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| X-Men |
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  (8/10)
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Runtime: 104 |
| Public Rating: 6.35 (51 votes) |
Director: Bryan Singer |
MPAA Rating:  |
| Genre: Comic Book |
Year: 2000 |
| Writer(s): David Hayter/Tom DeSanto |
| Distributor: 1 |
| Reviewed by: William McGuire |
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The comic-book film is the ultimate hit-or-miss genre. You either get great popcorn flicks like “Batman” and “Blade”, or you get a campy, cinematic wreck of a film. Marvel Comics the world’s largest comic-book company has often had it’s most cherished properties portrayed by ninth-rate actors in direct-to-video movies. But, now Marvel appears to be on a winning streak. First, the relatively minor character Blade was turned into a hot Hollywood franchise, now the X-Men, one of the lynch pins of the Marvel Universe, are coming to film. But, how do the mutant crusaders hold up on celluloid?
Well, let’s talk about casting first. Ian McKellen is spot-on as Magneto. He brings the mutant megalomaniac to life in a way no other actor has done for a comic-book villain. The Australian Hugh Jackman is just as excellent as Wolverine. In one particular scene with Rouge, he is menacing and warm at the same time. He gets all the facets of Wolvie’s personality down pat. At the other end of the cinematic spectrum, Halle Berry is utterly unwatchable as Storm. I hope she has better luck as a Bond girl. The rest of the cast is somewhere in the middle, not given quite enough screen time for me to give a real review of their performance.
As far as the story, it’s fairly by the numbers. In the not too distant future, (Way down in Deep 13) we are beginning to see the next phases of human evolution. These new beings are dubbed mutants by the general population and feared and hated. With the Senate about to vote on the crucial Mutant Registration Bill, we are introduced to a number of main characters. The mutant-hating bigot, Sen. Kelly, the original X-Woman Jean Grey, and the two archrivals: Professor Xavier and Magneto. Magneto thinks that only a war between humans and Mutants can solve the problems facing both. Xavier is trying to work out a peaceful solution to the problem. Xavier assembles his team consisting of: Jean, Cyclops a man who shoots optic blasts out a specially created visor, Storm who controls the weather, Wolverine with a mutant healing factor that makes him indestructible, and Rouge who can “borrow” a mutant power when she touches one. They do battle with Magneto’s hench-men: Toad super-agility, poison spit, sticks to walls, Mystique a shape-shifter, and Sabretooth, a big dumb lug.
The plot has some nice twists toward the end, and the characters are fascinating, but the battle scenes lack energy and there are very few. But make no mistake, comic-book movies are back! And we have Bryan singer to thank for it.
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