METAL FATIGUE (IRON MAN 3)

Last month, the Palme d'Or winning director Steven Soderbergh delivered a lecture entitled the 'State of Cinema' at the San Francisco Film Festival.

Soderbergh, whose work includes films as varied as 'Sex, Lies and Videotape', 'Ocean's Eleven', 'Traffic', 'The Girlfriend Experience' and 'Che', recently announced his retirement from the film industry after making the Liberace biopic 'Behind the Candelabra' for HBO with Michael Douglas and Matt Damon.

His 'State of Cinema' address gives us some reasons why.

The central premise of Soderbergh's lecture is that the Hollywood machine has gone out of control to the point there is a now a clear difference between cinema and movies.

Cinema is a "specificity of vision", to quote Soderbergh, where a director has a clear concept of what he or she wants and that ends up on the screen.

Movies are what the Hollywood studio system produces and they are made by committee.

According to Soderbergh, the situation has gotten so bad you have movie business executives with little love, knowledge or experience of cinema dictating what should be in a film.

Market values determine what movies get made and how they are made - action adventure, brash comedies and animation are optioned because of their appeal with international audiences.

The bigger the budget, the director observes, the more homogenised the final product.

There's also the expense of releasing a mainstream movie, at a point of entry cost of $30 million (with another $30 million for overseas markets). So to get the $60 million back, the movie must gross $120 million at the box office. 

In Soderbergh's view, the system is broken, with studios focussing on profits and not nurturing talent with low cost ventures that would encourage artistic expression.

He proffers the theory that most US and international audiences are suffering from some sort of post-traumatic stress disorder after 9/11, opting for escapist movies rather than challenging cinema.

In an industry where the numbers are everything, that makes movie executives even less likely to take risks and gamble on talent, sticking rigidly to the formulas that will put bums on seats - even if that means audiences leaving their brains at home.

At the beginning of the address, Soderbergh describes watching a fellow passenger on a Jet Blue flight viewing a series of action sequences from half a dozen movies throughout the entire journey, skipping over any dialogue.

"This guy’s flight is going to be five and a half hours of just mayhem porn," Soderbergh observes and he muses how in this disposable, instant information age, traditional narrative is becoming so blurred that "previously distinct causes and effects collapse into each other" and "there's no time between doing something and seeing the results".

Last year, that is exactly how I felt when I reviewed Joss Whedon's 'Marvel Avengers Assemble' - now officially the third highest grossing movie of all time.

Whedon came up with two hours and 20 minutes of mayhem porn, disguising ropey writing and acting with high octane action set pieces.

Did that matter? 

Not to mainstream audiences who appeared to lap up his diet of non-stop violence and destruction and characters that had all the subtlety of WWF pro wrestlers.

Otherwise, why would it outperform the more cerebral, darker and challenging 'The Dark Knight Rises'? 

'Marvel Avengers Assemble' felt like a movie executives' wet dream, bringing together a group of superheroes who had already proven to be a success at the box office - Captain America, Thor, The Incredible Hulk and Iron Man with The Black Widow in tow.

For the uninitiated, 'Iron Man' exploded onto our movie screens in 2008, with Jon Favreau in the director's chair and Robert Downey Jr as the wisecracking playboy industrialist and mechanical engineering genius, Tony Stark who is kidnapped in Afghanistan.

Suffering a shrapnel wound near his heart, he is saved by a fellow captive who places a powerful electromagnet in his chest and they develop, while they are in captivity, a powerful electronic suit of armour capable of wiping out all bad guys.

The movie, which featured Gwyneth Paltrow as Stark's sassy love interest Pepper Potts, Favreau as his bodyguard Happy Hogan, Paul Bettany as the voice of an artificial intelligence computer program JARVIS and Jeff Bridges as a corrupt businessman, Obadiah Stane, was a huge hit for Marvel Studios and Paramount Pictures, generating $585 million in box office and costing $140 million.

In 2010, Marvel, Paramount and Favreau generated healthy box office returns for 'Iron Man 2' (raising $624 million for a film costing up to $200 million), with a plot which saw Stark's bodysuit at risk from Mickey Rourke's monstrous Russian physicist Ivan Vanko and Sam Rockwell's oily weapons manufacturer, Justin Hammer.

Paltrow, Favreau and Bettany reprised their roles, with Don Cheadle replacing Terrence Howard as Stark's chum, Lt Colonel James 'Rhodey' Rhodes.

In a shape of things to come, Scarlett Johansson also had her first pre 'Marvel Avengers Assemble' outing as Natalie Rushman/Natasha Romanoff, AKA The Black Widow and Samuel L Jackson as the eyepatch wearing Nick Fury.

Now 'Iron Man 3' is in our cinemas - this time as a joint venture between Marvel and Disney - and it is already smashing box office records.

The first post 'Marvel Avengers Assemble' franchise film goes back in time to New Year's Eve 1999 in Switzerland where the smooth talking Stark is wooing Rebecca Hall's Dr Maya Hanson who is developing a way of regenerating plants.

As they head back to her hotel suite, Stark and Hanson are pestered by Guy Pearce's nerdy Aldrich Killian who Stark brushes off by suggesting they meet up on the roof of the hotel but he then fails to turn up.

Years later, a radically transformed and bronzed Killian turns up at Stark Industries, which Pepper Potts is now running, to pitch a regenerative virus to her but she turns him down, fearing it could be used by the arms industry.

Meanwhile, the US is gripped with fear following a series of bombings inspired by an Osama Bin Laden style terrorist The Mandarin (Sir Ben Kingsley sporting an accent that lies somewhere between John Huston and Garrison Keillor) whose aim is to assassinate the US President (William Sadler).

When Stark's bodyguard Happy is injured during an explosion at Los Angeles' Chinese Mann's Theater, he finds himself challenging The Mandarin over the airwaves to take him on at his Malibu Mansion.

It soon becomes clear The Mandarin is in league with Aldrich Killian and Stark/Iron Man's ability to be an all American hero is once again tested to the limits.

'Iron Man 3' is directed by Shane Black, who carved out a decent career for himself in the 1980s and 1990s as a savvy screenwriter for buddy action movies like 'Lethal Weapon', 'Lethal Weapon 2', 'The Last Boy Scout' and the box office dud that was 'The Last Action Hero'.

Prior to 'Iron Man 3', he had just one directorial credit to his name, working with Robert Downey Jr in 2005 on the well received crime caper 'Kiss Kiss Bang Bang'.

His screenplay for 'Iron Man 3', along with Drew Pearce, has many of the hallmarks of a buddy action movie - particularly in the relationship and the banter under fire between Stark and Don Cheadle's Lt Colonel Rhodes.

And there is a neat twist in the last third of the movie.

But while 'Iron Man 3' is entertaining enough, you do feel it is the cinematic equivalent of a Big Mac - carefully packaged, expertly marketed but not all that satisfying or nourishing.

Stark remains one of the most annoyingly smug of all the superheroes we have seen on the big screen, with Downey Jr appearing entirely comfortable in his skin - probably a little too comfortable.

Robert Downey Jr is a talented actor who has developed a penchant for slight movie roles but why wouldn't he be? Marvel and Disney are reported to be waving a fat $50 million cheque at him to reprise Stark.

However you can't help wondering if he is prepared to coast along forever and when or if he will ever stretch himself again with a demanding role that doesn't involve cheap laughs or loud explosions.

Australia's Guy Pearce is suitably slippery as Aldrich Killian, while Cheadle, Paltrow, Favreau and Hall do exactly what is required of them in the supporting roles.

Sir Ben Kingsley is a different kettle of fish and really embraces the role of pantomime villain.

But for all the bravura special effects, one cannot help feeling this is yet another example of a movie made by Hollywood committee.

And while I would not say it is devoid of passion, it lacks the depth and sense of cinema that Spielberg's best blockbusters like 'Jaws', 'Raiders of the Lost Ark' and 'Jurassic Park' had.

I'd defy people who have seen those three films not to recall scenes.

But I'd struggle to come up with one scene in 'Iron Man 3' that really resonated.

To function as an industry, Hollywood, of course, needs blockbuster movies that appeal to a mass audience and generate huge profits.

But for the sake of cinema, the studios should show a spirit of adventure and throw some of those huge profits towards smaller budget movies with more challenging themes and let off the leash those filmmakers who have more to offer than just superheroes and super villains.

Future Steven Soderberghs need to be discovered and nurtured if the artform is to continue to develop and the studios must have a broad enough vision to accommodate blockbusters and more intimate and challenging cinema.

('Iron Man 3' opened in UK and Irish cinemas on  April 18, 2013. This review originally appeared on Eamonnmallie.com)