IRON MAN 3 Review

The biggest problem with "Iron Man 3" is that it doesn't feel like an "Iron Man" movie. Under the new helm of writer/director Shane Black, best known for writing "Lethal Weapon" and collaborating with Robert Downey, Jr. on "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang," there's a new level of manic energy that's hard to place. He co-wrote the script with Drew Pearce which is full of material for Downey, Jr. to chew on as the sardonic smart-ass Tony Stark. There's no doubt he brings his A-game, spurting off one-liners and verbal sparring that's fun and infectious. It's just too bad everything else about this Marvel outing is pure cash grab, a hold-over until the real sequel arrives.

But that also doesn't stop an onslaught of other Marvel outings we'll be seeing later this year and next, too. "Thor: The Dark World" and "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" are both on their way, part of the second Marvel wave before the second act, the main attraction that is "The Avengers 2." This Iron Man outing serves more as a sequel to "The Avengers" than actually "Iron Man 2" itself. The characters reference the incidence in New York, the opening of an alien wormhole in the sky at the conclusion of Joss Whedon's extravaganza. Still reeling from it, Tony Stark is unstable, not sleeping, suffering from panic attacks and working on endless replicas of his metal suit.

The Mickey Rourke-Sam Rockwell villain combo from "Iron Man 2" may not have been the strongest, but at least it wasn't the lame-brained concoction the Mandarin (played with exuberance by Ben Kingsley) is. He is the face of an entire terrorist manifesto, which is meant to be the core of the film's darker storyline as represented in the trailers. But once the plot begins peeling away the layers of Mandarin's evil and introduces a mad scientist named Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce), logic gets thrown to the wind, and the nationwide threat becomes borderline farcical. Devolving into a jarring mix of quippy humor and shocking violence, the movie is tonally all over the place.

Once the action gets underway, some of these sequences are great. The total annihilation of Tony Stark's cliffside Malibu house is thrilling as is the highly-teased free-fall sequence out of Air Force One as Iron Man soars through the sky to catch an improbable number of people. These harrowing scenes, however, are wasted in a screenplay that instead chooses to take Tony Stark to the heart of middle America to meddle around with some young boy. Luckily the temptation of sentimentality is avoided as Stark is consistently snarky and shooting the boy down every chance he gets. Still, the whole second act is a weird diversion when more important characters should be getting screen time.

Don Cheadle's Rhodes has a newly re-branded Iron Patriot that gets minimal use while Gwyneth Paltrow's once sweet and charming Pepper Potts bursts onto the scene as her own form of superhero looking more bronzed, more ripped and sporting only a sports bra for the film's climactic battle: an onslaught of clashing metal reminiscent of a "Transformers" movie. Shane Black does have fun with new twists in the Stark technology having individual pieces of the suit remote-controlled and soaring onto the body of different characters -- Rhodes and Potts included.

But what more is there to say? What once started as a strong and promising franchise has turned into another perfunctory cog in the Marvel machine with this threequel. The ending credits tease that Tony Stark will return, and we can only hope that's referring to the next "Avengers" and not "Iron Man 4."

FLIGHT Review

Robert Zemeckis hasn't directed a live-action movie since "Cast Away," so how perfect that 12 years later he's at the helm of "Flight" whose centerpiece is a harrowing 20-minute airplane crash sequence. Nothing tops the FedEx flight disaster in the 2000 Tom Hanks vehicle, but this certainly comes close in its heart-pounding detail and claustrophobic point-of-view placing us right in the cockpit. After escaping stormy weather and turbulence, the plane suffers a mechanical failure sending it into an irreversible nose dive. The fear evoked in the lead flight attendant (Tamara Tunie) and young co-pilot (Brian Geraghty) is a contrast to the calm, level-headed demeanor of pilot Whip Whitacker (Denzel Washington) who rolls the aircraft upside-down to maintain its altitude in a gut-instinct decision.

Hours prior to this very flight, we see Whip hungover in a hotel room. Beer and liquor bottles scatter the room, and he fights on the phone with his ex-wife while a naked woman dresses beside the bed. To jolt himself back to life from his grogginess, he sniffs two lines of cocaine and throws on his dark aviator sunglasses to portray a man completely in control. It's a facade, though, as Whip is a man who's completely lost control, and playing this tortured soul gives Denzel Washington his most hypnotic and powerful dramatic performance in years. And Zemeckis, who recently turned his efforts exclusively toward stop-motion animation ("Beowulf," "The Polar Express"), hasn't lost the ability to draw performances from great actors.

Whip glides the plane with 102 passengers on board into a crash-landing in a vacant field holding nothing but a small church. Only six die in the crash, and to those who don't know Whip personally, he's hailed as a hero. No other pilot could've landed the plane the way he did, and crash simulators following the event prove this. The fact remains, however, that Whip was intoxicated. An investigation from a federal organization goes underway with Whip under close scrutiny. The film, against expectation, is smart in not devolving into mere procedural. Instead, it continues as a brooding and intense character study with phenomenal supporting turns to accompany.

Retreating to seclusion at his grandfather's farm, Whip dumps all remaining alcohol in his possession. He realizes the plane crash was his wake-up call; his opportunity to turn his life around. When his union representative (Bruce Greenwood) and lawyer (Don Cheadle) turn up, however, with the bad news of Whip's toxicology report, whether Whip can stay above the influence of his past behavior or continue his downward spiral comes into question. During his stay in the hospital, Whip meets a drug-addicted woman named Nicole (Kelly Reilly); just when you think it'll be him who saves her, she attends AA on her own, and her disappointment in Whip trumps her ability to help him.

And if John Goodman is to be nominated this year, it should be for his role here (over "Argo") as Whip's drug guru, Harling Mays, who channels the Dude from "The Big Lebowski." He arrives at a crucial moment when Whip is held overnight in a hotel room before the morning of his hearing. In only two scenes, he steals the show injecting the movie with dark humor. Likewise, Melissa Leo commands the screen during another pivotal single scene. A bold claim can be made for ensemble of the year here.

"Flight" is about a man battling his inner demons, and the screenplay from "Real Steel" scribe John Gatins doesn't tell us how to view, or judge, Whip. The film nears perfection, but then backs off at the last minute. It gives Whip the easy option, the nicely wrapped epilogue. Such tumultuous proceedings should've been left more open-ended, not so easily solvable; give Denzel Washington's acting more credit. His impending Oscar nomination proves it.