Iron Man is a 2008 American superhero film based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name, produced by Marvel Studios and distributed by PARAMOUNT Pictures. The first installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it was directed by Jon Favreau from a screenplay by Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby, and Art Marcum and Matt Holloway. The film follows Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), an industrialist and master engineer who builds a powered exoskeleton after a life-threatening incident, and becomes the technologically advanced superhero Iron Man. The film had been in development since 1990 at Universal Pictures, 20th Century Fox, and New Line Cinema at various times, before Marvel Studios reacquired the rights in 2006. Marvel put the project in production as its first self-financed film, with PARAMOUNT Pictures serving as distributor. Favreau signed on as director, aiming for a naturalistic feel, and chose to shoot the film primarily in California, rejecting the East Coast setting of the comics to differentiate the film from numerous superhero films set in New York City-esque environments. Filming began in March 2007 and concluded in June. During filming, the actors were free to create their own dialogue because pre-production was focused on the story and action. Rubber and metal versions of the armor, created by Stan Winston's company, were mixed with computer-generated imagery to create the title character. Iron Man premiered in Sydney on April 14, 2008, and was released in the United States on May 2, 2008. It received praise from critics for its acting (particularly Downey's), screenplay, direction, visual effects, and action sequences, and was selected by the American Film Institute as one of the ten best films of 2008. It received two nominations at the 81st Academy Awards for Best Sound Editing and Best Visual Effects, and was followed by the sequels Iron Man 2 and Iron Man 3 in 2010 and 2013, respectively..
The core of the territory of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant was from 2014 until November 2017 in Iraq and Syria, where the organization controlled significant swathes of urban, rural, and desert territory. ISIL also controls land in Afghanistan as well as Nigeria, and used to control land in Libya, the Philippines, Egypt, Yemen, possibly Somalia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.[10] The group also has insurgent cells in Jammu & Kashmir, Algeria, Iraq, Pakistan, Tunisia, the Caucasus, and Saudi Arabia that do not control territory. As of September 2018, ISIL controlled only 200 square miles (520 km2) of territory in Iraq and Syria, according to the US-led coalition against ISIL. However, this estimate referred only to the Euphrates region and disregarded a large ISIL pocket remaining in the Syrian Desert. By late March 2019, ISIL territory in Syria was reduced to only the besieged 1,550 square miles (4,000 km2) central desert pocket. The enclave was surrounded by Syrian government forces and its allies. The Syrian military conducted combing operations and airstrikes against the pocket, but with limited success. In early 2017, ISIL controlled approximately 45,377 square kilometers (17,520 square miles) of territory in Iraq and Syria and 7,323 km2 of territory elsewhere, for a total of 52,700 square kilometres (20,300 sq mi). This represents a substantial decline from the group's territorial peak in late 2014, when it controlled between 100,000 square kilometres (39,000 sq mi) and 110,000 square kilometres (42,000 sq mi) of territory in total. ISIL's territory has declined substantially in almost every country since 2014, a result of the group's unpopularity and the military action taken against it. ISIL propaganda claims a peak territorial extent of 282,485 km2. The majority of ISIL-controlled territory, though much-diminished, continues to be in eastern Syria, in addition to isolated pockets elsewhere in the country. The majority of the terrorist group's territory, population, revenue, and prestige came from the territory it held in Iraq and Syria. In Afghanistan, ISIL mostly controls territory near the Pakistan border and has lost 87% of its territory since spring 2015. In Libya, the group has lost nearly 100% of its territory, and as of 2017 controls only a handful of villages and neighborhoods. In Egypt, the group controls 910 km2 of land centered around the village of Sheikh Zuweid, which represents less than 1% of Egypt's territory. In Nigeria, Boko Haram (at the time an ISIL affiliate) controlled 6,041 km2 of territory at its maximum extent in 2014, though most of this area was lost amid military reversals and a split within Boko Haram between pro- and anti-ISIL factions.(WiKi)
