Review #743: 'X-Men' (2000)

It's hard to believe that back in 2000, Marvel's first crack at creating a superhero universe on the big screen, X-Men, was a near perfect summer movie. 14 years on, and the cracks are as clear as day in Bryan Singer's hesitant and rather tame blockbuster. Don't get me wrong, X-Men still has plenty to enjoy, but the meatier, more confident recent efforts such as Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy and Marvel's own Iron Man (2008) and Thor (2011), as well as the vastly superior sequel two years later, form a rather large shadow over Professor X and his pupils' first outing.

In the near future, evolution has taken a huge leap forward, creating 'mutants' - humans with special powers and abilities that defy anything science has seen before. Tensions between humans and mutants is at an all-time high, with the idea of mutant cataloguing being passed around by Senator Kelly (Bruce Davison), despite the efforts of telepaths Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and Jean Grey (Famke Janssen). Mutant Magneto (Ian McKellen), a Holocaust survivor with the ability to control anything magnetic, has different ideas, and plans to induce mutation on world leaders gathering on Ellis Island.

As the machine, powered by magnetics, could easily kill him, Magneto seeks Rogue (Anna Paquin), a young girl with the ability to temporarily steal a mutant's power. Having just met Wolverine (Hugh Jackman), a beast of a man with a skeleton covered in an indestructible metal, which he can shoot out like claws, and an uncanny healing ability, Rogue's abduction fails and is foiled by Storm (Halle Berry) and Cyclops (James Marsden). They end up in Professor Xavier's school for gifted children, where Wolverine learns about mutant struggle and falls in love with the powerful Jean Grey.

With a film this packed with personalities and powers, it's only natural that it loses it's grip on a lot of its characters. Sensibly, the main focus is on Wolverine, who has always been the most interesting X-Man, and is perfectly played by Jackman, a performance that made him a huge star. The rest of the characters, with the exception of Professor X and Magneto, do little but fall flat. They either suffer because their powers aren't particularly interesting, or spend the duration of the film using what little dialogue they have to explain who they are and what they can do. The movie also has one of the worst lines in cinema history, uttered by Storm. You'll know it when you hear it.

For all its lack of ambition and absence of any real set-pieces, X-Men is still the first of its kind. Refusing to give in to the idea of comic books being light, colourful and mainly for kids (which was still the general idea back in 2000), the opening scene depicting a young Magneto in a concentration camp ensures this is something that should be taken seriously, yet still enjoyed. Singer grew in confidence and made X2 two years later, which is still considered by myself and many others to be one of the best superhero movies ever made. X2 showed that the vast ensemble can be given room to breathe, and had the set-pieces to match, and in hindsight, makes X-Men a much tamer, yet still very entertaining, animal.


Directed by: Bryan Singer
Starring: Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen, Famke Janssen, James Marsden, Halle Berry, Anna Paquin, Bruce Davison, Rebecca Romijn
Country: USA

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie