First post in this long neglected blog.
So yeah First Class was surprisingly good. Considering I really wasn't expecting much from the trailers it put the previous X-Men films to shame. Looking back at the original trilogy (let's just ignore Wolverine: Origins *shudder*) they haven't really stood the test of time. As summer action films they're pretty good but watching them in light of First Class made me realise that despite being fairly faithful to the source material they didn't really make me invest in the characters despite the great casting. Maybe this was down to having such a large cast that only a handful of main characters got any real development and even then they played second fiddle to the action scenes.
First Class on the other hand manages to strike a near perfect balance of action, plot and character development.
The plot really captures a sense of time well and conveys the uncertainty that was prevalent at the time of the Cuban missile crisis. By the end we see all of humanity finally ending the cold war and getting ready to move into the modern world but at the same time entering a new age of fear and using that new found cooperation to start a new war against mutant kind.
Kevin Bacon is marvelous as Sebastian Shaw and pretty much drives the entire plot along by playing the various factions off against each other and really plays the role like a great Bond villain who just happens to have super powers.
It's hard not to draw comparisons to Bond but also the Austin Powers films with the Hellfire Club which is so kitsch it's almost laughable.
For all this is billed as the story of Charles Xavier and Erik Leshnerr the two of them are never really developed and apart from the comradely of being mutants we're really just told that they're friends and never really shown why. It's a shame because James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender work so well together that you still buy the friendship despite the lack of substance.
The rest of the cast don't slouch either despite being made up of largely B list X-Men characters and the younger cast members seem like much more of a team than the members from the chronological sequels. There is one point where we see the younger members partying which seems aimed at the teenage audience but just comes across as a bit cheesy and pointless.
Still for every bad scene there is a great one. Watching Xavier and Magneto train the youngsters in a 80s style montage is absolutely brilliant and has some genuine laugh out loud moments in particular Banshee's training and everyone's favourite Canadian furball makes a welcome cameo.
The action scenes deserve a special mention because these days it seems like too many films go with endless fast cuts and mass battles but First Class keeps it simple and you're never left wondering what you just saw but still have a sense of epic scale. Remember how bad ass that scene with the bridge in X3 was? Well it rivals that several times.
Perhaps the biggest flaw is the films need to keep continuity with the previous films so inevitable sequels.
If the makers had just billed this as a straight reboot then it would have been fine but now they've painted themselves into a corner where they're going to have to keep it up but as long as they continue to make them as well as they made this one then I'm willing to forgive the odd slip up.
***Slight spoilers***
I just have to mention Mystique here. For me she was the most interesting character in the movie and watching her be rejected by some of her own kind including Xavier who she thinks of as a brother is genuinely moving.
Some people have complained that it detracts from the movie but I disagree. At a time when mutation isn't out in the public eye it's understandable how even other mutants would still have more normal standards of beauty and why it's easier to fit in when your mutations are easily hidden. If anything it humanises the other mutants and stops them from coming across as flawless.
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