Part 8: What is a Wolverine?

32:05 - 33:35 (1:30)

Cut back to Wolverine and get a scene between him Jean Grey with some nice flirting before, wait for it, More Exposition! This time we learn about Wolverine's powers, which is redundant because we've already seen them in action. Note to writers: If you're writing a movie where characters have super powers, having one character explain those powers to another character is bad writing. Show not tell. Come on!

Part 7: Mystique vs Senator Dickhole

29:54-32:04 (2:10)

We cut back to Senator Dickhole's story and me finally meet Mystique. (Rebecca Rojmin-Stamos) Mystique's transformation is a really cool looking effect. Easily the best mutant effect we've gotten yet. And she looks AMAZING in her blue body paint thing she's got going on. It makes you wish they chose more exotic looking mutants for the rest of the cast instead of people who look mostly like humans, because they nailed the look on this one. Mystique, disguised as some random aide, transforms and beats up Senator Dickhole and flies him back to Magneto's lair, which appears to be an island.

Part 6: Introducing Xavier's School

22:08 - 29:53 (7:45)

We switch back to Wolverine's POV...Wait! A random POV switch? I'm not a huge fan, as I think Rogue is a more relatable character and I'm not a huge fan of this type of bait and switch. It's natural to want to position Wolverine as the archetypal hero of the narrative while relegating Rogue to the damsel in distress, but a better movie would have committed to Rogue as the protagonist.

Wolverine escapes his medical examination and Xavier leads him to his office via some bad-ass telepathy and the rest of this sequence is given over to exposition. In nice character beats, Wolverine refuses to shake Cyclops hand and calls Xavier Wheels. Xavier lets us know that he runs a school for mutants and also a super hero team. The filmmakers manage to keep this as visually exciting as possible and again I appreciate the details but this is clumsy writing. We do get a bunch of the coolest visual effects shots in the entire movie in this sequence so there's that:

1.)Kitty Pride Runs through a wall.
2.)A kid cheats at sports by teleporting in basketball game.
3.)Cyclops shoots clay pigeons with his lasers
4.)Iceman extinguishes Pyro's fireball which then shatters on the ground.

Iceman's and Rogues flirtation is also set up in this scene so even amongst the clumsiness we do get some actual storytelling. In some more clumsiness Xavier sets up some selfish reasons for Wolverine to stick around in an obvious way to get him to give them up. I like this movie, but it's no masterpiece. This segment is also where we break into Act II for all that's worth. The hero is in his new world.

Part 5: Magneto's Lair

20:48 - 22:07 (1:19)

Here we get Magneto's lair in an undisclosed and Toad (Ray Park) is here. Not much happens in this scene (Magneto is up to something nefarious!) and honestly probablly could've been cut from the movie but I love it for this one detail:

Magneto's desk has one of those whatchamacallits except his has no strings and when he leaves the room they fall down! Awesome!

Part 4: Wolverine's Introduction; Bonding with Rogue; A Fight

9:22 - 20:47 (11:25)

This is the most important segment of the entire movie because this is where we meet Wolverine (Hugh Jackman, in the only role he'll ever need). If you fuck up Wolverine you don't have a movie franchise. Spoiler Alert. They don't fuck it up.The importance of this segment reflected in the length.

We cut to Canada and we're back in Rogue's POV. Her family clearly didn't take her being a scary mutant who sucks the life-force out of people. The movie mercifully skips over that. We don't need that falling out in all its gory detail; we have more mutants to meet. Inside a bar we see Wolverine in a cage fight with some poor schmuck. The metallic sound effects are another nice detail here.

Back at the bar, Rogue is enjoying some water and eyeballing the tip jar. The dick bartender moves it out of reach. You can tell they spent a lot of time getting this scene right as its full of great little moments like that. We get some exposition out of the way via a television news report while the camera focuses on Rogue and Wolverine checking each other out. Good storytelling.

The punk Wolverine beat up in the cage comes by and has a(n admantanium?) bone to pick. You know what its time for? CLAWS!

Wolverine gets to be a bad-ass but leaves the bar with out actually hurting anyone. Wolverine is back on the road and in yet another great detail he uses his superhuman hearing to deduce that there's a stowaway in his trailer. The use of mutant powers in non-combat situations goes a long way towards making this world and the characters feel real. Wolverine then goes on to ditch Rogue on the side of the road because he's an anti-social loner of course, before going back to give her a ride because really he's a big softie. It's a little obvious but its still a nice character beat and Jackman plays it well. That gruff exterior really is all pretense, isn't it?

Rogue and Wolverine have a great little conversation where they bond over being outcast freaks in constant pain. I love this line:

ROGUE: When they come out... does it hurt?
LOGAN: Every time.

 So good. What I don't get is why Rouge is actually calling herself that? It's weird that a teenage runaway would giver herself a bonkers nickname like that and the film makes no reference to this being part of mutant culture of which she's not yet part of. It's a little sloppy and Wolverine even draws attention to it by asking her about it. That was her name in the comics; just deal with it, OK? Fine!

Wolverine crashes the truck and nearly 20 minutes in we get our first hint that this isn't just a weird character drama/racial allegory and its actually a movie where freaks with superpowers fight and stuff. Wolverine vs Sabretooth (Tyler Mane) isn't much of a fight and really more of an excuse to for Cyclops(James Marsden) and Storm(Halle Berry)to make their heroic entrance and save Rouge from the truck, which by the way was about to explode!

Explosion count:1

Cyclops and Storm were in their leathery X-Men uniforms which I'll dive into during a later scene but briefly; they're OK. The weather control and eye laser effects are nicely done but not a particularly mind blowing visual. I would've hoped by this point in the movie we would have had at least one four star shot by now, but alas...

Part 3: Professor X talks to Magneto

5:57 - 9:21 (3:24)

Cut to Washington, and this time we don't get a helpful subtitle telling us where we are because who needs consistency? Jean Grey (Famke Janssen) is talking to congress about mutants and advocating for against some anti-mutant legislation. Some dickhole senator (Bruce Davison) interrupts to tell us that mutants are to be feared. And here we get our real first evidence that this isn't going to be a GREAT movie. Not only do we get a lame ass introduction to an important character but we get a whole chunk of clumsy non-dramatic world building dialogue. Show not tell, guys. Come on!

After the testimony we watch Professor X (Captin Jean Luc Picard, nailing it!) follow the now fully adult Magneto (Gandalf the Grey, also nailing it!) out into the hallway and we get this nice exchange that sets up the central conflict of the movie:

XAVIER: Erik. What are you doing here?
ERIK: Why do you ask questions to which you already know the answers?
XAVIER: Don't give up on them, Erik.
ERIK: What would you have me do, Charles? I've heard these arguments before.
XAVIER: That was a long time ago. Mankind has evolved since then.
ERIK: Yes... Into us.
ERIK: Are you sneaking around in there, Charles? Whatever are you looking for?
XAVIER: I'm looking for hope.
ERIK: I will give you hope, old friend. And I ask only one thing in return. Don't get in my way.
ERIK: We are the future, Charles, not them. They no longer matter.   

Patrick Stewart and Ian Mckellen absolutely embody these roles and make all their line readings awesome. I also love that although they are on complete opposite sides philosophically they're always polite and friendly in their personal exchanges. They give off a real history and it comes across in the performances and writing.

I also love this production detail on the wheels of Professor X's wheelchair. It's a friggin' X.

Part 2: The Introduction of Rogue

4:15 - 5:56 (1:41)

The subtitle informs us we're in Mississippi in the not too distant future. The not too distant future? Really? We've already established that this is a fictional universe where mutants are a thing. It is completely unnecessary to also set this in the near future. Any differences between reality and the movie we're already explained away by this being a universe where mutant exists so it should really just be present day. Gee, could I be any more nitpicky? Just you wait.

Rogue (Anna Paquin) is hanging out in her bedroom with some schmuck of a guy talking about all her big travel plans for after high school. Then, when she goes to kiss the boy, she nearly kills the poor schmuck. Naturally she freaks out and this all happens over some nice diegetic piano music. This scene does a good job of demonstrating how fucking terrifying it would be to just wake up with dangerous mutant powers.

A little weird we get Rogue (7th billed!) before the likes of Professor X, Wolverine, Cyclops, Storm or any of the mutants people actually care about, but this makes perfect sense when you think about it. Rogue acts as a nice audience surrogate. She's just a typical teenage girl and then shit gets real and she's thrust into this unfamiliar world of being a mutant. This shit is new to her too. The bit about wanting to go on adventures is a nice touch too, because she's going to get to do that now and that's pretty fucking awesome.

Part 1: Magneto's Origin

1:17 - 4:14 (2:57)

So, if you're making a movie about mutants with superpowers you can do it in one of exactly two ways:

1) Spend a good chunk of the film not showing the viewers mutants using their powers in order to heighten the impact when you finally do show the goods.
2) Give it to them right away. In the first fucking scene. Because its a goddamn movie about mutants. Fuck restraint.

The filmmakers mercifully went with option number 2 and we get magneto bending a gate here in the first scene but part of me wonders if they made Jaws in the 21st century if we wouldn't get a full on shot of the shark in all his CGI glory in the first 5 minutes.

The scene takes place in 1944 Poland and a young Magneto watches his mother taken away by Nazi's. He's able to bend the gate but a solider knocks him out and we fade to white as young Magneto goes unconscious. It's a little weird that our superhero action movie starts with a sympathetic introduction to the villain but I like it. It's efficient storytelling; in just under 3 minutes and with no dialogue we establish our antagonist is a complicated character with strong and relatable motivations who can manipulate metal. I mean fuck Nazis, amirite? Also the Holocaust setting nicely sets up the themes for the rest of the movie. Does anything evoke racism and genocide more than the Holocaust?

Opening Credit: This Movie is About Mutants

 0:00 - 1:16 (1:16)

So we get a nice little touch on the 20th Century Fox logo that starts the movie off in that it takes just a second longer for the X in Fox to fade away than the rest of the logo. Get it? X. It's a cute detail and I honestly like it. I always like when they pimp out the studio logo for a specific movie. Its like a little gold star the studio gives to the movie for being special.

"You're worth it, X-Men movie"-20th Century Fox Logo

So we start off with this bit of expository voice-over by Professor X, who at this point in the movie is just a disembodied voice:

"Mutation. It is the key to our evolution. It has allowed us to evolve from a single-celled organism to the dominant species on this planet. This process is slow, normally taking thousands of years. But every few hundred millenia, evolution leaps forward"

This is a nice efficient way to get the premise out of the way. The bit of magic that the audience just has to accept at face value. Mutants are a thing. Deal with it. No, it doesn't take thousands of generations of natural selection for a person to evolve something as incredibly complex as shooting friggin' lasers out of their goddamn eyes. It just happens. I'm a huge fan that this passage implies that this happened a few hundred millenia ago too. You know what this means? T-Rexes shooting friggin' lasers out of their goddamn eyes! Yes please. Make that movie now, please.

Anyways, this voiceover occurs over some fancy computer generated DNA and we get the single opening credit; the studio and the license owners. You know all those people who made the movie and created the characters? Fuck them! They'll get their credits at the end! Corporations first!

 

We get a brief shot of a shiny metal x and the we zoom in on the blue dot in the center and it's actually the first shot of the first scene of the movie! Oooh, fancy transitions.  

Introduction

So you've stumbled upon this blog and you're probably wondering what you're in for? No? Well I'm going to give you what might be the most in depth review of the X-Men movies of all time. You're Welcome. I'm not some crazy obsessive X-Men fanboy. I like the comics well enough but have not read that many of them and I enjoyed the 90's cartoon when I was a kid. I'm simply a guy who likes movies and wanted to do a scene by scene review of a movie as an intellectual exercise. Just to see what I can learn by watching movies very closely and breaking that shit down. I chose the X-Men movies because:

1)There's a shit ton of them. 6 and counting. I won't be running out of material anytime soon.
2)There isn't a masterpiece among them. This would be a pretty boring exercise if every scene my analysis boiled down to OMG that was A-MAZE-ING!
3)They run the gamut from very good to very bad. This should be more educational for me.
4)Even the bad ones are entertaining enough. I'm no masochist.

Enjoy.

I like the tag line on this poster. Trust A Few/Fear The Rest. Given that X-Men is often read as an allegory for racism, I think its kind of awesome that the anti-progressive message of this poster is: trust some minorities, but fear most of them.