Action movie for the not-so Brain Dead

Rating: Null/10 (21 August 2000)

Hollywood often goes for the easy option - make an action movie with tons of brilliant action sequences or sfx and forget about the plot or background story. X-Men doesn't do this, instead it is a very intelligent, and well founded story packed with enough action to make you sit up and take notice.
The film's premise is acceptance and tolerance - and our attitudes to other things other than the "norm". However it doesn't seem to question "what is the norm, and whom defines the norm".
A brutal example of this is where the film starts out in Poland 1944 - where we see Magneto as a child being ripped apart from his loving family and his family sent to the death camps, this was pretty dark and gritty - yet it didn't have that real kick to it that it needed.
It has Magento played by the maginficent Sir Ian McKellen - sigining McKellen as Magento was a master stroke - but alas his on-screen scenes with Stewart (as Professor Xavier) were far and few between, I wanted more of them.
The film, although a tad silly does have brilliant SFX, sometimes you hardly notice it - your not meant to, your meant to sit back and enjoy this film - and I did.
It was a shame that Ray Park's fighting skills were not on screen as they were in Phantom Menance - and its a shame we weren't told why Sabretooth hated Wolverine or why Magento didn't realise his brain was scanned when sexy Famke Jannsen was using that mind enhasing machine...
Apart from this the film is a good intelligent film - its a shame they were little holes in the plot or script, and its a shame that the end scene's on the Statue of Liberty were never the climax it was meant to be - its a good film, but its an action film, no more - no less.