20th Century Fox
Rated PG-13
Running time: 132 minutes
In 20th Century Fox and Marvel Entertainment's X-MEN: FIRST CLASS, you see the origins of Charles Xavier, James McAvoy, and Erik Lehnsherr/Magneto Michael Fassbender as they form a team of mutants - humans born with an evolutionary X-gene allowing them to develop unusual abilities - to prevent evil mutant Sebastian Shaw, Kevin Bacon from creating the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 and thus starting a Nuclear War.
This prequel to the X-MEN series is a better origin story then even the original X-MEN. This is not a children's film, even if there are mutant teenagers in the film, but a mature adult film. You get into the backgrounds of the characters, some of which are the ancestors of future mutants - and the reason why some mutants, who were originally good, decide to join the evil Brotherhood of Mutants due to their need of a surrogate family abused and persecuted in the same way they have. As Xavier and Magneto, McAvoy and Fassbender were originally friends - but their ideologies drifted them apart, such as Jewish Fassbender's vengeful search for Bacon for manipulating Fassbender's genetic ability after surviving the Holocaust - until McAvoy and Fassbender finally wind up on opposite sides of mutants evolutionary place in the world. The film deals with the mutants problem of acceptance, not only from the "normal" society of humans - but also from themselves. Some mutants are even more mutant than others. This causes a deep great feeling of abnormalcy in the mutants and they would do anything to become "normal." As Raven/Mystique Jennifer Lawrence says "Mutant - and proud of it!"
The film is also very political dealing with both the Holocaust and the Cuban Missile Crisis in the film, and with breaking news stock footage of President John F. Kennedy adding a sense of realism to the story. The international feeling with German, Russian and other languages, languages that become sub-titled in the movie, makes the story more worldly than just a setting at home in Washington D.C. or New York. This is similar in feeling to the Bond films.
While the movie adds some mutant characters that I do not recall from the X-MEN comic books, they add to the film, even if we really do not get to know them. Moira MacTaggert's, Rose Byrne, origin is different from the comic books since she is now a CIA agent investigating the Hellfire Club and mutant connection, but it explains the relationship she has with McAvoy. Oliver Platt's talent was pretty much wasted as the CIA Man in Black in charge of putting together the Mutant Project, as he had very little to do and was made the butt of jokes, but he was responsible for engineering Cerebro - the mutant locator. Watching trained mutants fight is amazing to see as they kick ass with their powers. The X-Men flying the SR-71 Blackbird was pretty cool. The Hellfire Club was great to see, but after it's initial introduction, you do not see it much anymore except for Bacon's few mutants - like the White Queen Emma Frost, January Jones. This is a shame as the Hellfire Club is a high profile political and business club. I would like to see more mutant political maneuvering from the Hellfire Club in future movies.
The uncredited cameo of Hugh Jackman was priceless.
Rated PG-13 for violence, language, and sexual situations. Running time: 132 minutes
Pancho
All people smile in the same language.
