“Young @ Heart” is the “Feel-Good movie” of the Year

Let’s dusk off a well-used cliché: “Young @ Heart” is the feel-good movie of the year.

If you fear or are apprehensive about aging, this film will ease your mind without sugarcoating the inevitability of mortality.

Originally shown as a BBC-TV documentary by Stephen Walker, “Young @ Heart” was a hit first in the U.K.

“It’s been quite a ride,” said chorus director Bob Cilman, who visited Florida with three chorus members to promote the film. “The were close to 3,000 e-mails when it was first shown on BBC. The chorus has been a hit in Europe since 1997. Now we tour there two to three times a year.”

It was Cilman who came up with the brilliant idea of having his elderly chorus (age 73 up) sing songs of youthful love, hope and rebellion.

David Bowie’s “Golden Years” takes on an entirely new meaning when sung by people in the twilight of their life.

Fred Knittle, a singer with a professional-quality baritone, brings a meaning to Coldplay’s “Fix You” entirely different from the original intent.

When a 90-year-old woman sings The Ramones’ “I Wanna Be Sedated,” you believe her.

So it goes. “Young @ Heart’ has the drama of the passing of two of its key members before an all-important show and another afterward. It has the comedy of a group of oldsters trying to master the intricate syncopations of the Pointer Sisters’ “Yes I Can-Can” and the excitement of an al fresco show before young, hardened inmates of a local prison who are won over completely. It has the inspirational message that it is never over until it’s over. That’s a lot packed into a 90-minute film.

Three and a half stars

A Kinder, Gentler “Iron Man”

Trust Robert Downey, Jr. to bring something unique to each role he plays.

Downey seized the core of the melancholy genius Charlie Chaplin and made it his own in 1992. In 2007 he became the obsessive police detective in “Zodiac.”

Now Downey has crafted a super hero with a heart and conscience: “Iron Man.”

Tony Stark (Downey) is the devil-may-care playboy scion of Stark Industries, a major supplier of weapons to the armies of the world.

On a trip to Afghanistan stark gets a dose of his own medicine. He is mortally wounded, and with the help of one of his company inventors, an electronic heart and metal armor suit are devised.

Back at company headquarters in California, Stark senses something is amiss. Despite solid support from his loyal assistant, Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) and his best friend Capt. Jon Rhodes (Terrence Howard), Stark finds his authority being undermined at Stark Industries.

Could it he his No. 2 chief yes-man, Obadiah Stane (Jeff Bridges)?

Jeff Bridges has loads of fun spoofing his laid-back surfer dude image as bearded, shaven-headed, nefariously devious Obediah.

It wouldn’t be a Marvel Comics action movie without a big showdown, and director Jon Favreau obliges with a spectacular but totally unbelievable knockdown, drag-out fight to the finish.

When Downey declares: “I am Iron Man,” you believe him.

Three stars