Unit 7 Part 2 (note form)

Unit 7. Comment and reflect on the film acting focusing on particular actors, formats and reading. Establish knowledge and understanding of defined methods and techniques the specialist disciplined practice.

Notes

Robert Downey Junior

I’m looking at the Iron Man film.

Notes

His eyes – First scene one of the soldiers asks Tony Stark a question, and in Tony’s response, Robert Downey jr made the decision to never look away from the soldier’s eyes, so in the shot, his eyes were fixed. In my opinion I believe it to be a sign of intimidation, that looking into the soldiers eyes would make him feel nervous. He continues the eye contact with the other actors.

During the scene were tony stark gets captured and the supposed leader ask stark to build a rocket, during that time Robert Downey junior continues the same facial expression, whereas other ways of doing that scene is to be acting differently to everything that the other actor is saying, doing would show that you are listening to what that character is saying, and understanding. But Robert Downey Junior obviously decided against doing this, possibly to reflect realism and truth in how his character feels.

Half way threw the film, Robert Downey junior made the decision for his character to disconnect eye contact with other characters as seen in the seen with Pepper, when she says she quits. I believe that Robert Downey Junior did this because he wanted to show that Tony stark isn’t at the top anymore, that close friends are betraying him, and that he may have hit rock bottom and he needs Pepper’s help.

Behind the scenes

Some scenes were shot with two cameras to capture lines improvised on the spot; Robert Downey Jr. would ask for many takes of one scene since he wanted to try something new. (IMDb. Date Unknown)

This quote helps support the detail of Robert Downey Junior always changing how he does the scene, he would never do the same performance twice, he would always change something whether it’s the delivery of the anything in his movement. Also to support this I did some basic research into ‘Iron Man outtakes’ or ‘Avengers outtakes’ that he has also taken part in.

A specific video I found on YouTube, titled ‘Avengers bloopers’ uploaded by Hope Daugherty. The part that evidences my topic in the video was at 2:27 where both Robert Downey Junior and Mark Ruffalo (The Hulk) do the same scene three times, in these scenes I noticed a slight difference in the delivery in Robert Downey Juniors lines.

I feel that doing this could really challenge the actor to keep them of their toes, and doing this well, as a self discipline makes the scene fresh and renewed.

Bibliography

H.Daugherty: (16.03.2013.) Avengers bloopers. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ozvm703hp8 Date Accessed: 23.10.2014.

IMDb. (Date Unknown) Iron Man. Trivia. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ozvm703hp8 Date Accessed: 23.10.2014

J.Favreau (02.04.2008.) Iron Man. Feature film.