Is Iron Man 2 an escapist, crowd-pleasing piece of big-budget popcorn entertainment, or a two-hour ad for neo-capitalism? Can it be both?
I – Marxist Film Theory and Criticism
As Jean-Luc Comolli and Jean Narboni convey in their essay, “Cinema/Ideology/Criticism,” “Because every film is part of the economic system it is also a part of the ideological system, for ‘cinema’ and ‘art’ are branches of ideology.” The authors go on to categorize films that affirm or challenge dominant ideologies to differing degrees:
“The first and largest category comprises those films which are imbued through and through the dominant ideology in pure and unadulterated form, and give no indication that their makers were even aware of the fact. We are not just talking about so-called ‘commercial’ films. The majority of films in all categories are the unconscious instruments of the ideology which produces them.”
II – Iron Man 2
In several simple ways Iron Man 2 follows the typical Hollywood formula for ideological mythmaking: the protagonist wins the girl (an expected affirmation of heteronormativity and monogamy), the film concludes with closure in the triumph of the clearly delineated good over definite evil, it contains the presumed destiny for greatness (here enabled by the Stark’s father), and the hero succeeds through the triumph of individualism. This formula can be found everywhere in Hollywood cinema since its silent years, and while such conventions may at first seem like simple repetitive storytelling, they also serve the function of affirming the most treasured of American value systems. But the Iron Man films operate more specifically on a political level as well.
Mainstream superheroes have had a history of functioning as symbols of ideal American value systems, classically exemplified by Superman’s association with “Truth, Justice, and the American Way” (one in doubt of Superman’s nationalist function only needs to turn to Superman Red Son to see how the association with a different nation and ideology changes the meaning of the superhero entirely). Iron Man operates similarly.
The first Iron Man is a story of American exceptionalism by means of our political ideology’s value of individual triumph. The way Stark survives and succeeds in Iron Man’s first act is by proving his superiority in intelligence, ingenuity, and willpower over what are posited as the inferior (technologically and otherwise) Afghan militants. His triumph over these enemies is, in a sense, a triumph over their culture, specifically a non-Western culture possessing competing values and traditions. All of Stark’s n