OHMIGOD IT'S SO GOOD IT'S SO GOOD IT'S SO GOOD.

I spent much of yesterday evening leaning forward with my hands stretched outward behind my back, palms down, telling the fiancée that I was flying like Iron Man.

The whole movie I kept on asking myself: When did Robert Downey, Jr. get how? And why won't he call me?

@moff: Seriously, though, it's really good.

@moff: Isn't it like the funnest thing EVER?!? I swear, I was like, this is like Christmas on top of making out on top of a rollar coaster! Soooo good!

@contradicto: um. . . hot. Sorry, he seriously got me flustered.

@CodePink: YES! Tony Stark could show a certain Gotham City resident what "billionaire playboy" is supposed to mean. And the flying. OMG the flying. And the shooting. And everything else.

@moff: You so did not, as I was clearly Iron Man, with my hands at my sides whizzing past F16's like a missile shot out of heaven, while they scrambled unsuccessfully to stop me. Training accident, indeed.

Oh, yeah. It was great. (Missed the sneak peek at the end. Boo!)

@moff: Seriously, and RD JR. can mumble anything and it sounds like the coolest thing ever.
(Also, I'm scared that this super duper success is going to make him do drugs again because tragic people are like that.)

The 98 .rar files I downloaded containing this movie look awesome!

@CodePink: This is also my fear. The Less Than Zero days were frighteningly tragic, even if they were acted geniusly

Dang, I didn't stay through the credits. I was trying to beat the crowd to Chevys.

Also! Are all Vanity Fair writers like the one Leslie Bibb played here?

P.S.
Yes, I liked the film VERY VERY much.

Is this Robert Downey Jr's Jack Sparrow? Has another 80s teen star become an accidental box office phenomenon? Is it possible to snort coke off the end of a Peoples Choice Award?

Avery Brooks would've been a much better Nick Fury.

@Gregoire: Yes. Yes. Yes, because RDJ is just that good.

@Gregoire: yes, yes, and absolutely if you turn it on its side.

@hummingpenguin: damn slow Gawker comments!

@CodePink: If he does spiral out of control again, I hope he at least isn't wearing the suit when it happens, because that would be really dangerous. Also, I hope he breaks into my house and falls asleep there.

@koala325: She was hot in a way that made me want to have sex with her very, very badly.

@Gregoire: Like Johnny Depp, he's kind of better known as an offbeat fantastic actor than an '80s teen star, you know.

@moff:
a-greed.

also, it is now officially cool to respond to any statement of "Well, I don't know..."

with, "Tony Stark built it in a cave!"

@moff: Which brings me to my prediction for Iron Man 2: Tony Stark drunk-driving the suit, with upsetting, possibly tragic, results.

(Please note that my previous Iron Man prediction, which I made well over a year ago, almost panned out.)

Mmmm, I couldn't help but admire RDJ's guns (the muscley kind, not the pew-pew kind). I realize they are probably the result of hours of obsessive-compulsive, addiction-replacing, 2 AM, more-like-self-punishment-than-self-improvement workouts. But oh my -- I do admire the results.

Gwynnie, on the other hand, almost ruined it for me. I could accept the flying metal man and the intelligent Vanity Fair reporter and all the other comic-book absurdities -- but NO WAY does a woman in 4 inch fuck me pumps and 3 pairs of Spanx run for her life across those criss-crossy reactor grid platforms. I call BS.

@moff: @moff:

I'd also like to share some fried calamari with her, if you know what I mean.

@koala325: Chevy's was soooo crowded.

@moff: On a scale of 1 to 10, how good was RTJr, and how often does he actually get to speak? I'm afraid to see the movie because I'm afraid it will involve him spending all of his time in that machine, not talking?

Also, am not a fan of the Paltrow. Is she annoying or ok?

@Helman: Um, RD Jr.

@Helman: He was a 9, and I only give him a 9 because I try to save my 10s for situations where my eyes have actually been blown out of their sockets. Honestly, though, his dialogue is just as compelling as everything he does in the suit.

Gwyneth is great in the parts where she has to be dryly witty, which are most of them. She really is not good at looking scared and running. As my lady put it, she just kind of does an easy jog away from whatever's exploding at her. She's certainly no dealbreaker.

@contradicto: I was doing that too. I was just so terribly confused. Maybe it was the ILM guys. Except for the moustache. It was extremely bothersome to me that he had a patched shaved under his nose. I don't know why.

But there was that part where he was all pale and sweaty and I felt a little reassured that the old RDJ was in there.

But it was awesome. Awesome Awesome. I'm not even pissed by the fact that it was basically a 2 hour Act I for the Iron Man series. I just want my own robots to dress me in the morning.

@VirusWithShoes: You live in the future, don't you?

@moff: The thought I had was, This movie will make people like Gwyneth again.

I loved it. It raised the bar, for sure. I loved the party with the stewardesses on the private plane, and the stripper pole.

@moff: Was it better than Batman (the most recent, obviously)? How so? I was too hung over yesterday or I'd know the answer.

@Koreanish: I know! I wanted to mention that part but didn't want to spoil it for anyone who hasn't seen it. But now that the onus is on you... The thing is that you want to be Tony Stark long before he even puts on the suit, and not solely because of his billions of dollars.

Honestly, as I just emailed a friend, it was the best popcorn flick I can recall in recent memory. The perfect mix of light and dark.

@Helman:

David Denby pretty much hated the movie...but I thought his, uh, thoughts on RD Jr were interesting...

[www.newyorker.com]

@fiveinchtaint: It would be hard to conclusively say it was better, but I thought the story was a little better laid out, and it certainly wasn't as dark. I know that's just a function of the respective characters, but you get just as much whooping and hollering with Iron Man, none of the doom and gloom, and a lot more laughs. That said, the darker parts, just because they're set in Afghanistan, do leave you feeling appropriately unsettled. My inner liberal was disturbed at seeing brown people get blown up, even if these particular brown people totally deserved it.

@koala325: Good God. Denby's comments about the waterboarding were exactly the sort of thing that makes people use the phrase "New York liberal" disparagingly. The whole point of that scene wasn't that the brown bad guys are actually the terrible people and we're so great -- it was a bit of irony, showing the great American capitalist being treated as atrociously as his fellows had treated so many other people. I mean, they couldn't have made the "Tony Stark's past comes back to haunt him" theme much more blatant without it turning into Syriana or Babel or some shit.

(Please note that I have never seen Syriana or Babel.)

@koala325: Wow. Quite high praise from DD.

@moff: Ugh, and I haven't been able to stand Gwyneth lately. But there I am sitting there thinking awe, isn't she good. And thinking that Downey might actually have some talent and not just know where the bodies are buried. I'M SO CONFUSED!!!!

Oh, and beeteedubs, that robot of his with the fire extinguisher was so the great grandson of the one from Short Circuit. Loved him.

@moff:
Yeah, I think Denby saw a different movie than the rest of us. And "Good God" was the exact thing I said after reading his review (after I saw the movie...)

Anyway, can't wait for Ed Koch's review in The Villager.

I went to see Iron Man on the Upper West Side at 4:10 Saturday afternoon, but it was sold out. So I bought a ticket to see it at 7:20 instead. It was also crowded. The audience already seemed to know the characters. The reviewer in the Times said good things about this movie...

@koala325: Ha! Awesome.

@Hipp:

Ok, let me switch into my comic book geek persona here for a minute. Having Samuel L. Jackson play Nick Fury is an in-joke for comic book nerds. In the Marvel book The Ultimates, Nick Fury is drawn looking EXACTLY like Sam Jackson, and has been for years. Nick Fury is the head of S.H.I.E.L.D. (as seen in the movie) and, eventually, is the person who puts together The Avengers (Marvel's premiere super-team - like the Justice League is for DC). Iron Man is a founding member of The Avengers. The Hulk also becomes a member, along with Hawkeye, Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver, The Wasp, Captain America, and Thor.

@Smirk: You say in-joke. I say, homage-as-casting-pitch, with the story auditioning for Samuel L. instead of the other way around. It looks like Sam said yes.

I think some people in the audience came when he said Avengers.

@Koreanish:
Yes, which again confirms that Samuel L. is all kinds of awesome.