Just how cool is Robert Downey, Jr? A guy I never much cared for: for all his talent, there was a foppish smarm that was always there, an insouciance that undermined, at least for me, his roles. Then there were his drug addictions, incarcerations; he fell away. Cut to Iron Man, the surprisingly solid superhero flick now raking in truckloads of cash: he's just the right age, time and trouble have weathered ever so slightly his face, a boyishness is gone. There's
a laconic ease to his delivery, a droll way which was always his specialty but all the same was never exactly authentic. He's an unbelievably inspired choice to play Tony Stark, billionaire weapons manufacturer and future alcoholic. After Spiderman 3's embarrassing flame-out, Iron Man, a character with nowhere near the recognition as Spidey, Tony Stark has caught on in the public imagination. Without Robert Downey, Jr, that ain't happening.
***
Saturday. Carrollton. Yeah.
About Me
- Paul
- Paul Guest is the author of four volumes of poetry and a memoir. His debut, The Resurrection of the Body and the Ruin of the World, was awarded the 2002 New Issues Poetry Prize. His second collection, Notes for My Body Double, was awarded the 2006 Prairie Schooner Book Prize. His third collection, My Index of Slightly Horrifying Knowledge, was published by Ecco Press/HarperCollins in 2008. His fourth collection, Because Everything Is Terrible, was published by Diode Editions. His poems have appeared in Harper's, The Paris Review, Poetry, Tin House, The Kenyon Review, and elsewhere. His memoir, One More Theory About Happiness, was published by Ecco in May 2010 and selected for the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Program. The recipient of a 2011 Guggenheim Fellowship and a 2007 Whiting Writers' Award, Guest lives in Charlottesville, Virginia.
5 comments:
I loved it, too. I've always been so-so on RDJ, but he's really amazing in this. Did you stay for the hidden scene after the credits?
I did. That was pretty cool. 2010 will be cool.
I have had much the same feeling about him over the years, and yet when I saw him in Zodiac, he seemed somehow changed. I haven't seen Iron Man yet, but plan to.
Seriously?
I LOVE him. Ever since "Chaplin". Despite his "stuff" in the past. Brilliant actor.
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