Reviews

I thought that another reboot couldn't possibly be worse than the original campy series or the campy '90s movie. I was wrong.

The first three segments are all about the teenagers insufferably whining. There's no action at all during this part, nor are the characters doing anything to make us root for them. It's all bad cliché family drama stuff.

Finally, an alien ship attacks, but we don't know who the aliens are or why they're attacking. They're generic "bad aliens" and do nothing to increase the interest of what's happening.

I find it nearly impossible to believe that this came from John Woo, a director who knows how to shoot more exciting films than this, and Doug Petrie, a really good writer from the Joss Whedon camp. I don't know how this went so wrong, but it did indeed go very wrong.

Seek this out to satisfy your curiosity alone. I can very much see why the WB didn't pick this up for a series.

In the late 90's, Jack and Kathy Riley wrote an excellent script called "After the Truth," a thriller/legal drama about a German lawyer who found himself unwillingly having to defend "the Butcher of Brussels" in court. I was fortunate enough to read a copy of this script before I saw the film; it was exciting and fascinating, and the moral of the story - to cherish every life - was abundantly clear.

Unfortunately, the English-language script ended up getting made by a German production company. Whether something just ended up getting lost in the translation, or whether changes were made for other aesthetic reasons, the finished product doesn't really resemble the original script.

The main character is changed from a sympathetic, family-loving character who is put in a bad situation, into an unsympathetic character who's mean to his wife and seems to partly agree with the "Butcher." As another poster commented, one gets the impression that the "Butcher" thinks of himself as noble and that no one is willing to challenge him on this.

So while I agree that the film doesn't quite work, I would hasten to add that the original intent of the Rileys' script was not truly maintained. So for any potential bad messages in the film, the blame cannot be laid at their feet.

To be fair, the film has some good acting, and there are some chilling moments as well. Besides, this is (I believe) the first German-language film that even acknowledges that the Holocaust ever happened. Surely that's a step forward, isn't it?

When franchises switch directors, it's always a scary thing. Fortunately, this isn't Batman Forever. Unfortunately, part of me wishes it were *more* like that film: rather than being too campy, this movie was often too depressing and self-important, like most modern blockbusters.

Oh, if only Joss Whedon had been allowed to direct this. On Buffy the Vampire Slayer, major character deaths are motivated by the needs of the story. In this movie, I felt like all the deaths were motivated by contract negotiations gone awry.

James Marsden has never been happy with being in these movies, so Scott was changed from a pretty cool character in the other films (IMHO) into a complete loser who gets offed easily in the first 10 minutes. Then, apparently because Patrick Stewart wants out of the franchise, the audience has to watch as Professor X gets his very skin ripped off his body. It's painful and unnecessary. Couldn't these characters have given themselves in the final battle instead? (BTW, how do you like the Professor's strategy? "Let me go into Jean's house alone, so that she can kill me easier." Good thinking, Prof. Haven't you seen any horror movies?) And what happened to Rogue's character arc? She was the helpless victim in X1, then (if I remember right) she became more of a hero in X2. Now she's just worried about her boyfriend (whatever she claims, it was about him) and she gives up all her powers. She seems happier, which totally contradicts the whole "we don't need to be cured" theme.

Jean Grey died a very cool, sacrifical death in X2. Unfortunately, that's where it should have stayed. "Pheonix" turned out to be nothing but Famke Janssen standing there looking stoned while the special effects whirred and whizzed around her. She was just out of control; there was no motivation for anything she did. When she died the first time, I felt bad for her; when she died the second time, it was like putting a mutt out of its misery.

I really wanted to see a struggle between the two sides of Jean's personality. If she hadn't killed Scott and the Professor so early on, there could have been some suspense over whether or not she would be redeemed. Instead, it was obvious from the get-go that she needed to be killed.

While everyone else is getting smaller roles, I-won-an-Oscar-so-I've-got-a-huge-ego-now Halle Berry finally got a bigger role, as she asked for. While Storm was an interesting supporting character in previous installments, she now inexplicably takes lead for everything, including the running of the school. I was keenly aware of the writers having to pull strings every time she suddenly took charge of things.

Other things I didn't like: There was an unusual amount of gore in this film - it pushed the upper edges of PG-13, to be sure. Did we really need to see that many characters explode on screen, especially a couple that we cared about? I was ticked that the Sentinels showed up only briefly in a holographic test, rather than in the actual movie.

I missed the bit at the end, because no one warned us in advance. But I'm disgusted that the filmmakers hedged their bets after all that. I no longer want to see X4 after this.

Whew. OK. Didn't I say I like this film? I did. Here's the good stuff: Grammar was perfect as Beast. I found him totally believable in the dialogue scenes, and the audience cheered when he started kicking butt near the end. Kitty Pryde - both the action scenes and the love triangle. Juggernaut was great, scoring some of the few funny lines in the whole film. Mckellen was awesome as usual, providing the gravitas necessary to make Magneto believable. Angel was cool. And some of the fight scenes were amazing, and actually had the audience (including myself) cheering.

And it was nice to see Rebecca Romjin as a human for a change. She's one of the most gorgeous women alive, yet the filmmakers somehow managed to make her hideous for the last three films. So this was a welcome change.

So, actually...it was a decent film, but not good enough to warrant a continuation of the series.

And the dialogue and acting in this film is still better than Revenge of the Sith. In spite of all the acclaim that film received, this one is actually a better film (though I expect a larger negative lashback).