In a few months’ time we’ll be looking to the skies to see the Man of Steel heading up, up and rebooted once more, but in not-so-old London Town on the 17th April, the metal in question is most definitely iron. Somewhere a few miles across town, the controversial Iron Lady is on her way to be laid to rest with ceremonial fervour, but at a small screening room in Soho Square and then at the Dorchester, it’s Tony Stark’s Iron Man that holds court and has his repulsor rays on stun.
Or, more accurately, it’s the hero’s other alter ego Robert Downey Jnr alongside director Shane Black and villain of the piece SIR Ben Kingsley. The official UK premiere of the film itself has been delayed a day to make way for the funeral, but in a week of Margaret Thatcher’s farewell and a newly subdued and cautious London Marathon, the third outing for Marvel’s shellheaded superhero is clearly able to hold its own.
Shane Black’s previous efforts have included the delicious subversive action-satire Kiss, Kiss, Bang Bang (also starting Downey Jnr.) which, ironically, could be the family motto of Tony Stark, the playboy billionaire played with innate panache by the actor. Even at the time of the original film it was clear the Stark casting was perfect. As Tim Burton had found out with Batman, you cast the right man behind the mask and the mask will take care of itself. Hollywood’s partially-reformed bad-boy was able to walk on screen with a martini in hand, a smile on his lips and an eyebrow primed for misbehaving and a page of needless exposition could be thrown out the window. Hello, ladies.
But what story was there left to tell? The previous Iron Man movies and last year's Avengers fairly well mapped out the character and you couldn't really go any 'bigger'. Black decided to go deeper instead.
"I think when you do anything where there’s a ‘number three’ after it, you have to ask yourself ‘How can we pretend this was supposed to happen anyway. What’s the story left to tell that that it makes it seem in retrospect that it was just waiting to get itself told?' I think finding the the things you like about Iron Man that haven’t been mined yet and trying to include them in such a way… It’s weird, it’s not a trilogy. There’s another movie in the middle of it called ‘The Avengers’ and so it’s like there’s a trilogy and THEN us. He saves the world, he perfects his technology and has emerged as this global superhero. THEN we have the fourth movie. You’re still looking for the thing that hasn’t been explored yet, trying to find something different..." Black explains. "When you make an action film, I think we all know what that’s supposed to be, but it’s just quantifying it. So it’s the extent to which we can access what we already know. Action doesn’t change whether you’re doing a car-chase or a science-fiction . More important than that is the ability to generate a story that works. I think – and this is very important for me – movies LOOK great, for the most part. Movies SOUND great. You don’t hear someone say ‘I went to the new big-budget movie and God, it sounded shitty…’ TECHNICALLY things are perfect. The stories are… not always engaging, not always perfect and so as long as I have the chance to come on board and dictate or try to give flesh to a story that makes sense and works and that I can collaborate with people like Robert… I know we’re going to make a shape, a stew that could be fun. I don’t care how much it costs or what scale it’s at… the story is what’s important, the spectacle is simply a part of telling that story. NOT the other way around. The tail doesn’t wag the dog… the ‘bigness’ of the picture is the least interesting thing about it. The innovation and the talent and the funniness of it is what I’m most proud of… and all the people here have done a marvellous job!”
But Black admits that he was cautious about coming onboard after Jon Favreau's previous two outings had done so well - especially as the director was still on-set playing Happy Hogan, Stark's Head of Security.
"Jon Favreau was just a goddamn prince… in terms of coming to him and and saying ‘How did you do this on number one?’, ‘What was your thinking?’, ‘How do I stay true to the lineage and legacy of what you’ve established?’ We had to make a film that was a different tone from The Avengers, but consistent. This was a guy who had every stake and he could have come on and been bored and been disrespectful… instead he was the most gracious, helpful, wonderful participant in this process. He helped me a helluva lot," Black acknowledges.
Black's previous movies have a definitive flow, a very organic feel to them as if there was no script, just incredibly instinctive actors having fun and coming up with the eventual goods. Shane says that while there's an element of that, most of what we see on screen in Iron Man 3 was actually tightly scripted and well-rehearsed... they just make it LOOK easy. Talking about a key scene in the movie that features Downey, co-star Don Cheadle and Sir Ben Kingsley, he explains that though the actors shot scenes where they tried different things, the shots in the movie were the closest to the original script... and it was all in the delivery.
“These are fabulously talented people who have the ability to make structure seem like 'improv'," he nods. "They knew this scene backwards and forwards and performed it in such a loose way and wonderful way that makes it seem like it’s just occurring in the moment. Just dancing and thinking on their feet. No, we covered it like every other scene. We shot it like every other scene. It was probably the truest to the script of any scene in there – and it’s one of the best because of the talents of the people involved. In particular, just seeing Sir Ben open up in that … at the end of the shooting day, the crew spontaneously applauded.”
With this re-teaming with Downey, it does raise the quesstion as to whether there could be a sequel to Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang, which may not have made a ton of money but still has a cult following...
“It would be nice, wouldn’t it…" he pauses. "… but no. It just didn’t make the coffers overflow. No-one was paying to see Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang when they needed to. It was a hit here (in the UK) but what’s Britain’s box-office compared to the US… half?"
He shrugs. Ever the pragmatist... but one suspects (and hopes) we'll see Black and Downey making more movies together. There's no contract for an Iron Man 4 and the actor has been non-commital about the franchise's future, but with the first box-office tallies emerging - and in some countries Iron Man 3 opening bigger than The Avengers did - we may yet see the dynamic duo being marvelous once more.
See our review of Iron Man 3 HERE...
