Captain America
Steven Grant Rogers
Movie · Phase 1
Captain America: The First Avenger
2011 · 124 min
Steve Rogers is a 90-pound asthmatic from Brooklyn who has been rejected by five recruitment boards and keeps coming back, because the point of him was never the body. Abraham Erskine picks him for…
The Infinity SagaDisney+80%Released
The story
Steve Rogers is a 90-pound asthmatic from Brooklyn who has been rejected by five recruitment boards and keeps coming back, because the point of him was never the body. Abraham Erskine picks him for Project Rebirth precisely because he knows what weakness feels like.
The film is a 1940s serial adventure with a HYDRA villain hunting an Asgardian artefact, and it earns its ending: Steve flies Schmidt's bomber into the Arctic to save New York, wakes up seventy years later, and the first thing he does is run into Times Square looking for a war that ended without him.
Key facts
- Release date
- 22 Jul 2011
- Status
- Released
- Phase
- Phase 1
- Saga
- The Infinity Saga
- Runtime
- 124 min
- Certificate
- PG-13
- Director
- Joe Johnston
- Writers
- Christopher Markus, Stephen McFeely
- Streaming
- Disney+
- Timeline placement
- 1942–1945, with a framing sequence in 2011
Cast
| Actor | Role |
|---|---|
| Chris Evans | Steve Rogers / Captain America |
| Hayley Atwell | Peggy Carter |
| Hugo Weaving | Johann Schmidt / Red Skull |
| Sebastian Stan | Bucky Barnes |
| Tommy Lee Jones | Colonel Chester Phillips |
| Dominic Cooper | Howard Stark |
Characters
Easter eggs
- The original android Human Torch, Jim Hammond, is displayed in a glass tube at the 1943 Stark Expo — Marvel Comics' very first character, from Marvel Comics #1 (1939).
- Stan Lee cameos as a general at the awards ceremony who mistakes a stand-in for Captain America.
- The Tesseract is established as an Asgardian relic pulled from 'Odin's treasure room', linking HYDRA's technology directly to Thor.
- Steve's USO stage costume is a note-perfect recreation of his 1941 Captain America Comics #1 look, winged helmet and triangular shield included.
- Arnim Zola's face appears projected on a monitor in a shot framed at chest height, a nod to his comic design of a body with a face in the torso.
- The Howling Commandos assemble around Dum Dum Dugan and Gabe Jones, lifted from Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos.
- Peggy's photograph inside Steve's compass becomes the film's emotional through-line and recurs across three more movies.
- 'Cut off one head, two more shall take its place' is HYDRA's comic mantra, delivered here for the first of many times.
Trivia
- Chris Evans turned the role down at least twice, worried about a nine-film commitment, and only signed after the deal was reduced.
- Skinny Steve was achieved with a body double, digital shrinking of Evans' frame and CG head replacement — a technique Marvel refined across the shoot.
- Joe Johnston had already directed The Rocketeer, and brought the same pulpy period-adventure grammar to Cap.
- Sebastian Stan originally auditioned for Steve Rogers before being offered Bucky.
- Hugo Weaving's Red Skull combined prosthetic appliances with digital removal of the nose and cheeks; Weaving has said the makeup was gruelling.
- The film was released as simply 'The First Avenger' in Russia, Ukraine and South Korea to avoid the nationalist framing.
- Alan Silvestri wrote the march before shooting so it could be played on set during the USO sequence.
Box office
- Budget
- $140 million
- Worldwide
- $370.6 million
- Domestic
- $176.7 million
Reviews
Critics
80%
With plenty of pulpy action, a pleasantly retro vibe, and a handful of fine performances, Captain America is solidly old-fashioned blockbuster entertainment.
The MarvelGossips verdict
Still the most sincere film Marvel has made, and the only one that works as a straight period adventure. The back half compresses an entire war into a montage, which is the price of getting Steve to the ice on schedule. Evans and Atwell do more with fifteen minutes of romance than most franchises manage in five films.
Related titles
Frequently asked
How long was Steve Rogers frozen?
Approximately 66 years in-universe — he crashes in early 1945 and is thawed in 2011, shortly before The Avengers. The film's coda has Fury telling him he has been asleep 'for almost seventy years'.
Is the Human Torch really in Captain America?
Yes, in android form. Jim Hammond, the 1939 Human Torch and Marvel's first published character, is on display in a tube at the Stark Expo. He is a different character from Johnny Storm.
What happened to the Red Skull?
Handling the Tesseract bare-handed teleports him across the galaxy rather than killing him. Avengers: Infinity War reveals he was banished to Vormir as the Soul Stone's Stonekeeper, recast with Ross Marquand.
Where does the Tesseract come from?
It is the Space Stone housed in an Asgardian container. Schmidt recovers it from a Norwegian church in 1942, describing it as a jewel from Odin's treasure room, which ties HYDRA's weapons directly to Thor's mythology.