Saturday, May 5, 2012

The Avengers (IMAX 3D)

My fellow nerds, this the moment we've all been waiting for! After all these years and several individual movies, The Avengers is finally here. I've so been looking forward to this, but in the back of my mind, I worried how they were going to fit all those superheroes into one movie. Turns out, there was no need to worry. They somehow found a way to make it work and created an amazing movie.

I'll only give a bried summary of the plot since I'll spoil things if I say too much. By the way, you don't necessarily have to have seen Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, etc. in order to see The Avengers, but it certainly helps and I highly recommend that you do anyway. So basically, Loki (Thor's adopted brother) has made a deal with some sort of powerful alien race- if they give him an army to help take over Earth then he will give them the Tesseract, a cube shaped object with an unlimited energy source. In other words, all hell is about to break loose. So Nick Fury (played by the amazing and badass Samuel L. Jackson), the director of S.H.I.E.L.D, brings together all the heroes we've seen in the individual movies over the last few years- Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo, who replaces Edward Norton), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Captain America (Chris Evans), Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), and Black Widow (Scarlett Johanson, whom I'm normally not really a fan of but I think she does a great job in this). They'll need all of them in order to stop Loki and his army.

The director of The Avengers is Joss Whedon, probably best known for being the creator/writer of one of my all time favorite tv shows, Buffy The Vampire Slayer (a rare case where the tv show is better than the movie it's based on). I knew if anyone could pull this movie off, he would. And boy does he.

The budget was over $200 million which is insane, but they definitely put it to good use. The special effects were some of the best I've seen in a long time. I especially liked what they did with The Hulk. They used the same type of performance capture technology that was in Avatar. So Mark Ruffalo was actually able to perform in those scenes and not just do the voice later on in a recording studio as I beleive was the case in the previous versions of The Hulk.

This movie is nonstop action that keeps you on the edge of your seat from the moment it starts until the credits roll. Never for one second was I bored.

As far as the characters go... well, what can I say that hasn't already been said a million times? Outstanding work by everyone involved. Joss Whedon made sure each one of them had enough screen time (which was my main concern about this movie) and a chance to shine. I still don't know how he managed to do it. My favorite moments were when the team was first being assembled. Grouping all those heroes together, personalities will clash. There's an awesome fight sequence between Iron Man and Thor in the woods.

There were several funny moments throughout, many of them involving Samuel L. Jackson who was one of my favorite parts about this movie. I found myself laughing til my stomach hurt.

The 3D was really good overall. Worth the extra money. Definitely see this in IMAX too if you can. This is the kind of movie IMAX was made for. Good luck getting tickets this weekend though. Most of the showings at the theater I went to last night were sold out. The people at the showing I was at were nice though. Had a chance to talk to some of them while we waited in a VERY long line to get in. It was a lot of fun and I felt comfortable, like I belonged lol. During the movie we were all very energetic, but no one was obnoxious from what I could tell.

Be sure to arrive early, not only to get a good seat, but they show the latest trailer for The Dark Knight Rises (which I've watched several times on my iPhone since it came out a few days ago, but seeing it on an IMAX screen I was like :o :o ). It was incredible. Everyone in the crowd sat there in silence as it played. It was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. And then when it was over, everyone cheered and applauded. I've seen that happen after a movie (as everyone did again after The Avengers was over), but this was the first time I've seen it happen for a trailer. It was great! Moving on...

If you're at all familiar with the Marvel movies (and even if you're not I'm just letting you know) then you know what I'm about to say- make sure you stay through the credits!! And I mean until the end of the credits. There's actually two scenes that they play, one in the middle (which seems to set up a sequel. I really hope they make one) and one at the very end which is priceless :)

Brilliant. Amazing. Jaw dropping. These are the words that come to mind when I think of The Avengers. I really have nothing bad to say about it. It's easily one of my favorite movies this year so far.

Thank you Joss Whedon! Fir creating an Avengers movie that was way more than I could've ever hoped for.

My Rating: 10/10