A comic-based film that actually doesn't suck!

Rating: Null/10 (20 September 2000)

Times are really changing. I'm old enough to remember fairly regular announcements of my favorite comics characters preparing to leap to silver-screen glory, only to fall dismally short, usually mired in abusrd circuses of litigation. I'm also old enough to recall the slide of the "Superman" series into camp hokum, as well as the period in the mid-80's where former Marvel honcho Stan Lee apparently went insane, selling his company's entire character catalogue to the schmucks who made all those Chuck Norris movies. I don't have the room to go into the results, even if I wanted to.
After all that, to watch hopefully as Tim Burton saved the comics world in '89 -then to watch in disbelief as Joel Schumacher turned the character into a Sydney Mardi Gras float- drained me of my enthusiasm for comic-based films by the time "X-Men" was finally greenlit.
Well, I always enjoy a film that manages to surprise me! I finally caught a matinee of "X-Men," and it did indeed surprise me. I won't waste words on a play-by-play synopses, if you've seen it, you already have an opinion and if you haven't, I'll simply say you wouldn't be wasting your money or time on this movie. What more can you ask for these days?
It's a simple enough story, told quite effectively; instead of simply hashing over your basic good versus evil spandex grudge-match, Singer and Co. give us an intelligent yet fanciful picture of warring ideologies with the stakes at their most extreme. In the X-Men themselves, we find heroes whom -despite their awesome powers- are as paradoxically complex and ordinary as we are. Even the villains are afforded a strangely refreshing tragic dignity beneath their grotesque surfaces.
Naturally, a great deal of the credit for the success of this film has been bestowed upon Patrick Stewart and (Sir) Ian McKellen, and they do deserve credit just for agreeing to appear in a movie the more effete critics will see as beneath them. Mr. McKellen is to be commended for rising Erik "Magneto" Lensherr above a villain, into an angry and misguided victim exploiting his special talents for a most ironic revenge. The film's bedrock, the role of Charles Xavier is obviously no strain on Mr. Stewart's talent, but he deserves gratitude for never playing down to the film or its audience.
Still, it's the supporting cast -all relative newcomers- whom the die-hard fans will turn out in droves for, and they shouldn't be disappointed. I don't claim to be an expert when it comes to the history and characterizations of the X-Men, but I was pleasantly surprised at how accurately they were portrayed, as well as how well they were portrayed. Mr. Jackman and "The Piano's" Ms. Paquin in particular provided welcome surprises in their respective pivotal roles as the semi-feral misfit Logan and the lonely, sensitive runaway who calls herself Rogue. Famous covergirls Fammke Jansen, Halle Berry and Rebecca Romijn-Stamos, as well as teen idol James Marsden, also contribute solid, dimensional performances in their surprisingly well-scripted parts. Pro-wrestler Tyler Mane, as Victor "Sabertooth" Creed, does well with what little of the film he is given, as does red-hot stuntman Ray Park -whose Darth Maul stole the show in "Star Wars: Episode 1"- as the incredibly agile Mortimer "Toad" Toynbee.
In a movie like this, one would normally expect the pre-requisite over-indulgence of special visual effects to glaze over any weaknesses or inconsistencies. Wisely -and thankfully- the filmmakers chose to throttle back substantially on the visuals, which are confined mostly to the battle sequences, and used sparingly throughout the rest of the film; mostly to illustrate the extent of the powers of Xavier's youthful charges. And frankly, I'm pleased to report there aren't really many serious weaknesses or inconsistencies in the film to warrant such glitzy excesses.
Given the generally somber tone, and themes of the storyline (fanaticism, alienation, militant philosophy), "X-Men" will probably never achieve the revered classic status of 1978's "Superman: The Movie" (ironically, Richard Donner is one of this film's producers). But thanks to its razor-sharp production style and quirky humor, it will likely be every bit as influential, if not a fair bit smarter than Tim Burton's 1989 "Batman."