The Avengers (Joss Whedon, 2012)

[matrixschmatrix]

I saw it last night, and was pleasantly surprised- the Marvel movies have been consistently ho hum, good characterization dragged down by bad plotting and incoherent or uninteresting action. This one still had mediocre plotting, but the characterization was as good or better than ever (the singly established characters all have interesting people to bounce off of for once) and the action is easily the best of any of the series.

[Matt]

One of Whedon's strengths as a writer is to give everybody in an ensemble equal value. I'm glad to see that he wrote to his strengths here, even if he also indulged one of his major weaknesses of making every character (except Cap) a smart aleck. I was already only seeing this for Chris Evans' Captain America, so I'm glad Whedon kept him refreshingly square. I don't think I'd watch it all the way through a second time, but I wouldn't mind revisiting some scenes here and there when it's on TV.

[wattsup32]

One of Whedon's strengths as a writer is to give everybody in an ensemble equal value. I'm glad to see that he wrote to his strengths here, even if he also indulged one of his major weaknesses of making every character (except Cap) a smart aleck. I was already only seeing this for Chris Evans' Captain America, so I'm glad Whedon kept him refreshingly square.

I agree to some degree about this being a weakness of Whedon's. Stark was, no doubt, even more of a smart aleck than he normally is. He was also, no doubt, better than he had ever been. I am curious who else came off as a smart aleck to you. Not Cap, as you mentioned. Certainly not Banner either as he was written terse, restrained dialogue. Did you feel that way about the others?

[matrixschmatrix]

There's definitely a free floating smirk throughout the movie- Black Widow definitely seems to have been infected by it, as have a lot of the SHIELD personnel- but it didn't turn into the worst of Whedon, where everyone's essentially speaking with the same voice.

[hearthesilence]

In J. Hoberman's piece on Celine and Julie Go Boating, he gives an unexpected rave for The Avengers in the last paragraph:

Indeed, having newly revisited “Celine and Julie,” I could not help but superimpose its premise over the weekend’s two other outstanding releases — the superlative comic-book (or pure cinema) son-et-lumiere spectacle that is “The Avengers,” and the lovingly restored re-release of Shirley Clarke’s landmark 1961 adaptation of Jack Gelber’s dope opera, “The Connection.” While it’s superhero business as usual to watch the eponymous Avengers vie with Loki for control of their scenario, it would be truly fabulous to watch Celine and Julie insert themselves into and take control of “The Connection”’s Pirandellian ritual.

[Matt]

There's definitely a free floating smirk throughout the movie- Black Widow definitely seems to have been infected by it, as have a lot of the SHIELD personnel- but it didn't turn into the worst of Whedon, where everyone's essentially speaking with the same voice.

That's kind of how I feel, too. All of the major characters except Cap had their moments of snark, some more than others. I have a terrible memory for dialogue, so I can't cite any specific examples now. It was certainly less than I expected from Whedon, and some of it was funny. The audience I was in seemed to like it just fine.

[J Wilson]

Saw this and was entertained as an old school Marvel fan, but my real WTF moment was during the interrogation scene with Black Widow and the Russians. I kept thinking I had seen the guy in charge and couldn't place him until my friend told me it was Jerzy Skolimowski, as we had watched Deep End and its extras a few weeks before. Didn't even know he was an actor as well.

[stroszeck]

Just out of curiosity and not to be a jerk since I know this was almost universally acclaimed, but did anyone feel that it was sort of just all action and no real character development of any kind? It just seemed to me that it was so highly lauded in all the reviews as the perfect blend of action, story, acting etc but I thought it fell sort of flat and didn't find it very funny. And whats up with the whole strange fascistic subplot involving SHIELD? I'm no fan of comics so I was surprised that the story revolves around a bunch of powerful good guys just saying yes to the whims of a secret society that controls things behind the scenes. Oh and the ridiculous costumes...

[Roger Ryan]

I can't say this film was significantly better than THOR or CAPTAIN AMERICA (both of which I consider acceptable entertainment) but it certainly can't rise to the level of IRON MAN. The opening sequence is quite clumsy and confusing; it appears to inspired by, yet contradicts, information provided by the post-credit sequence in THOR. The action just falls flat and it takes the Black Widow introduction scene to get the film on its feet. Throughout, Whedon does manage to find a decent balance between all of the Avengers, but I never felt the threat was properly articulated. The mid-film showcase sequence is well-conceived and executed, so much so that the BIG climax feels labored and overblown in comparison. The viewer is reminded far too often that the main characters can not be physically harmed in any way, so there is little suspense in the action scenes. The in-jokes are plentiful and amusing, but they can't make up for the lack of a compelling (and understandable) storyline.

Not nearly as much fun as Whedon's (and Drew Goddard's) THE CABIN IN THE WOODS!

[zedz]

Just out of curiosity and not to be a jerk since I know this was almost universally acclaimed, but did anyone feel that it was sort of just all action and no real character development of any kind?

Well yes, but that's completely true to the source material. I enjoyed the film on its own terms and felt it embodied the comic books all too well, right down to the paper-thin characterizations, contrived fan-service scenarios (Thor vs. Iron Man! Everybody vs. the Hulk! (Until the plot demands that the Hulk fights the real baddies, natch)), pompous cosmic hoo-hah, hero-hypnotized-into-serving-evil-and-then-snapped-back, generally dodgy motivation. It was a hoot, and at least the action sequences had a modicum of coherence, but all of its assets are completely trivial. The ecstatic reviews seem to me to say much more about rock-bottom expectations than any great achievement of the movie itself (unless 'not being really really terrible' is now an achievement for a summer blockbuster?)

[Brian C]

The ecstatic reviews seem to me to say much more about rock-bottom expectations than any great achievement of the movie itself (unless 'not being really really terrible' is now an achievement for a summer blockbuster?)

Along these lines, it's interesting how Marvel has carved out a "not really really terrible" summer-movie niche. I don't think any of these films have been all that good (and I think The Avengers ranks toward the bottom of the list), but I'll be damned if I don't leave every one of them thinking, "man, that could have been a lot worse."

I'll be honest, when Marvel announced their plans for these films several years ago, I thought it would be absolute disaster for them, and I doubt I was alone. But here we are, 5 movies in, and now their coup de grâce is going to end up being one of the handful of most successful movies of this era of Hollywood. Credit to them, because I didn't think it could happen, and they've managed to create a cycle of mega-budget corporate films without them being really really terrible. I don't know exactly how big of an accomplishment that is, but it's not nothing.

[Matt]

stroszek, you also have to remember that this is basically the sixth installment in a serial. All of the character development that you want already took place in those earlier installments.

[domino harvey]

I never would have expected zedz to have attended this, which goes a long way towards explaining the box office returns: there's something mildly intriguing about the film to most if not all quadrants

[zedz]

I never would have expected zedz to have attended this, which goes a long way towards explaining the box office returns: there's something mildly intriguing about the film to most if not all quadrants

It was the "not really really really terrible" reports that hooked me. I actually love a good popcorn movie, but all too often the popcorn movies I see seem like complete failures even on their own heavily compromised terms. And boring, so, so boring: embarrassing cyphers sleepwalking through the same so-called 'character arcs' that have been used in every other blockbuster (which is why the Avengers just doing their thing was something of a relief, as well as a sort of meta-comment on the age-old continuity bugbear of team comics), incoherent and inert so-called 'action sequences' that start to function like television commercial breaks ("you reckon I've got enough time to go to the crapper before the film starts again?"), ending after ending, all paced strictly to factory settings while your wristwatch seems to start running backwards.

I thought Brad Bird's Mission Impossible film was very enjoyable too, possibly because he understood that nobody actually cares about the characters as characters and so practically waved the irrelevance of the plot in our faces, instead simply throwing all his creativity into making the set pieces work in purely abstract and mechanical terms.

[stroszeck]

I think like most I'm all for set pieces. Hell one of my favorite Jerry Lewis movies is the Ladies Man and thats one LARGE set piece! But its hard to stay interested or invested in a film when there's really not much of any substance to grab onto. Aside from hating the corny pseudo-proper English that Thor and Loki and their ilk spew out with straight faces while wearing bright plastic costumes, I actually enjoyed the lighter opposite-of-Those-Batman-Movies tone which was playful and sort of tongue in cheek. But aside from Downey's Iron Man, nothing else once again really did it for me. I felt the comedy sort of fell flat

Spoiler

really, a "he's adopted" moment? Thats humor meant for 5 year olds, no?

and the nonstop pace of such a sheer volume of action and crap blowing up made the Transformers movies look like an Ozu/Mizoguchi arthouse flick (I exaggerate for effect.) This is another good example, for me anyway, in the use of my defense of Christopher Nolan's brand of cinema. How easy and lazy would it have been for Nolan to cram a TON of CGI and action into his batman world like the rest of these Marvel directors and have people walk out and give them praise just because their expectations were low? At least I actually think TDKR like its predecessors will present us with something real, more subdued and somewhat personal to grasp onto in the midst of so much "blockbuster" madness.

[knives]

Wouldn't nearly all of that apply to Suzuki though (at least in his more extreme films)? I'm not saying that Whedon accomplishes what Suzuki does to earn his reputation (in fact I very much doubt it), but wouldn't the complaints of ridiculousness and 'not much of any substance to grab onto'. Even the non-stop pace and volume accusations fit in their own way. Of course several of Suzuki's films do have substance, but Princess Raccoon for example doesn't have that commentary going on. Just putting up the Marvel/ Nolan divide doesn't make much sense since they are working to different ends within the means of the genre and any comparison would suggest that doing things one way is preferable which I doubt very much (if anything it's easier to make a great film going Nolan's route of thematic exposition which has been done better elsewhere). It's smarter to compare apples to oranges than to apple flavored candy.

[zedz]

Maybe it's just me, but in most cases Hollywood blockbusters trying to do 'substance' just comes off as painfully embarrassing. Let's not pretend that anybody is in the cinema so that they can feel James Bond's pain.

[hearthesilence]

zedz's got an excellent point. I think commercial films should be something more, but the fact is, most of the A-list directors handling these franchises aren't exactly John Ford and Howard Hawks. (I think Whedon is good, but he's a bit overrated.)

And I just remembered A.O. Scott (or some major critic) bringing that up when reviewing the original Iron Man, comparing Favreau's direction to studio directors who made something out of the endless commercial films they churned out under the Studio System. Unfortunately, he hasn't followed that up with anything nearly as good.

[matrixschmatrix]

It was the "not really really really terrible" reports that hooked me. I actually love a good popcorn movie, but all too often the popcorn movies I see seem like complete failures even on their own heavily compromised terms. And boring, so, so boring: embarrassing cyphers sleepwalking through the same so-called 'character arcs' that have been used in every other blockbuster (which is why the Avengers just doing their thing was something of a relief, as well as a sort of meta-comment on the age-old continuity bugbear of team comics), incoherent and inert so-called 'action sequences' that start to function like television commercial breaks ("you reckon I've got enough time to go to the crapper before the film starts again?"), ending after ending, all paced strictly to factory settings while your wristwatch seems to start running backwards.

I thought Brad Bird's Mission Impossible film was very enjoyable too, possibly because he understood that nobody actually cares about the characters as characters and so practically waved the irrelevance of the plot in our faces, instead simply throwing all his creativity into making the set pieces work in purely abstract and mechanical terms.

Yeah, this is where I stand- the Marvel movies have been impressively consistent in their mediocrity, and I love the experience of seeing big dumb movies as long as they aren't actively terrible- compared to Transformers, the action is wonderfully coherent, the humor is likable instead of racial stereotypes and piss jokes, and the movie doesn't spend half its length leering unpleasantly at women. That's a low bar, but a depressingly small number of blockbusters of late clear that bar. Mission Impossible did, and most of the Marvel movies do- this one more strongly than the others.

Mocking this kind of movie for having silly dialog and goofy costumes seems like attacking a Western because the people are gun happy and wear silly hats- it's a genre convention, and not an inherently problematic one. I like Nolan's Batman movies, and I like this, and I'd be a happy man if all the summer movies that played in the drive in were this good or better (or at least as good as John Carter, which played along side this when I saw it, and which was pleasantly sincere if also lumpy and unintentionally goofy.)

[colinr0380]

I don't know - it is an interesting trend, but I'm a little suspicious of this idea that you have to plan out doing five or six 'practice' films to get to your 'decent' one. The epic lengthed Harry Potters have a lot to answer for in this regard, as perhaps does the first X-Men film 'setting the scene' for the more elaborate X2. It feels as if, rather than abandoning narrative altogether, that the need for a narrative backbone or 'justification' for the events on display planned out over multiple films has become even more concretised into an industry standard - as if to get to the film that they really want to make, it has to be approached and built up through set up films and prequels.

Making it less a standalone film than one piece in a massive jigsaw - simultaneously both more and less important than a sequel. A sequel has less responsibility to the films around it in the series, focusing more on entertaining within itself, yet it can easily be disregarded by any further sequels which take the same approach. An entry in say the Harry Potter series retains a kind of inherent importance (e.g. "you must watch Chamber of Secrets otherwise events in Half-Blood Prince make no sense" and so on), yet each entry is only important for how it is building up to the pre-planned grand finale.

The "don't worry and stick with it, as it gets good by the third installment" trend seems to run counter to any sense of artistry or experimentation (because filmmakers are held in check by the franchise, by the need to stick to the story beats or, in James Bond terms, to reset everything so that the next film can be produced without having to refer back to it. The next installment may even already be in production in a separate studio!), which perhaps fits with films created by big conglomerates like Marvel or toy companies 'exploiting their intellectual properties' and bringing them all together for maximum impact in one value meal bundle.

By the way, since we are on the subject of blockbusters, how did I not realise until now that Tadanobu Asano is in Battleship! For all of the promos emphasising Taylor Kitsch and Rhianna, that one piece of casting has immediately jumped the film from a "maybe I'll catch it on TV one day" to at least a rental!

[knives]

By the way, since we are on the subject of blockbusters, how did I not realise until now that Tadanobu Asano is in Battleship! For all of the promos emphasising Taylor Kitsch and Rhianna, that one piece of casting has immediately jumped the film from a "maybe I'll catch it on TV one day" to at least a rental!

Same thing happened to me with this film and Skolimowski. Hopefully he got payed well.

[Matt]

Skolimowski's title card was shared with Jenny Agutter. I thought to myself, "now that's something I didn't expect to see." Probably the only surprise in the whole movie.

[scoundrel]

Skolimowski's title card was shared with Jenny Agutter. I thought to myself, "now that's something I didn't expect to see." Probably the only surprise in the whole movie.

She was one of the shadowy cabal faces, correct? I also saw Alexis Denisof's name on the credits, but couldn't place him in the film. I still have a crush on him since the Buffy days.

[Matt]

Skolimowski's title card was shared with Jenny Agutter. I thought to myself, "now that's something I didn't expect to see." Probably the only surprise in the whole movie.

She was one of the shadowy cabal faces, correct? I also saw Alexis Denisof's name on the credits, but couldn't place him in the film. I still have a crush on him since the Buffy days.

Yep. And Denisof was even more shadowy. He was The Other: the guy in space at the very beginning and very end running the bad-guy show.

[HistoryProf]

saw the Avengers today finally and will confess to it being pretty much awesome. surprised how the Hulk got the two best moments. They did an amazing job making them all fight amongst themselves and then come together without it ever feeling cheesy or forced...just brilliant writing. It was also incredibly well choreographed for all the chaos going on - i never felt lost or wondered where someone was. I honestly don't know how you can really top it. Ergo, that should just be the last superhero movie ever made. End on a high note Hollywood!

And my favorite part was putting Jenny Agutter on the Senate...loved it.