THIS AIN’T NO SHRINKING VIOLET: ANT-MAN REVIEW (SPOILERS MAYBE)
Going into ANT-MAN, I had pretty low expectations. After a decade of it being in development, Edgar Wright decided to leave the film a month before shooting (We won’t go into details). This didn’t exactly make me want to run to the theatres to go watch this. But, what I got was a vibrant and exciting entry into the Marvel Cinematic Universe that has more in common with the first Iron Man movie than any other in their film catalogue.
In this adaptation of the comic book character, Paul Rudd takes on the role of the Ant-Man. He is Scott Lang, a cat burglar who was recently released from jail and who wants to start a relationship with his daughter who’s life he has missed out on due to his crimes. His ex-wife (The great Judy Greer who basically just plays mothers in movies now) doesn’t want him around until he can pay child support and get his life back on track, so he turns back to his old life of crime so he can be able to afford it.
This starts the hilarious and action packed set of events (some described in detail by the brilliant Michael Peña) where Scott is lead to steal a special suit from Michael Douglas’ Hank Pym. Pym is a retired Scientist/Super Hero, who created a suit that lets one shrink to the size of an insect (or Ant) and then grow back to normal size at the push of a button. He left SHIELD in the 80s when it became clear the government and others wanted to use his technology for warfare and has been hiding the suit since. Pym’s protégé, Corey Stoll’s Darren Cross, took over the company he started, and is now close to achieving a similar shrinking technological breakthrough.
Pym, worried about the future of the world, uses the help of Scott (Paul Rudd) to help steal it from a heavily guarded research facility with the help of his daughter and Scott’s friends. His daughter Hope, played by Evangeline Lilly, trains Scott for the assault on the lab, and it leads to a final heist that involves a lot of teamwork from even the smallest of characters.
I will not go into further detail of the plot, but there is a small cameo from one of the newer Avengers, and there are some cool little easter eggs in here for the fans. The main thing though, is the fact that this is probably one of the smallest MARVEL films to date. There aren’t any cities in real danger here, except for a couple of research facilities and a house, the destruction is at a minimum, which is a nice change to the comic book movie proceedings.
Paul Rudd is great in this, putting his stamp on the leading man thing that Chris Pratt did so well last year. I hope we get to see more from him in this instance. We already know that Scott Lang will be in the next Captain America film (I am going to enjoy this laid back portrayal when he meets the uptight superheroes of the Avengers) , so we know that this will not just be a one movie deal, there may not be an ANT-MAN 2, but the character and perhaps his friends will be in other films to come.
Michael Douglas was far more important than what I thought he would be as Hank Pym the original ANT-MAN. In fact you would say that he is the co-lead of this film, as his story drives the film along and forcing the much more laid back character of Scott Lang to proceed along. The fact that both characters mirror each other’s Daughter issues also helps in identifying that these two characters could work and motivate each other.
Evangeline Lilly has the harder role, as Hope Pym, the daughter of Hank Pym, she has to hate/dislike both Hank Pym and Scott Lang (for various reasons) but at the same time be likable enough to root for (check out the post credits sequence) we will definitely see more of her in films to come.
Finally, the crew (Michael Peña, David Dastmachian, and T.I.) they create a comedy sidekick crew who work as Scott Lang’s personal cheerleaders as well as the tech and muscle behind his life of crime. Michael Peña is the secret weapon of this film, bringing the biggest laughs with him, this is great coming from an actor with such solid drama credits.
Marvel movies have been hitting it out of the park for a few years and going into this I was worried that this would be their biggest failure (this may still be the case as we are still only in our first week) but at least what they brought is still a fun, funny, great movie that is entertaining not just for fans, but for the more casual movie goer.
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