Film review: Avengers Assemble (five out of five stars)

(12A) 142mins
By The Newsroom
Published 1st May 2012, 13:39 BST

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Director: Joss Whedon

Starring: Robert Downey Jr, Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Tom Hiddleston

IT HAS seemed a long time coming, but one of this year’s mega blockbusters has arrived - and it’s great.

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If you’ve followed all the constituent parts (Iron Man 1 and 2, Thor, Captain America) you’ll be pretty clued up what to expect.

I did have concerns that this might be a film full of strands that don’t add up to a complete package or it might be style over substance.

Hapilly, Joss Whedon has pulled it all together for a great movie that delivers on all fronts.

However, if super heroes or comic book characters don’t float your boat this will be 142 minutes of agony.

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The plot sees Loki (half-brother of Thor) teaming up with some equally unpleasant aliens to take over the world.

Nick Fury (Samuel L Jackson), commander of the covert security agency SHIELD, brings together Iron Man (Downey Jr), Captain America (Evans), the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) and the Black Widow (Johansson) to save the planet.

It could have been very corny but the script is excellent and there are superb touches of humour, especially involving the Hulk.

In fact, if the Hulk 1 and 2 films had been given a similar treatment they would probably have been far more successful.

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Hiddleston turns Loki into a great villain, full of anger and contempt just waiting to explode.

The rest of the cast all do their bit to make this a classy action movie and there are little cameos for Powers Boothe, Jenny Agutter and Harry Dean Stanton, while comic guru Stan Lee makes his customary appearance.

The action scenes are breath-taking and the special effects excellent.

For those who have seen the other movies, yes there is a trailer for a future film in the end credits, though you have to be a total Thor geek to work it out (I’m not, so resorted to Google).

The biggest compliment I can give this film - the 142 minutes just flew by.

Steve Payne

Screening courtesy of Cineworld Crawley