Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Captain America: The Winter Soldier

        With the Marvel films, I feel conflicted due to my love for “The Avengers” but indifference toward the rest of the canon. As we enter “Phase II” of the Marvel franchise it seems there is room to expand into new areas especially with the upcoming release of “Guardians of The Galaxy” and the construction of the most recent Iron Man film. Captain America acts as the backbone to the Avengers team representing more of a patriotic ideal grounding the highs of Tony Stark and The Hulk while being foreign to the present time yet less foreign than Thor. This backbone plays well in an ensemble of characters yet it seems to be tough to highlight the star qualities of Captain America.

This second installment of the Captain America franchise goes in the direction of a paranoid thriller when Steve Rogers/ Captain America begins to question Nick Fury (Samuel L Jackson) on how things exactly are run in S.H.I.E.L.D.. In an action set piece highlighting more of the Tony Stark technologies in the series rather than any type of cinematic action, we are introduced to an army of faux police officers who attack Fury while he is driving. Technologies such as a computerized bullet proof car, equipped with a machine gun can get him out past the police officers but a sudden new threat is introduced as a man resembling more of a disturbed teenager than a super villain known as The Winter Soldier who’s badassness comes from the accessory of a metal arm is introduced flipping Fury’s car with heavy explosives. Fury is able to escape the assassination attempt with enough time to tell Rogers to trust no one while handing him a drive with information on how S.H.I.E.L.D. has been compromised. The events leave Captain America alone, unsure about Fury, unable to trust anyone.

Due to previous installments, we as the audience are incline to trust Natasha Romanoff/ Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), and it seems Captain America feels the same as she is able to become a partner to Rogers, giving the character of Black Widow much more development and screen time that is deserved yet empty from the other films. Johansson’s character of Black Widow is a lot of fun combining the out of place physical action in “Iron Man 2” with the wit and ability to always be one step ahead during her scenes in “The Avengers”. Captain America is also paired with a new character Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) a likable Iraq War Veteran and running companion of Steve Rogers who has secrets and talents of his own. Another addition is Alexander Pierce (Robert Redford) known for turning down the Noble Peace Price because “Peace is not a prize”, who holds a position in the World Council and is a close friend of Fury’s. Redford comes at this character with a lot of energy but the character is not well written leaving scenes focusing on him to be heavy with plot circling around the S.H.I.E.L.D. crisis.

The film is at its best when it is trying to capture the 1980’s body action. The film opens showing a routine stealth mission for Captain America as he boards a ship captured by pirates and takes out almost all of the bad guys by himself with pure force. These scenes are shot like a “Bourne” film using the shakey camera to disorient but the action is pure muscle. This is shown more steadily when it comes to fight sequences between Captain America and The Winter Solder who has connections with The Black Widow’s Soviet past, his metal arm represents the mechanics and machinery associated with 80’s Soviet villains (Rocky IV) which tests the strength of the American body of Captain America, or one built on muscle. Unfortunately, by the end of the film, Marvel once again takes us on a gigantic robotic air ship that distracts from the spectacle and physical action of Captain America’s fighting scenes.

On the surface, the sequel adds inner conflict to the character of Captain America, it is interesting how the character reflects American history in the way Captain America (similar to 1940’s public opinion) is portrayed as being pro war and government in the need to take down an evil empire Nazi Germany/Hydra but as time goes on he tends to question his government as the enemy is not so defined and the question of how much surveillance is necessary comes into play.  Surveillance does become the main focus of the film that really pushes forth its post 9/11 imagery and NSA themes. Fury even says something along the lines of “After New York we needed to do everything possible to prevent another attack”. Marvel has not been known for getting into gritty realistic political themes in their films, yet “Captain America: The Winter Soldier” falls into the same category as blockbusters from “The Dark Knight” to “Star Trek Into Darkness” by trying to push a bigger message more current with our political reality. In the case of Captain America it treads onto elements “The Dark Knight” explored six years prior while never exploring what it means to live in a world with superheroes, surveillance, and over bearing government but instead just echoing what we see in headlines everyday choosing to project rather than reflect.