X-Men: First Class
polycounter lvl 18
Went and saw this with some buddies last night.
This film was a definite step-up from X3 and Wolverine. I would even be willing to give it a slight edge over the first X-Men film. (despite the lack of Patrick Stewart)
The plot is fairly silly, and a bit contrived. As should be obvious from the trailers, it revolves around a group of evil mutants manipulating the Cuban missile crisis to instigate World War III. (and the accompanying nuclear holocaust) The methods by which they go about doing this are often times ridiculous. A bit more effort in developing the plot would have helped.
In the area of performances, its a bit hit-and-miss. The actress they chose for Emma Frost delivers a wooden, emotionless performance with almost no hint of nuance or subtlety. The bit players on the sidelines are also a tad rough. The actor they got to play Beast was actually quite strong, I just wish they could have done a little more with the character. He had a fairly strong story arc that merited further exploration. Mystique was a surprise, turning in some solid emotional range earlier in the film. Unfortunately she isn't able to carry this throughout the entire movie. This could have been more the fault of the script than the actress herself. Her all-blue costume also seemed to hinder her performance, preventing any believable facial expressions.
Thankfully enough, there were a few real stand-outs. Professor-X and Magneto both had great actors who had real chemistry together. The development of their friendship was the high-point of the film, and helped to carry most of the narrative. I also felt that Kevin Bacon was delightful as the primary antagonist. He milked the role for all it was worth, and was consistently charming and unnerving. The relationship established between his character (Sebastian Shaw) and Magneto gave the film a proper antagonist, while simultaneously communicating one of the film's primary themes.
Overall, I'm giving this one three out of five stars. It is far from a classic, but for the franchise that its a part of, it is a breath of fresh air.
This film was a definite step-up from X3 and Wolverine. I would even be willing to give it a slight edge over the first X-Men film. (despite the lack of Patrick Stewart)
The plot is fairly silly, and a bit contrived. As should be obvious from the trailers, it revolves around a group of evil mutants manipulating the Cuban missile crisis to instigate World War III. (and the accompanying nuclear holocaust) The methods by which they go about doing this are often times ridiculous. A bit more effort in developing the plot would have helped.
In the area of performances, its a bit hit-and-miss. The actress they chose for Emma Frost delivers a wooden, emotionless performance with almost no hint of nuance or subtlety. The bit players on the sidelines are also a tad rough. The actor they got to play Beast was actually quite strong, I just wish they could have done a little more with the character. He had a fairly strong story arc that merited further exploration. Mystique was a surprise, turning in some solid emotional range earlier in the film. Unfortunately she isn't able to carry this throughout the entire movie. This could have been more the fault of the script than the actress herself. Her all-blue costume also seemed to hinder her performance, preventing any believable facial expressions.
Thankfully enough, there were a few real stand-outs. Professor-X and Magneto both had great actors who had real chemistry together. The development of their friendship was the high-point of the film, and helped to carry most of the narrative. I also felt that Kevin Bacon was delightful as the primary antagonist. He milked the role for all it was worth, and was consistently charming and unnerving. The relationship established between his character (Sebastian Shaw) and Magneto gave the film a proper antagonist, while simultaneously communicating one of the film's primary themes.
Overall, I'm giving this one three out of five stars. It is far from a classic, but for the franchise that its a part of, it is a breath of fresh air.
Replies
Magneto and Proff. X were exquisitely well acted
More so, there were 2 things that stood out to me:
First, the film is incredibly sexist. Nearly all females are wearing mini-skirts. Even when it was pouring rain and men around them had coats with umbrellas, they still had minis. wtf. The fact that
Secondly,
Then the film starts trying to Hollywood it up and it becomes progressively campier and more action based. Characters start feeling tacked on and it becomes less about their personal struggles.
For a reboot, it feels remarkably similar in themes to the previous films and had they kept more focus on Magneto, Xavier, and Mystique it could've been a landmark superhero movie up there with The Dark Knight.
It's almost like they didn't know which way they wanted to take the film and settled on something inbetween a serious character driven franchise and a Summer Action Blockbuster for kids. Which is a shame because there are hints of brilliance.
Unfortunately that's how the girls/african americans were treated in the 60's. Watch Mad Men for more examples.
This. At times it felt like it could take off but in the end it felt too far towards the latter. The development between Erik and Charles, which felt like it should have been the main focus, ended up taking a backseat to the X-Men kids and the Hellfire club/missile incident which didn't really hold up for me.
It had potential but I felt a bit let down, especially as its from the guy who directed Kick-Ass which was a fantastically balanced film.
Are you being sarcastic? :P I've not seen it yet. Was there anything at the end of Stranger Tides? I hate this trend of putting something at the end of a film, feel like a knob staying back after everyone else has left :P Gonna see XMen soon!
He's not kidding. There was nothing after the credits, don't wait around once the credits start rolling. My friends and I waited just in case, but we were disappointed with a whole lot of nothing.
http://www.nooooooooooooooo.com/
The story was good, the acting was good and the vfx was used in the right way.
^ THIS. i would love to see that in a film someday
My only nitpick was that it was missing a couple character beats for mystique.
Mystique started out with Charles, yeah, but she never felt comfortable at that camp. She felt fearful of other humans, then a bunch of those humans try and kill you by bombing the shit out of you, and this one dreamy good-lookin' Nazi-fighter, who (I think) she already slept with, saves your ass and I would switch sides too.
Oh, and that cameo was pretty nice too.
BTW, I didn't see a Stan Lee cameo, did I miss it? And none of the usual Marvel extra scene at the end.
I didn't catch Stan Lee in it either. Was he in the previous xmen though? I don't recall him being in those.
http://conceptartworld.com/?p=7831
Xavier was so against Eric killing Shaw, however the writers failed to provide Xavier with any sort of feasible alternative. Everyone I watched the movie with was confused as to what else they could have done with someone so powerful BUT kill him. Especially since Xavier said he couldn't freeze him for very long. So the conflict that the built up throughout the movie between X and Eric ended up losing a lot of meaning and made Xavier look a little naive. But perhaps I missed something.
The other bothersome thing was that Eric said that he agreed with everything that Shaw said but he wasn't going to let him live because he killed his mother. I felt like that line served to flatten his character a bit. I was hoping for a bit of a smoother transition from hero to anti hero. Instead it left the audience feeling like we just traded one super villain for another. If his turning point happened just after the missiles were all fired then I think it would have worked out a lot better. I for one hated his speech and thought there wasn't much in that particular performance.
As for mystique... I think her trauma was more at the hands of her friends then humans. She was tired of being rejected. When hank rejected her and Xavier referred to her looks as a "cosmetic problem" something probably broke insider her at that point. It's still a bit shaky in my book but I'll let it slide because in real life after knowing them for a long time sometimes people don't make complete sense.
A minor nitpick I have that isn't a huge deal but didn't make much sense was when Xavier told Hank that he had to let the beast out and referenced Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Something about animal natures and other hogwash.
Oh and did anyone else notice that the first of the mutants to die was the one and only black guy? What the hell is up with this stereotype continuing in movies? When he started to turn silver after swallowing the energy I thought he was going to adapt and become Collosus. (would have been an interesting new backstory for him...) It was disappointing to see him die.
Overall I enjoyed the movie and I'll probably watch it again on video but it didn't quite reach it's full potential.
Was a well needed time off and good watch & as time well spent!:thumbup:
http://conceptartworld.com/?p=7853