Maybe we should take comic book movies seriously

I saw Iron Man yesterday with a few friends, and I liked it more than I was expecting to. Sure, it had a borderline-ridiculous plot, but Robert Downey, Jr. was brilliant. He’s has been one of my favorite actors ever since I saw A Scanner Darkly, and his role in Iron Man is the only reason I went to see the movie. I wasn’t disappointed. In Iron Man, he gave a performance that deserved to be in a much better movie, and I think we should be able to acknowledge that. I’m not sure if I’d say he deserves an Oscar, but his performance might warrant a nomination. Or it may not. The point is, we’ll probably never know, simply because most everyone agrees that superhero movies and actors in them don’t belong in the Oscars. They aren’t serious films, or at least that’s the tradition. And in this case, it’s mainly true — Iron Man was not a serious or artistic movie — but I can think of another superhero movie coming out that will be.

In the previews before the movie, I saw a trailer for The Dark Knight. It did not feel like watching a preview for a summer action movie. Rather, it felt more like an independent movie, or maybe a movie from a few decades ago, or even a foreign movie. It was anything but a Hollywood blockbuster, and that’s definitely a good thing. In my humble opinion, The Dark Knight looks like it will be one of the best movies of the year.

Just from this trailer, I can already guess that Heath Ledger’s performance is Oscar worthy. The movie as a whole might even be deserving of an Oscar. Sure, it’s a summer action movie, a superhero movie even, but that alone shouldn’t stop us from taking it seriously.