Captain America: The First Avenger

At around 1:14 or so, did anyone else hear a "Mr. Stark" from Abraham Erskine? Would that be Tony's dad?

 

Yes that is Howard Stark, father of Tony.

 

Cap is my favorite.

That trailer made me giddy.

 

Who's the chick supposed to be again?

 

You forgot to mention that she is also quite yummy.

 

Hahaha, touche!

 

Shouldn't this be a July4 release?
No, Seriously.
Why the hell not.
Get that jingoism mojo working.

 

Stupid industry politics...
I remember one of the Austin Powers movies made a big deal about how it was going to open the same weekend as one of the prequels, just so people who couldn't get in to see SW would have an option, then the studio or some exec decided about a month before to push it back a week.
TF doesn't need 7/4. And I give it a 75-90% chance of sucking.
CA would be much more appropriate, and I give it a 75% chance of NOT sucking. And a 20% chance of being really good.

Unfortunately, logic and reason don't have anything to do with the industry. Sadly, neither does quality normally. I ran into an interesting article about a rogue film director who made movies in spite of the system and got major studios to distribute them. Not that they're great movies, but they're a lot better than the usual crap.

 

I remember the commercials: "If you see just one movie this summer...see Star Wars. If you see two movies this summer, see Austin Powers!"

 

Silvestri does really well with some motifs and themes, and meh with most of the crud he is given for inspiration.

Would be interesting to see what Jerry Goldsmith could have done with some of these movies...

 

Lolz

I thought this was a review...

Don't tell!

 

I like it. It sounds big and heroic, as it should. Although, I REALLY like the Thor soundtrack. I'll have to wait to hear the final product to see which one I like better.

 

Today, I saw Captain America: The First Avenger. It?s not going to be on anyone list for film of the year (or at least, it shouldn?t be), but it was thoroughly fun and entertaining. It has a very different feel from the average modern action film: the fight scenes were universally easy to follow and filled with fists being liberally applied to jaws, and none of the fight scenes dragged on unnecessarily. The movie didn?t feature overlong slug-fests; if a person was shot, they went down. If they were hit with a few good punches, they went down. If they fell through a propeller, they? went down.

The dialog was generally crisp, in an ?aw shucks, ma?am? kind of way. Tommy Lee Jones was responsible for no small proportion of the best of the humour in the story as Colonel Phillips, but most of the characters got at least one or two good one-liners. A show-piece number to sell War Bonds was brilliant. Chris Evans was very well cast as the Captain himself, coming across with a good mix of warmth, humanity, determination, and earnestness.

The film itself looked great. The New York of the 1940s felt like a New York of the 1940s. The scenes in Europe often looked appropriate for a non-fantasy WWII movie, the American labs felt like period labs, the German labs had a certain retro-futuristic Frankenstein look to them. The makeup actually looked similar to period make-up as well, and the soft lighting in many scenes helped add to the period feel of the film. The special effects were mostly well done; it felt bizarre seeing the small, pre-enhancement version of Captain America, but aside from that things looked good.

The shout-outs to the other Marvel films were generally well done and entertaining to see. The Stark Expo begs comparison to the Stark Expo of Iron Man 2, the Cosmic Cube plotline ties in with Thor quite nicely. Nick Fury?s appearance at the end of the movie was a little jarring, but it felt intentionally so. Steve Rogers fell asleep at the height of WWII, and woke up in the 2010s, and it was even more of a shock for him than it was for the audience.

Of the Avenger prequel films, I?d say that this is pretty solidly the second best. It?s not quite as good as the first Iron Man film; Steve Rogers just isn?t as entertaining to watch as Tony Stark, but the action was significantly better. The movie will definitely bear watching again on DVD, multiple times; hopefully, it?ll make the wait for the Avengers movie easier. It also makes the wait harder, because all the set pieces are up: the Cosmic Cube, Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Black Widow, Hawkeye, Nick Fury, and maybe even Loki and the Red Skull. I?m looking forward to Tony Stark and Steve Rogers conversations. The preview trailer looked good, and if it can match up with the quality of the films to date, it should be one of the must-see movies next summer.

 

Got back from seeing it today. Very impressed. I figured it would be a good movie but it surprised me with how good it was. It captured the look and feel of the 1940s nearly perfectly. Steve was a nice change of pace for a hero, he's just so good and decent. I can't really think of any negative character traits about him. I enjoyed pretty much everything in the movie.

The only thing I had a problem with was why he had to bring the plane down. It just wasn't explained well enough why he needed to, it was like forcing a heroic sacrifice for him. I would've liked it better if the plane was badly damaged and going to crash and he diverted it away and crashed it into the ice. I mean couldn't he have just circled around until they got Stark on the line? I just felt that whole scenario could've been done better.

And one minor thing, at the big battle at the end both sides seemed to be slowing walking towards each other and firing at each other from like 4 feet away, just felt a little odd. Figured they'd use more cover and less 18th century line tactics.

I really liked the whole 'cut off one head, two more take it's place' thing Hydra has going. Now that Red Skull is gone I wonder if the two new heads will be Zemo and Baron Von Strucker for a sequel.

And Red Skull's whole Raiders of the Lost Ark reference at the beginning was awesome!

It looks like they've set up Bucky to be Winter Soldier too, I don't believe for one minute they'll let him stay dead. Not to mention when Steve found him it looked like he was being experimented on, I wonder if they were testing a super solider serum on him too, that would help explain how he could survive.

And no way is Red Skull dead, it looked like the Bifrost teloported him somewhere rather than kill him.

 

I saw Cap yesterday with my 62 year old father and my 5 year old son. We all had a ton of fun. My son was tapping me on the shoulder saying "this movie is awesome!" My dad, I think, enjoyed the movie mostly for the whole patriotic element being a Tea Party sympathizer sort than for it just being Captain America. I think he'd probably be disturbed if I told him how Steve Rogers has stood up for what he believes is right against the US government and was assassinated for it. He'd probably be outraged if he learned what Cap(Bucky) and Falcon had to say about the Tea Party too. Anyway. Moving on.

I'm no flag waving sort, always been more of a flag burning sort really. But this movie was a load of fun and I especially liked Steve's response to the "do you want to kill Nazis" question. Perfect answer and perfect reasoning for standing up to the unjust whoever they may be, wherever they may be, no matter what flag they wave. And the General is right, Rogers' character is just so darn straightforward and decent you cannot dislike the guy. No matter what your perspective may be on the political overtones that the very notion of a guy named "Captain America" might conjure up in your mind.

The only problem I have with the whole premise really is the super soldier serum. It's a super steroid and this guy gets his physique without any work. For some reason I think it would have worked better had he been given this serum that helped him overcome his physiological defects, but had to work for the muscle mass that he ends up with.

A big plus for this movie and my own personal tastes, I have a soft spot for the 1930s-40s era. I'll probably be going to the barber and asking for the "Steve Rogers" and show a picture of a helmet-less Cap. I'd love to see the next attempt at Batman done in the Dark Deco style of B:TAS in live action and for them to take some ideas from the Avengers Cap uniform for how to realize Batman's costume fitting with that setting.

 

I would see that.