Triple Bill Mini Musings: Mutants, Codgers, and Radioactivity...

X-Men Days of Future Past:
What's it about?
In a bleak near-future, the mutants are being hunted down and exterminated by "The Sentinels", and in a last-ditch effort to change the course of history, they send Wolverine back in time to 1973 (via some weird mental transference kind of thing) to fix the future by changing the past.
Who would I recognise in it?
Hugh Jackman, James McAvoy, Jennifer Lawrence, Michael Fassbender, Ian McKellan, Patrick Stewart, Halle Berry, Nicholas Hoult, Anna Paquin, Ellen Page, Peter Dinklage, Shawn Ashmore, and more.
Great/Good/Alright/Shite?
Jam-packed with mutants and time travel craziness, DOFP is a busy movie. Taking place some time after the events of X-Men 3 in a horrific future world torn apart by human-on-mutant genocide, the action switches over to 1973 - picking up several years after the events of X-Men First Class - and then a whole bunch of stuff happens. Suffice to say, the plot is complicated - but in a good way - and filled with its fair share of fun/mind-bending time travel convolutions. Like the plot, the cast is full, so full that many characters only make cameo appearances or have very little to do. However, while some fan favourites may get shunted to the sidelines, it does help add a sense of a wider 'mutant community' and an entire world of mutants populating the X-Men universe. The script is richly textured, although perhaps a little over-stuffed (making the not-overly-long 131 minute running time feel hefty), and the tone is mostly balanced, but surprisingly dark at times. The action sequences are thoroughly enjoyable, but the stand-out moment is owned by Quicksilver, who steals the entire movie with one superbly realised sequence inside the Pentagon. It's a big, big movie - sometimes an unwieldy one - but it's successes far outweigh it's minor problems. On the cusp between good and great.

Click "READ MORE" below for a rude octogenarian and radioactive horror...

Favourite Films of 2011 (that I've seen):

There's inevitably a delay in seeing some movies, particularly when it comes to Awards Season (as such I was months late in seeing The King's Speech, and only just over the Christmas season have I caught up on Black Swan). Plus you might not always be able to get to the cinema - indeed there was a huge gap in my cinema-going after the forgettable Columbiana in the first half of September, that was only plugged in the last days of the year with the excellent Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol.

Part of me decided that, in these more restrained times, I'd only go and see films I was much more certain would be worth the trip and the ever-increasing ticket costs ... but then there are other films that you are certain you'll be buying on DVD or Blu-Ray. Kevin Smith's Red State is a must-buy for me, so rather than spend several quid seeing it in the cinema (it was barely on the screens as it was) I can put that cash towards the home video release (which, now that I mention it, is in January). Also coming out in January will be Drive - another flick I'm rather switched-on by, so there's two examples of September 2011 releases that I won't see until January 2012.

Enough of that though - what flicks (that I actually saw in the cinema) tickled my fancy in 2011? In chronological order, my Top Ten of 2011 are:

1) The Fighter - Mark Wahlberg's restrained boxer is the perfect balance to Christian Bale's far-out, wide-eyed, character-of-characters in this true-life tale of a working class boxer rising to great heights before the chance slips through his fingers entirely. If it was between this and Rocky, I'd pick Rocky, but The Fighter is well worth seeing.

2) True Grit - the Coen Brothers give us a fresh telling of the source novel. Typically classy Direction, beautifully photographed, and brilliantly performed. An absolute must-watch.

3) Paul - Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Kristen Wiig, a pot-smoking alien-on-the-run, and a whole host of modern comedy legends make Greg Mottola's fanboyishly fun sci-fi-action-road-movie-comedy a total blast.

4) Fast Five - surprisingly bloody good fun. I might even go so far as to say it's the best of the series. Big in every way, the action is thunderously entertaining, the vehicle sequences thrilling, and it was just such a fun ride. A little heart, a little humour, and Justin Lin's assured ability at crafting memorable action set pieces make this a damned good time.

5) X-Men: First Class - exhibiting smarts to equal its brawn, even underwhelming side characters can't affect the fascinating central battle between good and evil that birthed the Xavier/Magneto war of conflicting ideologies. Sweeping aside the action-heavy but ever-so-dimly-written-and-directed Last Stand, Matthew Vaugh's comic book fest proved to be the highlight of a heavy crop of comic book movies this year.

6) Captain America - putting characterisation ahead of blowing shit up, Joe Johnston's comic book adaptation proved to be a thoroughly entertaining ride that actually bothered to ascribe meaning to all the spectacle.

7) Hobo With A Shotgun - without a doubt my number one film of 2011. Jason Eisener's grindhouse throw-back is gleefully gruesome, utterly barmy, and lovingly crafted with a truly independent spirit and method. Rutger Hauer brings heart and even pathos to the titular avenging street-dweller, while everyone else brings grue, guns, and gurningly over-the-top performances. It was my most anticipated movie of the year, and the Blu-Ray release didn't let me down at all - bloody brilliant.

8) Rise of the Planet of the Apes - mixing smarts with blockbuster budgets seems to be becoming a common theme nowadays, and hip-hip-hooray for that. After last year's underwritten Iron Man 2, and three ever-diminishing and ever-dumber Transformers movies, the balance has been countered with films such as this. Trading on themes ever-present in the struggle for equal rights, the spectacular visuals were coupled with a meaningful script.

9) Super 8 - nostalgia, scope, heart, and thrills galore combined to form a nigh-on perfect sci-fi that harked back to the glory days of Steven Spielberg's milestone works such as E.T. and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. J.J. Abrams did a stellar job. The central child cast pull you in and feel real, joy isn't without pain or loss, and the jaw-dropping train crash compliments an accomplished sense of pacing.

10) Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol - deftly scripted and directed, nail-shreddingly tense action from Brad Bird as he makes his live-action debut. Mixing thrills with chuckles in all the right places, this is one of the best action thrillers I've seen in a long time.


The Technically-In, Technically-Out Mention (because I saw it on January 3rd 2012):

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (2011) - side-stepping the 'perfunctory pit' that so many English-language remakes fall into (Let Me In, please step forward), David Fincher brings his uniquely gifted talent to explore the ever-more-popular international phenomena that is the opening part of the 'Millennium Trilogy'. Fincher brings his remarkable sense of poise and precision to material that's already familiar to millions globally, but still manages to match the original Swedish film punch-for-punch.


Honourable Mentions:

Source Code - certain plot holes aside, Duncan Jones' follow-up to last year's impeccable Moon, is a breezy bit of sci-fi action that may sometimes stumble with logic, but nevertheless puts ideas ahead of fireballs.

Scream 4 - this third sequel rocked up a decade after the dreadful Scream 3 and actually had a little something to say. Most of the wit of the original had returned, and there were even a few good tricks pulled out of the bag. Perhaps it struck home more with those of a nostalgic disposition such as myself: I discovered the original flick during my formative years - initially loving it, then resenting it due to the torrent of tripe cash-ins that it unleashed, only to fall back in-love with it all over again after the horror genre regained its balls in the early 2000's.

The Inbetweeners Movie - the little Brit-flick that could. More like a long episode that doesn't always fire on all cylinders, but for any fan of the cringe-inducingly-good show on E4 must have been happy with this. If you're in-on-the-whole-thing it's great fun, but if you're decidedly on-the-outside-looking-in, you might think otherwise. Personally I'm on the inside having a great old time.

Do note that I usually come to less-mainstream fare after their release year, either through Sky Movies, Film4, the Horror Channel, or DVD/Blu-Ray.

Quadruple Bill Mini (and Cine) Musings: June 2011...

X-Men: First Class:
The first two movies were good-and-great respectively, but the third (Last Stand) was cobbled together style over substance, and then Wolverine was decent fodder but it curiously lacked the depth of X1 and X2 ... and, odder still, it lacked the x-factor (if you'll excuse the pun). Now with this sort-of-reboot for the franchise, we're transported back to the era of the Cuban Missile Crisis and the birth of the X-Men themselves.

The script bounds along quite nicely, although at times it does feel a tad overloaded with characters - which results in the weaker side characters (Salvadore, Banshee, Darwin, Havok) falling into "don't care" territory as our primary focus (and that of the filmmakers) is the main cast of characters, at the heart of which are the young Professor X (Charles) and the young Magneto (Erik). The latter is played thoughtfully by Michael Fassbender, who is fast carving out a career as a quality mix between character actor and leading man. Indeed, it is the central duo (the other half charmingly played by James McAvoy) that provides the main thrust for the script with a growing schism between the two men and how the mutant/human relationship should be carried out.

The movie is most impressive when it is busy delving into the motivating experiences of the leads, and once again the best work in the movie in this respect comes from Fassbender, who really sinks his teeth into the seething want for vengeance possessed by his concentration camp survivor who, as we all know, goes on to become the revenge-fuelled Magneto. It's this superhero-version of the civil rights movement (or indeed any discrimination felt by many in our society) that makes the X-Men franchise stand out, and such deep concerns are key to this prequel.

I initially groaned at the idea of First Class, but down the line here (with smart direction from Matthew "Kick Ass" Vaughn), it makes a lot of sense. While X1 and X2 were probably just a bit better, First Class entirely blows Last Stand out of the stratosphere with ease, and easily beats the not-as-good-as-it-should-have-been Wolverine. In fact, you could go so far as to say it's up there with X1 - although X2 remains the pinnacle of the lot.


Foo Fighters: Back and Forth:
This revealing delve through the backstory and history of one of the most successful bands out there right now is a must-see for any Foo fan. The establishment, and early trials, of the band are of particular interest, in this involving and nicely put-together documentary.


Death At A Funeral:
Surprisingly, and yet curiously unsurprisingly, this apparent black comedy farce from Neil LaBute isn't remotely funny. A drugged-out James Marsden steals the movie, but that evidently wasn't much of a challenge in the first place. I found it dull and didn't connect with it one iota.


The Creature From The Black Lagoon:
One of the classic monster movies from the 1950s - a period filled with so-called B-Movies that were obsessed with science and abominations of nature. This must have been quite a treat when it originally came out in cinemas, and the Creature itself pleasingly remains a creepy vision to behold - not least because of that dead-eyed look as it breathes deep, creeping ever closer to its next victim. I really quite enjoyed it.

X-Men 3...

It's been nice being so late to the X-Men party, because I've been able to enjoy the three-movie run inside a week. A run which has come hot-off-the-heels of the Wolverine movie, and as I've gotten further through the X-Men movie saga, the more I've gotten into it.

I've grown increasingly fond of the first two movies in the past few days since seeing them for the first time ever, and indeed it further cemented Singer's place as a director of quality ... despite that wobble with Superman Returns.

It's a shame then that the quality direction and writing of X1 and X2 didn't hang around for X3 ... because there's a considerable drop in quality in those departments.

The only area where X3 improves on the first two, is in terms of special effects and stuff generally blowing up - everywhere else, it falters seriously at best, and completely goes arse over tit at worst. Instead of trying to write cohesively, I'll just blurt out my complaints/thoughts as they come to me, in a list (it's been about 3 hours, at the time of writing, since I saw X3 for the first time).

* Cyclops has sod all to do before getting killed off out of the blue - lame.

* The 'reason' for Jean Grey not dying is lame.

* The "20 years ago" sequence is actually pretty cool - the 'youthing' of Xavier and Magneto is particularly impressive, and puts the appearance of a 'younger Xavier' in Wolverine to shame alright.

* Gee, let me guess, Rogue's going to get rid of her powers so she can play tonsil-hockey with Ice-Boy ('Man') ... and she bloody well does - thus pissing all over one of the core points in the X-Men series which is, 'don't be ashamed of who you are, and don't let anyone make you think you should change yourself' ... the alternate ending where she didn't go through with changing herself made far more sense.

* Xavier gets killed off - again - lame, plus he didn't seem to have sod all chance. So that's two awesome characters slain in the first half.

* The opening battle is cool - and brave - until you find out it's a simulation, gee, I wonder when that'll come in handy - yes, at the end, surprised? No.

* There's so many characters, and so little running time, that everybody is skimped over completely to the point where most of it doesn't make a lot of sense amidst the constant onslaught of shit blowing up.

* Magneto losing his power is an interesting plot point, although it's tossed into the last ten minutes, but fortunately some quality acting from McKellan makes the best of a bad situation.

* Mystique - yet another character dispensed with willy-nilly (or should that be titty-witty?) - I understand the point of it in the plot, but it's all so rushed - and then she's forgotten about for sodding ages until we get one brief glimpse at a monitor of her apparently giving away the location of Magneto's random woodland camp for his army (why are they in the woods?)

* This bald kid who saps people's powers - he's part of the reason for the entire plot, yet he's barely on screen - then he's rescued from that facility at the end so he can be promptly forgotten about entirely like the actually pointless character that he was.

* Pyro is an even bigger douche than he ever was.

* "I don't swim" - well then steal a boat, or have Magneto float you over the sea on a big sheet of metal - why go to the huge effort of uprooting the famous San Francisco bridge? Clearly (painfully so), it's a meaningless set-piece.

* Yes, throw a ton of flaming cars from the same bridge, but then show a full bridge (chock-a-block of headlights) in the wide shot. Stupid mistake there.

* Blimey, it's Ellen Page.

* Kelsey Grammar's not got a lot to do ... like everyone else ... ah, finally he punches someone.

* Numerous, clunking lines of expositionary dialogue yank you right out of the movie.

* Vinnie Jones ... looking like a giant walking cock ... they even have Ellen Page call him a "dick head" ... geeeeez.

* So Jones' dude can be restrained by thick metal clamps over his limbs and torso in a truck, but encasing him chest-deep in solid concrete does sod all - despite his power being reliant on momentum? Not a lot of sense going on here...but that's what you get in a rushed, hatched-job script.

* The ending they chose is about the best you could get (despite Rogue's stupid decision to lose her power - surely she's no longer eligible to attend the school), but the fact that there's three alternate endings simply goes to show that they had fuck all idea what they wanted in the script.

* That winged dude - what was the point of him? He's one of the least developed characters, and he's purely there to play the same lines we've seen before in X1 and X2 - "mutant is ashamed of self / mutant finds a home at the school / mutant saves the one who disrespected him/her so much in the first place" - an entirely pointless character given sod all to do.

* Fortunately, Hugh Jackman remains the most watchable and best part of X-Men (for me at least, but also many others I think - hence X-Men Origins: Wolverine).

* Tin Man - nifty power, but underacted, underwritten, and generally side-lined ... yes, like almost every other character.

* The final scene is an odd thing - the final punch isn't carried off as well as it could have been, it falls flat for some reason, despite the thankfully subtle nature of the last moment ... but what does work very well is McKellen, who brings some of that Royal Shakespeare Company gravitas to his (and the movie's) final scene. Magneto - robbed of his powers - sits all alone in a park full of old codgers playing chess in pairs, his face full of loneliness and despair. You feel sorry for him, despite him thoroughly deserving it (his cold-hearted ditching of Mystique is reason enough alone - and she was a villainess too!)

That's about all I can think of, off the top of my head, but it's as I figured. I thought X2 was great stuff, so - according to the common theme of reviews online - I was bound to be rather let down by X3 ... and I was. Also, as I'd figured, X3 is the "all action, and basically bugger all else" third act to X1's efficient, introductory first act and X2's grandiose, gap-filling second act.

X3 comes as a real shame - a duff cap-off to two excellent superhero movies which had brain and braun - X3 is as dumb and blunt as Vinnie Jones' Juggernaut. I also wasn't pleased with them killing off not only Cyclops, but Xavier and Jean Grey as well - it felt too harsh, and missing any kind of real redemption.

In the end though, the movie's flaws all come down to the script and the direction. The script is rushed, lacking, confused and misguided with no real direction. The direction is nothing special ... it's paint-by-numbers, it's formulaic, it's mechanical.

When compared to the writing and direction of X1 and X2, there's no similarities to be made on those two fronts, X3 simply fails to meet the standard set by those who came before.

Still ... the action was entertaining (despite the context), Wolverine continued to pwn everything, and the leads all brought their acting chops to the table and more than upheld their part of the deal.

And that was post #299, fact fans - next up, I'll do a run down (in ascending order) of my all time favourite movies (plus, and starting with, the honourable mentions list).

X-Men 2...

Clearly, the success of Spider-Man is written all over X2 - the increased budget, the far more expansive plot, the greater investment in character arcs and so on.

That said, X2 does walk a bit of a wobbly tight-rope between deeply-plot-driven, and simply-too-talky. The action is upped, but so is the running time by a considerable degree - and for the first half anyway, there's not a lot of bang to balance out the character exposition.

Then, particularly in the somewhat overlong third act, the pendulum swings in the completely opposite direction and large scale action mostly takes centre stage.

I've heard mixed reactions to X2 and X3 (I'm still yet to see X3) - some love X2 but hate X3, and some are of completely the opposite view. X2-wise, I did think it was perhaps a bit uneven - some more action earlier on, and less later on would have balanced the whole movie out ... and just thinking about it, the character arcs are a little bit mixed. Understandably, with so many characters, you're going to run into a problem of fleshing people out - I've experienced the issue myself when I was writing a script which had a whole list of characters - but what you do find is that some characters are underdeveloped, and even the ones who take centre stage find themselves cut adrift somewhat.

Mind you, I think X2 works - overall - better than X1 ... not that X1 was bad, not by any stretch of the imagination. X2 certainly feels far more epic, and the budget level feels far more suited to the plot this time around, when compared to X1 and I think that's where the difference lies.

Also, it's quite clear that X2 is the "second act" of a deliberate three-movie run ... and no doubt that's why there has been a varied response from fans. The second act is always the largest, and the one where the most exposition occurs. X1 - the first act in the trilogy, essentially - sets things up efficiently (although you do feel it would have benefitted from a larger budget), and X3 (which I am, at the time of writing, still yet to see) will be - I'd assume - the fairly efficient wham-bam third act loose-ends tie-up of the whole lot.

While X2 might be a bit flabby, it takes what X2 did and takes the simple notion of "more is more" and runs with it quite successfully - more plot, more characterisation, more action. Next up, let's see what X3 is like ... although it not being Singer branded X-Men, and having Vinnie Jones in a daft-looking costume, doesn't do it many favours from a pre-viewing stand point.

That said, I'll no doubt enjoy it - particularly as a three-movie closer - but, like Spider-Man 3, it will no doubt be "not as good as the first two".

X-Men...

What with the release of X-Men Origins: Wolverine, I figured it was about time to catch up on the X-Men movies, so I nabbed myself the 6-disc DVD boxset, and have set about pouring over the flicks.

I liked X-Men ... it's no Spider-Man or Batman Begins (in my view), but it's better than other superhero movies. It's quite well structured, the plot is decent (although it does flag a bit when they start fighting on Liberty Island), but these days it's not the most action-packed superhero movie.

It's like the original Batman movie from 1989 - Burton's flick is positively sedate, and Batman Returns is even more-so - although X-Men has more action than Batman, but I just made the connection as they're the first in a series (if you set aside the campy Batman movie from the sixties), but they also pre-date (by years, or by months) the time when superhero flicks really kicked off grand style.

Spider-Man was one of the first really huge superhero movies - and now we have the likes of The Dark Knight with it's hugest ever hype machine (which it lived up to), and Spider-Man 3 with it's truly epic budget.

X-Men, on the other hand, is a much more moderate affair. Yes, there's a good amount of action, but it's not especially long, nor particularly grandious - what it is, is efficient.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine...

I never saw any of the X-Men movies when they came out, but what with having a consistent posse of mates to go on frequent cinema trips with, there's so many movies to go and see - two of the group were really looking forward to Wolverine - and I thought it looked like fun, so off we went.

In the end, the two who were really looking forward to it came away a bit disappointed (I figured they would, the way they were banging on about it everytime the trailer was shown).

This said, it's not trash, it's a good bit of fun and I had fun watching it - despite not being someone who read the comic books, nor watched the kids cartoon (although I do remember the themetune, recently heard for the first time in years at a birthday party), and - when I saw Wolverine in the cinema - I had not seen the X-Men movies either.

Mind you, this being an origin story, it's not necessary - and indeed, I can view it in chronological order - Origins first, then the X-Men movies - and indeed, I've now seen the first X-Men movie (I got the 6-disc box set for a few quid, probably like a lot of other folk who love a bargain in a recession).

Action wise, Wolverine was packing heat - I've seen hotter action, but I've also seen far colder action ... if I dare draw that dodgy metaphor any further ... but I did think that in the last 30 minutes plot mostly went out of the window and was replaced by punching. Enjoyable punching, but also a little bit lacking.

Also, I would have very much liked the 'Wolverine through the ages' war montage (Civil War through Vietnam) to have been it's own 15 minute segment. I felt like the point where Wolverine 'goes solo' came far too quickly - we were there inside 15 minutes, when it really should have been at the 30 minute marker.

Or am I just seeking indulgence - the sight of Logan, chomping on a cigar, Thompson machine gun in hand, stepping off a troop transport onto the Normandy beaches was made of "pure win", quite frankly. More of that please, a little bit of indulgence now and then is a good thing after all.

For someone, such as I, who hasn't seen anything X-Men before (but was aware of it), Origins fills in all the right blank spots at the same time as acting as good fodder for the fans. Hugh Jackman is an absolute joy to watch as Wolverine (heck, the man just has the X factor ... and I don't mean having that shitty tv show taped on his DVR), it never truly stumbles (but it never truly thrills your pants off) and generally, well, it's a solid effort.

That whole bit where Logan was charging about on the motorbike was awesome though, as was the whole war montage.