Captain America
isn’t just the first Avenger, he’s the first Marvel character to get a
complete, fully functional movie. The superhero studio’s had its successes, but
none of those successes have ever had the stem to stern finished feeling of
this one. The original Iron Man is a lot of fun, but the second half is a
little less fun than the first. Thor has great characters, but sometimes seems
a little light on story. All of the studio’s other films have worked in spite
of some flaw, some glaring misstep which the better parts must overcome to
varying results. Not Captain America. This is stem to stern, an honest to god
film. Not a bunch of great characters in a weak script. Not a good idea with
nowhere to go. Not an advertisement for some upcoming franchise connection. The
First Avenger is a movie and a good one.
Maybe it works
so well because it’s also the first Marvel movie that doesn’t feel as though it
set out to be a superhero movie. Captain America is less interested in its
character’s super powers than in what it took for him to get them and how he’ll
use them. When it comes to Cap’s abilities, the movie barely discusses them. If
Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) spends any time after his transformation from
scrawny wannabe to mega-muscled hunk on testing the limits of his new
abilities, we never see it. Instead the movie starts by showing us who Steve
Rogers is, and then once it transforms him, focuses entirely on showing us the
man he’s become.
When we meet
him Steve isn’t a hero. He’s too little even to be a soldier, let alone a
heroic one. The special effects used here to turn buff Chris Evans into a
diminutive midget, are nothing short of stunning. Though America is in the
midst of World War II and desperate for warm bodies to fill out uniforms, Steve
is so small and weak that he’s repeatedly rejected by the draft board. They
don’t want a 90-pound weakling with chronic asthma, but Dr. Abraham Erskine
does. Played with gentle wisdom by Stanley Tucci, Erskine recruits Rogers for a
super soldier experiment he’s conducting with the army. Erskine believes that
only a weak man knows the true value of strength and gambles that giving it to
Steve will only make him a better man. It does.
Chris Evans
plays Rogers with a sort of earnestly serious, gee-whiz determination before
his transformation, and the really interesting thing about his performance is
how much Steve remains that same man even after he’s pumped up and put in his
costume. First Avenger keeps Steve’s road rocky, no matter that he’s given
power beyond that of normal men, life remains a struggle. Inside he’s still the
little guy who keeps getting knocked down but refuses to stay down. Captain
America’s real strength isn’t in his arms or in his ability to throw his
shield, it’s in his ability to keep getting back up, to keep going, no matter
the cost.
Eventually
Captain America ends up in the thick of World War II, fighting a Nazi
splinter-group headed by a nefarious super villain. These Nazis have mastered
technology beyond the normal Hitler loyalist, and calling themselves Hydra,
they run around blasting Allied troops with laser guns. Don’t let that throw
you. Cap’s on a collision course with their leader Red Skull (Hugo Weaving) and
along the way Johnston blasts fast-paced, but infinitely watchable action
sequences across the screen. If there’s any complaint here, it’s that he
doesn’t spend more time on them. Some of Cap’s earlier exploits end up being
reduced to a highlight reel, in which we watch him blowing up Hydra
installations. It’s a testament to just how good that reel is, I suppose, that
you’ll want more of it. When the movie settles down to really let an action
scene develop though, it truly soars, and does it in fairly simple fashion.
After a summer watching superheroes with power rings and mutant mental
abilities, there’s something refreshing about watching a guy defend truth and
justice with only his fists and big chunk of American metal.
That First
Avenger looks glorious is only a bonus. Johnston puts the period specific
skills he learned making movies like The Rocketeer to good use here, mixing a
dizzying array of World War II era iconic imagery with sci-fi strangeness.
Maybe the movie could have used a little more 1942 and a little less magic cube
from outer space, but the movie is in a sense beholden to its genre. Johnston’s
film works with that and at times thrives in it. The movie’s filled with great
little nods connecting to other Marvel movies, part of the studios effort to
bring their characters together in one, big team-up movie called The Avengers
next year, but none of that ever gets in the way of creating a self-contained
film. Those knowing nods will go unnoticed to the uninitiated with no
ill-effect while blowing the circuits of anyone who’s seen Thor. Captain
America is a movie, not just a Marvel movie. Yet when the movie ends with an
after-credits advertisement for The Avengers, it feels less like a trailer than
it does the perfect capper on an epic movie watching experience.
In an era where
we’re obsessed with dark and brooding superheroes, director Joe Johnston’s
Captain America is a breath of fresh air. He reminds us that superheroes don’t
have to be dark and disturbed to be interesting, they don’t need cracks and
flaws to earn our affection, they don’t have to be alien gods or magic
motorcycle riding demons. Captain America in his own simple way embodies much
of what's noble and good about humanity. That’s not boring, it’s awesome.
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