either way, America is so money.