Monday, 1 September 2014

Captain America - The Winter Soldier

The aim of this blog is not to tell you what films I have liked and disliked and therefore what you should go and see, but rather to spark discussion about a certain film and in a broader sense, the world of film. I was inspired to do this by a friend of mine and will hope to bring in the opinions of others in future blogs. I would massively appreciate any feedback, positive or negative. I have picked Captain America 2 as my first review for many reasons, ones which will become clear as you read on. I imagine that some of you are either massive fans of the so called 'marvel universe' while others couldn't think of anything worse than watch another beefed up actor travel through time to defeat his great enemy. Since the Marvel universe has fully exploded I have steadily flowed between the two ends of the spectrum just mentioned. For me Captain America 2 lands very firmly in the realm of what I would consider to be an enjoyable, interesting film that actually manages to subtly bring up some serious issues at the same time. This made even more impressive by the fact that the first Captain America was by far my least favourite of Marvel's recent creations as I'm sure most of you will agree.

The opening scene of the film did leave me fairly worried for what lay ahead in the next 2 hours of my time. We open to Steve Rodgers aka Captain America, played by the ever one faced Chris Evans, sprinting round Washington, lapping the tiring ex marine Sam Wilson played by Anthony Mackie. The two men somehow begin to engage in some friendly morning chat as they run, which becomes the birth of their friendship, questionable to say the least. When I run in the park I hardly expect to become best friends with each person who runs past me. The relationship develops as the film continues but I never feel particularly convinced or interested by the connection between the two. On the other hand I felt a genuinely real bond between Rodgers and his female companion, Natasha Romanoff played by the red headed Scarlett Johansson. It always amuses me how Romanoff's cat suit like costume is always fairly open at the top to leave little to the imagination, incidentally I'm not complaining. Open or closed body armour, her relationship with Captain America for me sparks a real turn around in the lack of imagination super hero movies have shown in the past with hero and heroine relationships. The highlight of this summer's Amazing Spider-Man was easily the obvious connection between Spider-man and his love interest Gwen Stacy aided hugely by their off screen bond, it makes the dialog seem natural and relaxed. I saw glimpses of this between Romanoff and Rodgers, I found it even more interesting when I read that apparently some of the dialog between the two of them had been written by Johansson and Rodgers. This gives a nice move away from the usual marvel shot which tends to last no longer than 10 seconds before someone has some sort of one liner to throw in before the camera shoots to another more interesting explosion. In context of other marvel films lack of genuine heartwarming or comedic male-female relationships, that of the Captain and Romanoff is a welcome break.

Whenever I come out of watching a marvel film, or any action film for that matter (except The Raid 2 which has possibly the most incredible end fight scene ever, but thats for another time)  I almost always feel disappointed by the final duel with the bad guy, or guys... in Captain America 2 though I wasn't so. The reason being I don't think the directors, Joe and Anthony Russo, tried to close the film with JUST a fist fight between Rodgers and the steel armed Winter Soldier with more explosions and fireballs than the rest of the film put together. Yes, that did happen but it worked because it was supplemented by other duels that were happening at the same time. The cutting between the different pieces of action, all slightly different to one another made the ending of the film happen on a wider scale than just between two people. This I think fulfilled me far more than just watching different angles of the same fight, which will only ever have one winner no matter how unlikely it may look at any given moment. That being said I still think Marvel has a long way to go before it makes the ending of their films equal to the main body of the film.

I have always found with superhero films that the more human the lead character and his respective villain tend to be, the more I enjoy the film. Take Batman vs. Thor for example, its a lot harder for me to relate to a norse god that pops out of the sky wearing a long red cape and carrying a supercharged lighning hammer to fight his brother, who has an equally long green cape for the right to rule a mythical land somewhere between Sweden and Iceland. Batman on the other hand represents a self made hero who lacks the ability to conjure up forcefields at will. That being said I don't see myself similar to Batman either, but you get my point, the less super the powers the easier it is to relate to. Chris Evan's arms in this film are a superpower of their own, but apart from that and his fairly malleable shield he represents one of the more human characters in Marvel's world. As I mentioned earlier with the first Captain America it takes more than just a less fantastical hero to convince me. What really turned me here was the villain, no not Sebastian Stan and his metal arm but the threat that comes from within. For the first time ever in a Marvel film I felt that the terror caused here could potentially happen in real life. The idea of killing a person before he has committed a crime because a computer thinks he will in the future due to his DNA is a very real prospect we may face in the future. Which way would you swing? Do you risk an innocent man or woman's life because an algorithm tells you they are evil, or do you live in fear of the crimes they could commit in the future, IF the computer proves to be right. It's a very interesting and topical idea and the reason why Robert Redford's sly character Alexander Pearce and the rest of Hydra who have infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D for me are Marvel's best foe to date.

In terms of enjoyment, I have to say I fully enjoyed this film pretty much from start to finish, yes there are some rocky moments are corny lines written in for dramatic effect but overall the film delivers for me. Marvel are receiving a lot of stick at the moment for the hold they have on the cinematic universe but it doesn't look like that is going to change for a while, especially with films sketched up until 2018 and beyond. Since this is the case I think there is very little point in saying "oh another Marvel film... Great, they are all the same" one should look to find aspects that are different, because they are there if you look for them. If your thinking that it sounds like I would like to see Marvel films continue to dominate as much as they do currently, I wouldn't, but as a general rule they do tend to be fairly, if not very, entertaining so try not to take them to seriously or get into too much of a funk about another one coming out next summer, cough cough Avengers 2, because at the end of the day they are only a bit of fun.

Thank you very much for taking the time to read this, I really appreciate it and hope you have found it says something a bit different to what you would read in the paper. Feel free to give me any feedback negative, or positive via twitter (@josefkaplicky) or For the next post I would love someone to ask for something particular to be reviewed, feel free to message me on twitter or facebook. Thank you once again.








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