i am looking forward to the sequel

Rating: 7/10 (18 July 2000)

I know absolutely nothing about the X-Men. I went with a guy who did and he was like a guide. He explained things to me about the characters that I needed to know. But after a while I began to realize that it was unneccessary for him to do so. The film did a pretty good job of explaining it all to me. And I was impressed.
There was much left to be desired in this film but I think that was by design. I wanted to know more about Professor X and Magnetto. I wanted to know more about their friendship and their rivalry. How did it start, how did it get to the point it's at now and so on. But that is also a credit to the makers of the film because there is obviously enough material here to make a dozen films.
What I enjoyed most about the film was that the bad guys were not really cut and dried bad. There was no true villain. I guess you could say that Magnetto's henchmen ( and henchwoman ) were more evil than not, but Magnetto was an interesting study. This is a man who was in a Nazi death camp and he is being ostracized from society by humans that can't and won't accept another species as being better in some way than they are. The subleties of racism are not subtle here. There is a great line in the film when Magnetto says something to the affect of "Humans are always afraid of what they can't understand." How true. There is also a scene in here that shows humans experimenting on a mutant and that is similar to what we do to animals. Mutants are treated like lab rats but what one of the underlying subtleties of the film says is that everyone and everything should be treated equal. It is not up to us to play God and decide that just because someone or something is different than us that we should should arbitrarilly exterminate them. This is a deep movie disguised as a slam bam summer flick. I guess now I am just learning what comic book fans have known all along....X-Men is a great story, with many layers to it.
My favourite character is Wolverine. Not only is he Canadian, but he is a rogue and quite the bad ass. He reminds me of a bit between a cross of Han Solo and Luke Skywalker. He is abrasive and cocky like Han and he hasn't quite learned how to control and utilize his ability quite yet, like Luke in Star Wars. I would like to see him learn more about himself and his ability in the sequels to come. In fact, I am looking forward to the sequels just so I can learn more about all of these characters. My friend told me that there is a lot more to the X-Men than what we saw on screen and he said that Wolverine and Sabretooth hate each other and are always battling. That is something I am looking forward to with great anticipation. And of course, I want to know more about Magnetto and Professor X. This series should be treated as if no one knew anything about the history of the comic books. If it does so, this could really be a James Bond type series where it spans 4 or 5 decades.
I enjoyed this film. As I left the theater I wasn't quite sure what to think. It was good but it took me a while for it to sink in. Once it did, I realized that this is a great film and the fact that it introduced the characters just enough to garner my interest is also a bonus. I am now looking forward to perhaps 2002 to see the already greatly anticipated sequel.
7.5 out of 10.... I have a feeling the next X-Men is going to be even better. There is so much more that I want to know and learn about these characters and a sequel is almost a guarantee. This is a great summer film and I look forward to seeing all of the characters back for the next one. And one word of advice to the writers....
Give Toad more to say next time. He was funny and he cracked me up with his childish like antics.