MIGHTY ANT- MAN
A silly concept works
It’s just as well that Ant- Man stars funnyman Paul Rudd and features direction from Peyton Reed ( Yes Man, The Break- Up, 13 episodes of The Weird Al Show). Because it’s difficult to take the concept seriously at face value. The guy has all the powers of an ant — wait, at the size of an ant? Spider- Man could step on him!
But the screenplay does a good job of selling us on the idea; no wonder the credits list seven writers, including Stan Lee and his cronies, who created the character in 1962; Edgar Wright, who signed on more than a decade ago, with plans to direct; and Rudd himself, who did a late rewrite alongside Adam McKay. It takes a village.
It also takes a genius. Michael Douglas fulfils that role as Hank Pym, inventor of the Pym particle, which allows objects to shrink. ( Think what he could have done if he’d gone into creamfilled biscuits!) The science is kept deliberately vague. Physics teaches us that matter, like ideas in Hollywood, is mostly empty space; the Pym particle merely reduces the distance between the atoms.
But Pym took his particle and went into seclusion for a quartercentury to prevent its power being used for evil. Now his former protegé Darren Cross ( Corey Stoll) has managed to recreate it in his aptly named Futures Lab. To stop him, Pym has to steal the weaponized version and destroy all computer records of it. ( And hope Cross hasn’t kept his iCloud account up to date.)
Enter Scott Lang ( Rudd), whose Robin Hood act of corporate burglary/ espionage landed him in jail but attracted Pym’s attention.
Now a free man trying to go straight, Scott is recruited by Pym in one of those why-didn’t- he-just-call- and- ask moments that don’t bear too much thinking about.
As it is, Scott’s first, accidental use of the Ant- Man suit results in an improbable ( but thrilling) ride down a bathtub drain, across a disco dance floor and through a vacuum cleaner. It also provides proof that he’s well- nigh indestructible in the suit.
Rudd, even more so than his Marvel predecessor Chris Pratt, is an unlikely hero. Several beers short of a six- pack ( or several beers past one if you like), he also abhors violence, which makes his smackdown of a cameo guest star sound like Batman versus Captain Canuck: Thunk! “Sorry!” Thwack! “Sorry!” Wham- o! “Sorry!”
But Rudd makes the role work for him. Trying to recreate a bond with his daughter — a subplot clumsily echoed in Pym’s life with a daughter played by Evangeline Lilly — Scott just wants to do right by her. Originally that meant working in Baskin- Robbins and saving up for an apartment, but if it’s saving the world, then so be it.
The superhero origin story has its well- worn beats and grooves by now. Ant- Man covers the compulsories well enough but without any great flair; there’s the training montage, the first test, the first fight and so on.
Scott also learns that the suit enables him to control ants with his mind, apparently through some sort of Bluetooth technology. And he learns that ants can smell dishonesty, which might be something to keep in mind at your next picnic.
Oh, and there’s the obligatory don’t-try- this- at- home- or-anywhere-else warning. In this case it’s the danger of “going subatomic,” a fate that befell Pym’s wife and caused her to fall into a quantum realm where the Heisenberg/ Feige uncertainty principle rules, and all sequels are both green- lighted and not greenlighted simultaneously. This is worse than crossing the streams in Ghostbusters.
But mostly the film keeps to the lighter side, aided by Michael Peña in a comic- even- more- relief role, and by his criminal buddies Kurt, Dave and Gale. They’re a regular Lavender Hill Mob — or, if you need a more contemporary reference, the Fantastic Four with less fantasticness.
This may be problematic for many superhero fans, as the film risks falling into its own chasm of uncertainty, neither as joyously frantic as Guardians of the Galaxy nor as dark and brooding as the Batman- Superman franchise.
It also doesn’t strike much awe for viewers; in fact, it’s almost enough to make you forget that, in another corner of the Marvel universe, alien beings are plotting to take over everything.
But Ant- Man proves that if you don’t take care of the little things, you’ll never manage the big ones.