Sunday, June 5, 2011

Spotlight: X-Men: First Class (James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Kevin Bacon, Jennifer Lawrence, January Jones, Rose Byrne)

 
Hello everyone I saw X-Men: First Class last night and let me tell you for a prequel to the original trilogy it is amazing. Let’s get into the review, warning this may be a long review as I want to give each actor credit where it should be given.

X-Men: First Class was directed by Matthew Vaughn, who directed Kick-Ass last year as well as produced movies such as Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch. This movie was produced by the same men who did the original X-Men movies, Simon Kinberg, Lauren Shuler Donner, and Bryan Singer as well as Gregory Goodman who has produced Gulliver’s Travels and The Day The Earth Stood Still. This film was made by such studios as Marvel Entertainment and Bad Hat Harry Productions. Please excuse the extensive cast list that comes before the summary and review. These actors really do deserve some props:


James McAvoy (Wanted, Atonement, The Last King Of Scotland) plays Professor Charles Xavier, Laurence Belcher plays the young version of this character.
Michael Fassbender (Band Of Brothers, Inglourious Basterds, Hunger) plays Erik Lehnsherr/Magneto, Bill Milner (Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, Son Of Rambow) plays the young version of this character.
Kevin Bacon (The Woodsman, Apollo, Murder In The First) plays Sebastian Shaw a leader of a group of hostile mutants, named Hellfire Club, as well as being a scientist.
Jennifer Lawrence (Winter’s Bone, The Burning Plain, The Poker House) plays Raven/Mystique, Morgan Lily (2012, Flipped) plays the young version of this character.
January Jones (Mad Men, Anger Management) plays Emma Frost/White Queen who is part of the Hellfire Club.
Rose Byrne (Bridesmaids, Insidious, Get Him To The Greek) plays Dr. Moira Mactaggert.
Nicholas Hoult (Clash Of The Titans, A Single Man, About A Boy) plays Dr. Henry “Hank” McCoy/Beast..
Oliver Platt (2012, Year One, The Big C) plays The Man In Black, the CIA agent who is head of the agency working with the mutants.
Zoë Kravitz (Californication, Assassination Of A High School President) plays Angel Salvadore, a mutant with the wings of a housefly that also spits acidic saliva.
Caleb Landry Jones (Summer Song, The Social network, The Last Exorcism) plays Sean Cassidy/Banshee, a mutant who has the ability of supersonic screaming and flight.
Lucas Till (Battle: Log Angeles, The Spy Next Door, Walk The Line) plays Alex Summers/Havok, a mutant who has the ability to absorb energy and discharge it as blasts.
Edi Gathegi (Twilight, Crank, My Bloody Valentine) plays Armando Muñoz/Darwin, a mutant with the power of “reactive evolution.”
Jason Flemyng (The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button, Mirrors, Stardust) plays Azazel, a Hellfire Club member who has the ability to teleport.
Álex González plays Janos Quested/Riptide, a mutant who has the ability to create whirlwinds.
Hugh Jackman and Rebecca Romijn also make cameo appearances as Logan/Wolverine and Mystique.


This movie first takes place in 1944 as we see Erik Lensherr being forced by Sebastian Shaw to use his magnetic powers. When he is not able to use them Shaw kills Erik’s mother, which leads to Erik using his anger to kill two guards and destroy the room. During the same time we also see Charles Xavier meeting Raven, he invites her to live with his family as he is happy to meet someone “different” like himself. The rest of the movie is based in the year 1962, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, as Shaw tries to start World War 3. Xavier and Raven are employed by the government to try to help them with Saw and the Hellfire Club and he ends up helping and meeting Lensherr. They then start up a mutant division in the CIA and also recruit other mutants they can find by using Cerebro, which was made by Hank McCoy. They recruit Angel Salvadore, Armando Munoz, Alex Summers, and Sean Cassidy. I think this is enough of a spoiler….

First off I’d like to say that this movie was very well done, it had some problems but it was good. The special effects were awesome and the visuals were amazing. I really liked how they made this movie and how they showed how Xavier and Magneto’s relationship began. I really liked the part when Xavier training the mutants to be their best, the multiple video went well with this part and it made it look amazing. Many of the lines were very witty and there was many comical lines that would only be funny to a fan of the series. Erik’s early life was well shown and would make you emotional when he loses his mother. I have heard that this movie did miss some points that should have been addressed. One was the fact that Mystique and Azazel never began any sort of relationship, since they are the parents of Nightcrawler. This may come in the sequels though, so it isn’t too much as a fault as it could be for now. I guess since it would have made for a longer story, they changed the way that Xavier came to be wheelchair bound. I think the original reason was because of the confrontation with the Shadow King, as I have read online, but I have also heard it was because of an incident with Juggernaut. Either way I know the way they showed in the film was just a quick way to show it happened. Although this movie had some parts that weren’t exactly to the comics, it is a very good movie and you should all go see it. I give it a 4.5 because although this is the beginning of the X-Men, they could have made it a little closer to the comics.



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