The recent release of The Avengers was important for many reasons. Rabidly anticipated by millions of fanboys and fangirls around the world, Joss Whedon’s superhero extravaganza kicked off the summer with a bang, earning an astounding $207.4 million weekend gross, an all-time domestic box office record that made it the first movie ever to earn over $200 million in its opening weekend. It raised the bar for a summer already bursting with high expectations.
All these movies in the same season? Plus this?
The movie gods have truly blessed us.
Avengers’ success is not just about the
numbers, though. To start with, it was a pretty damn great movie, one of the
precious few to actually live up to all the hype surrounding it. Going in, you
pretty much know what you’re going to get: awesome one-liners, a shitload of
special effects and explosions, perhaps some psychological angst thrown in here
and there and a bombastic, grand score courtesy of Alan Silvestri. Yet, I was
surprised by the one thing that stuck with me most as I exited the buzzing,
sold-out theater: the acting. As enjoyable and kick-ass as the action and humor
were, what I think elevated the film from being merely serviceable to being
genuinely good was the quality of the cast and the devotion paid to character
development by both the actors and writer/director Joss Whedon.
Marvel
superhero movies are generally thought to be ridiculous, “mindless” fun,
particularly compared to the moody grimness of, say, the new Batman films.
They’re essentially your prototypical summer blockbusters, but despite this
reputation, the best ones (which, along with The Avengers, are, I think, the first Iron Man and Captain America:
The First Avenger) work not
because they flaunt the most eye-popping weaponry or feature the greatest
amount of property damage, but because they cut through all that noise and
build substantial, nuanced characters.
One of the
most daunting issues facing The Avengers
was the task of giving a decent amount of screentime to each of its six (seven,
if you count Loki) lead characters. Luckily for us, they managed to pull it
off, in part thanks to some smart writing and direction from Whedon and a
pretty hefty running time. However, the majority of the credit, I feel, belongs
to the charismatic and flat-out talented ensemble cast. From Robert Downey Jr.
to Scarlett Johansson, each actor gives you a real sense of his or her
character’s background and personality and the inner psychological and
emotional turmoil they’re all experiencing throughout the movie. Whether it’s
Chris Evans conveying Cap’s loneliness and disillusionment through distant,
vaguely clouded gray eyes, Mark Ruffalo wringing his hands as the withdrawn,
mild-mannered Bruce Banner or Tom Hiddleston perfecting a self-satisfied smirk
as Loki, the movie’s diabolical yet bizarrely sympathetic villain, they
masterfully but effortlessly anchor a story that might otherwise have gotten
lost in over-the-top cartoonishness. Furthermore, their chemistry as a group is
undeniable.
Of course, The Avengers isn’t the first blockbuster
to feature quality acting. Though many seem to consider actors and characters
as nothing more than props to accessorize massive action sequences, high-budget
franchise movies that boast strong acting are not nearly as rare as it might
seem. To name a few relatively recent examples, The Lord of the Rings, The
Dark Knight, Inception, the Harry Potter films and the Star Trek reboot all featured
performances as commendable as those in any quiet art house drama.
Accolades
for these performances, however, are far and few in-between. There seems to be a feeling, at least within
critics or more serious film-lovers circles, that these actors, like the movies
they star in, are somehow unworthy of prestige or genuine critical praise. Of
the twenty performances nominated for an Oscar this past year, only five
(Rooney Mara for The Girl with the Dragon
Tattoo, Melissa McCarthy for Bridesmaids
and Viola Davis, Jessica Chastain and Octavia Spencer, all for The Help) were for movies that grossed
over $100 million, and none came from films that could even remotely be
considered special effects-heavy. It was the same case, minus Rooney Mara, with
the Screen Actors Guild awards, that annual celebration of thespians that
somehow comes off as even more self-congratulatory than the zillion other
awards ceremonies; with only an occasional exception, the most a summer
blockbuster can hope for is a nomination for Outstanding Performance by a Stunt
Ensemble. The last time any actor got serious awards consideration for a
mainstream summer blockbuster was Christoph Waltz for the indelible role of
Hans Landa in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious
Basterds in 2009 (and, granted, he got a lot of consideration), though if that’s still a bit too
artsy for you, you’d have to go back to 2008 with Heath Ledger for The Dark Knight.
Individual
performances in action- or special effects-oriented movies only seem to receive
recognition under special circumstances. Ledger’s Oscar, of course, came
posthumously, and as much as he still would’ve deserved it, it’s depressingly
easy to imagine that he wouldn’t have gotten nearly as much attention if he had
still been alive. Christoph Waltz portrayed a Nazi, and everyone knows the
Academy and all those other institutions that hand out awards at the end of
each year are suckers for anything Holocaust-related.
Except, maybe, this.
Standout
performances in blockbusters are treated as rarities, worthy of praise despite their
genre and the movie’s use of visual effects.
Imagine a
world, though, where Andy Serkis getting an Oscar campaign for his performance
as Gollum in The Lord of the Rings: The
Two Towers wouldn’t generate articles like this one (as
thought-provoking as it is), where Alan Rickman’s work as Snape in Harry Potter wouldn’t be automatically
dismissed just because he’s waving a wand and the cast of The Avengers would have just as good a chance as the cast of Steven
Spielberg’s upcoming Abraham Lincoln biopic at garnering a SAG Best Ensemble
Cast nomination. I, for one, don’t think that sounds too bad.
And if you disagree, you'll have to take it up with this guy.
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