But then, unprompted, he starts talking about another film that did not take him to his happy place. "There are times when you know you're pushing it and you don't have a great vibe about where things are going creatively. You have to be collarbone deep in molasses for four months and just go, 'I have no solace in my work whatsoever, and its 12 hours a day of cosmic punishment."
...I ask him which film
"I will not say its name."
Was it recent?
"Absolutely."
We talk about other things for a while, and I start eliminating movies. I've got it down to two.
Surely it was the Shaggy Dog right?
He leans forward and looks hard at me... "Shaggy Dog was a very, very important movie for me. It was a very enjoyable experience. He sounds sincere...I tell him through my powers of deductive reasoning that his cosmic punishment film must be Iron Man 2.
Downey flinches a little... "This is still art for commerce, at best," says Downey about his chosen profession. "I consider myself to be a pain-in-the-ass artist who's self aware enough to still be tolerable. While I have a little bit of juice, I try not to rub it in anyone's face, because it's just disgusting. And I use the term 'artist' loosely."
So there we go. I'm not trying to stir up anger or controversy, but rather intelligent discussion about these films, and the actors in them. Maybe we should take another look at Iron Man 2 and see if it really holds up? Or maybe we should accept that simply because someone does a stellar job performing in a film, that doesn't mean he loves it as much as he may pretend.
Personally, I agree with all of the points he makes, and have no illusions about Iron Man 2 or even films in general. I enjoy them thoroughly, but at the end of the day they are more commerce than art, much as we'd all like to
forget...
http://community.livejournal.com/ohnotheydidnt/45791943.html
Mens Journal, May 2010. Interview by Stephen Rodrick. Photos by Mark Seliger