FilmSnobReviews

Title: Captain America: The First Avenger
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Director: Joe Johnston
Starring: Chris Evans, Hayley Atwell, Hugo Weaving
Runtime: 2 hours 1 minute

What it is? Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) is a man who so badly only wants to do one thing…serve and protect the country he loves. However Rogers doesn’t fit the bill of a U.S. soldier, not one needed to serve in WWII anyways. He’s too skinny, too slow, too weak, and is asthmatic. All these things make Rogers less then ideal for the goal he wishes to accomplish. However Dr. Abraham Erskine has been coordinating  with the United States army to assist in building an army of “super” soldiers. Erskine helps get Rogers into the program, and eventually ends up picking Rogers as the man for the job at the behest of  Col. Chester Phillips (Tommy Lee Jones). However during the experiment on Rogers a Nazi spy shoots and kills Erskine. A newly superfied Rogers uses said abilities to catch a capture the culprit. However Erskine’s work died with him, and now America faces their biggest challenge Nazi pseudo-scientist and head of HYDRA Johann Schmidt aka The Red Skull (Weaving) is planning on using powers beyond belief to take over the world starting with winning the war, not for Germany but himself. To stop him the U.S. instills a new hero…Captain America.

What We Think? This is THEE superhero movie to see this summer. Captain America: TFA does a great job of staying rooted in reality, but at the same time making comic book magic happen on screen. Evans pushes Rogers into all the right places while Weaving is as villainous and cunning as ever as the evil doer  Skull. Perhaps the boldest choice was relative unknown Hayley Atwell in the role of Rogers’ love interest Peggy Carter. Johnston hit a homerun casting Lee Jones as Col. Phillips whenever he’s on screen there’s a memorable line happening. Compared to Thor which we gave a solid B+ Captain America manages to be even better, it’s quite frankly the best superhero movie since The Dark Knight. While not as concerned with prose, and lackg TDK’s dark sensibilities the fun, and thrills within the thin script more then make the 2 hours fly by.

Our Grade: A, It’s not perfect, far from it. But for a superhero movie it’s the best one to come about in a LONG time. Strong cast, and a fun story make up for the weak script, and often forced special effects. The enthusiasm and high spirit are strong here, and I can only hope The Avengers is as good as this film.