Review of Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) by Kal X. A — 08 Feb 2016

Joe Johnston struck me as an odd choice for the director of such a crucial Phase One Marvel Cinematic Universe film. I mean, sure he's proved he is a force to be reckoned with via his work bringing the visual effects of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope from concept to finished product, but I had my doubts that he would be able to pull off such an ambitious Marvel film.

However I was pleasantly surprised. Captain America: The First Avenger is still one of my favourite of the Marvel films nearly five years after it's initial release. Last night I decided to review the film for the Disillusioned Observer and sat down through all two hours of it's blu-ray goodness to find that my enthusiasm for the film is still unchanged half a decade later, and for many reasons. The first being is that they couldn't have picked a better actor to portray Captain America than Chris Evans who I first became a fan of due to his role in 2010's The Losers (Journey, anyone?). Evans gives Steve Rogers a perfect degree of the everyman quality which you don't see a lot of in superhero films but also paints Captain America as a loyal man who desperately wants to help his country cast down Hitler and the Nazis.

The second reason is that the rest of the film's cast is exceptionally chosen, specifically Dominic Cooper, Hugo Weaving, and Sebastian Stan as Howard Stark, Johann Schmidt, and Bucky Barnes respectively. My personal favourite character in this film, however, is not any of the aforementioned, nor is it even The Cap, it's Peggy Carter played to perfection by Hayley Atwell to a degree that not only is she one of the best-acted characters in the entire Marvel universe, but she is one of the few heroines in any superhero film I will admit to having a wild crush on for the past five years (yes, way more than Black Widow). Atwell's portrayal of Carter paints her as Captain America's equal, which is something which doesn't occur often in superhero films, and is a welcome change to the damsel-in-distress scenario which was frequently present in films prior to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

The last reason is due to the fact that it's one of the few superhero films to primarily not take place in the modern day. By setting the premise of the film in 1940s wartime America as the story depended heavily upon, Captain America is further set apart from the hundreds of superhero movies which all take place in present day insert-major-city-name-here. It also allows the film to explore the time period from the blatant sexism unfairly experienced by Peggy Carter throughout much of the film to more mundane aspects such as 40s wartime films, expos, and even entertainment aspects such as Rockettes and USO tours.

Many die-hard Marvel fans I know and am friends with don't give this film enough credit, or dismiss it with the piss-poor argument that "there aren't enough big fight scenes," or "it's too slow," to which I say adult-up and let a superhero film have some texture and richer plot. Captain America: The First Avenger is proof of the fruits which come with such a labor.