Mr. Adam WarRock (Euge Ahn) says it best, I think. Cap was an amazingly fun film and worth the watch, especially after watching the depressing (but pretty good) Harry Potter finale.

To director Joe Johnston: while it is not the Rocketeer 2 that I was hoping would happen, it is so god-damned close! Probably my favourite Avengers-tied film to date.

suitwithsneakers:

1. For about thirty minutes, Captain America is a perfect movie. I know that sounds hyperbolic, but for what it attempts to do, saddled with the historical import of the source material and the general cliches and service that comic book movies are forced to do, it accomplishes these with a flourish that warrants a soaring kind of emotional response. Steve Rogers represents the best in all of us, a kind of ideal vision of people, of what true strength and personal value could be worth in a better world. You want to cheer for him, because you want to believe that good people will always conquer evil, and that the gift of strength to a man who already has such courage and valor would create a hero worthy of our most optimistic vision of America. This movie makes you believe that, so much to the point that when (spoiler?) the grenade scene happens early in the movie, I honestly wanted to start crying, I was just so…damn….happy. 

2. The rest of the movie, while nowhere near as good as that first act, is a totally fun romp. I made the remark to Chris Haley, who I saw the movie with, that it was the worst war movie I’d ever seen, and yet, the fact that it decided to focus so much on the superficial attempts to be a war movie is what made it a special superhero movie. There weren’t people flying around shooting beams out of their hands, Cap isn’t a guy who can level buildings and lift tanks. It’s grounded in enough reality, that the stakes are realistic enough to give the movie some weight. I mean sure, there were cheesy moments, but it’s a movie about a guy named Captain America. The cheese is good, on top of your very substantial freedom fries. 

3. My only criticism is that the movie is COMPLETELY montage-happy. I mean, sure, there are going to be montages in an action movie, it’s just going to happen. But maybe the only time the movie dipped into a “are you fuckin’ kidding me” moment was the early montage about the Red Skull’s origin. Badly executed, but luckily it was over quickly enough that it didn’t really matter. 

4. So much to love about Howard Stark. The moment (spoiler) that he gets at the end, where he’s deadset on finding Cap in the waters was not only a lovely character moment, it was a beautifully acted piece by Dominic Cooper, who probably studied some of RDJ’s Tony Stark, as he had that same intense stare, the kind of all-business, everything-else-fades-away concentration that we’ve seen in the Iron Man movies. Playing off of the Tony/Cap relationship that’s formed in modern Marvel continuity, it was maybe the first true time that I felt like we were in an Avengers world, not just a single character’s world. 

5. This movie was the perfect table setter for the Avengers. The movie was dominated by cycles, loops, a sense of inevitability in knowing where Cap would end up, and seeing him get there and enjoying all the small, lovely moments in between. In the same vein, we’ve known where all these characters would end up: Stark with SHIELD, Banner brought back from being on the run, Thor’s return from Asgard, and now Cap’s emergence from the ice. We’ve had five movies in this world, setting the table for what will be a gigantic Hollywood event in 2012, and I’ve always sort of had the premonition that it would never really work, that it would disappoint, that it’s not going to be what I want it to be. Seeing Captain America: The First Avenger, as I stood up from my seat, for the first time, I said to myself, “Yeah…this is going to work. And it’s going to be fucking awesome.” I have no more doubts. I am ready. 

U-S-A! U-S-A!