Movie of the Week: X-Men First Class

I just got back from the first truly excellent movie of the Summer (please calm down fans of Bridesmaids and Midnight In Paris, both of which I enjoyed, but not as much as X-Men: First Class).  I was not sure about X-Men: First Class, mainly because the trend established by the extremely disappointing X-Men 3 and the crime against humanity that was X-Men Origins: Wolverine seemed to indicate that a 5th X-Men film would lead to mass suicide.  Instead it is a near-perfect Summer movie.  There will be no spoilers in this review, but here is the general breakdown of my X-Men experience:

Kips Bay 10:45 am: The Prelude

I arrived at the theater at 10:45 and the good news for the makers of the movie is that the theater was nearly packed, which I rarely see for the pre-noon $6 movies at AMC Theaters.  As the lights came down I was nervous about the crowd.  A young woman in the back row was texting and some older man yelled, “Turn that fu*king thing off!” To which she replied, “Hey, there are little children present,” speaking of the young children with her.  She was right, but I was fixated on the old man who appeared to be the Ghost of J-L Future.  And by future I mean me at the next movie I see.

As if the rumble behind me was not enough, to my right was a woman who shockingly turned off her phone before the movie began.  I say shockingly because, much like Austin Powers after he was unfrozen, she had no inner-monologue.  She spoke during every preview to herself and approximately every 3 minutes during the movie.  But I think she may have had some mild cognitive impairment (or was just sort of dumb) so I only threw one soda at her to try and make her shut up.

Lastly, before the movie began, I saw a preview for Rise of the Planet of the Apes, which is now my most anticipated movie of the Summer (no offense Transformers 3 and your Birth of a Nation portrayal of black men-inspired robots). Here is the preview:

So after hearing an old man curse out a young mom in front of her kids, sitting next to a woman who could not shut up and seeing a preview about apes taking over the world it was time for X Men.

The Main Event: X-Men First Class

For my money the greatest movie I have ever seen in a Summer is The Dark Knight.  It worked on any level – as a great film that could have been released during Oscar season or as a great popcorn Summer film experience.  X-Men: First Class is not at that level, but it still scores very high as a Summer movie.  And it is a good movie overall, but my effusive praise for it must be considered relatively.  That said,  it is the best movie of the Summer so far and I don’t think second place is close.

The movie delivers everything you want from a Summer movie and it delivers it well.  The acting is very good across the board, the effects are big and exciting, there are funny cameos and funny dialogue, neither of which feel forced or cheesy (contrast this to the humor found in most moments of the Transformer films).  Additionally, as expected, there are origin stories, which always make first installments of superhero movies fun (contrast this to one of the things I hated about Thor – it told his origin of how he came to Earth, but not how he got jacked (P90X?) and how his hammer became the baddest weapon in the universe).  And lastly X-Men: First Class has training montages, which any fan of Rocky IV can tell you make for fun viewing:

The stand outs

The cast is loaded with both stars and people that you will go – “Oh that guy/girl is in this too?!”  But there are three that stand out for me.  James McAvoy is great as the young Charles Xavier, Jennifer Lawrence, Oscar nominee from Winter’s Bone, is great as Mystique, mainly because it is just a matter of time before she is named Esquire’s sexiest woman alive.

And lastly, Michael Fassbender is the dominant force in the movie as the man who becomes Magneto.  He literally looks like Don Draper if Don Draper gave up cigarettes and booze for a personal trainer and a GNC.  He dominates the screen and has the most depth of any character in the movie (besides seeing how the villain becomes the villain is always great).  Sadly, his accent becomes very inconsistent in the last half hour of the movie, which was sort of disappointing given how great he was for most of the movie.

The only negative in the movie is the jumping from location to location in the first hour of the movie is a little cluttered.  It feels like there are about 17 different locations in the first 40 minutes of the movie.  The jumping around does not make the film confusing, but rather, gives the early moments a slightly cheap feeling, as if someone was trying to make shortcuts in the screenplay.

Overall, if you are a fan of superhero movies, summer blockbusters or well-made action movies I find it hard to believe that you will leave disappointed.  Grade: A-