This week’s HomeVideodrome podcast finds us debating the pronunciation of the last name of John Cazale, discussing the lovely disposition of Tommy Lee Jones, as well as the goings on at the Austin Film Festival. Of course, we also go through this week’s crop of releases in the most chaotic manner possible. So go listen, and enjoy!
Captain America: The First Avenger is the next step in Marvel’s massive attempt at crafting a cinematic universe for their comic book creations. Marvel’s days of licensing out their characters for stand-alone Hollywood movies are thankfully over, with Jon Favreau’s excellent Iron Man ushering in a new era of comic book moviemaking. The visionary approach taken by Marvel is that with each movie they make, they are crafting a larger mythos, a new universe for their classic characters to play in, not unlike the Ultimates line of comics they launched years ago. We’re getting films less concerned with being stand-alone entities, that instead have more freedom to tie into, reference, and cross over with each other. In other words, this is the way comic book movies should be.
Chris Evans, who previously played a Marvel’s Human Torch in Tim Story’s lackluster Fantastic Four films, fills the boots of Steve Rogers, the scrawny, strong-willed nobody destined to become the Cap himself. With the Nazi menace sweeping Europe, Rogers attempts over and over again to sign up to go fight the good fight for good ol’ Uncle Sam, however his sickly physical attributes consistently result in his rejection. Rogers’ determination to enlist catches the eye of Dr. Abraham Erskine (Stanley Tucci), a German scientist who has found asylum in the U.S., who wants to use the good-hearted Rogers to test his super-soldier serum. The experimental drug turns the scrawny Rogers into a super-man, however he ends up being used as a marketing tool to sell war bonds on the home front under a persona called “Captain America,” rather than fight the enemy at their doorstep. But when one of his best pals gets caught behind enemy lines by a rogue Nazi organization called Hydra, Rogers springs into action on his own, and soon Captain America and his Howling Commandos tear a swath in the European countryside, battling the wicked Johann Schmidt (Hugo Weaving) and his Hydra troops.
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