X-Men 3
**
The first X-Men movie was decent. It was a little rough around the edges, but it did a great job of introducing the characters and the main themes that have always been at the core of X-Men stuff. Then Brian Singer took everything that working in X-Men and built off of it to create X2, which is right up there with the best superhero movies made during this recent wave of them. There were some amazing FX sequences, but at its hart, what made X2 really work was that it made you care about the characters. It did a great job of accentuating the bigotry and persecution that the X-Men have faced throughout their history, especially through Brian Cox's fantastic villain William Stryker.
Now with Singer off to direct Superman Returns, Brett Ratner has stepped for X-Men 3: The Last Stand (as a sidenote, was this honestly the best subtitle they could come up with). Ratner tries to remain faithful to the precedents set by Singer in the first two chapters, but ultimate it feels like he created "X-Men Lite." By that I mean it sets up as much if not more story than the first two, but never really lets any of it develop, instead giving way to big action scenes, which, though they look impressive, are not necessary at all in many cases. The movie only runs for about an hour and 45 minutes, almost half an hour shorter than X2, supposedly in part because of how much filiming was rushed to get the movie out in time for Memorial Day. In this short space the movie tries to tell both the film version of the Dark Phoenix saga that was hinted at by the end of the 2nd film, while also following another plot regarding a "mutant cure" being developed. The movie never really slows down to give either of these story lines the exposition they need, and the movie ends up feeling very disjointed and not very emotionally hitting.
SPOILERS FROM THIS POINT ON
I didn't find much of the story incredibly effective, but the entire subplot with Jean Grey seemingly ressurected as the Phoenix was a complete mess. I didn't think it was absolutely necessary for the next movie just because of the one shot of the Phoenix in the water from X2's ending, and trying to cram it into this movie when its already trying to go in a totally different direction with the mutant cure premise was clearly a mistake. None of the stuff from the original comic book version of the Phoenix saga involving aliens and spaceships was included because the audience wouldn' t buy it, but the explanation given here is no less absurd. At the showing I was at there was audible laughter as Professor X explains how Jean Grey "wrapped herself in a cacoon of telekenetic energy." He then vaults himself into a big explanation about psychic barriers in Jean's head evidently somehow giving her multiple personally disorder. All of this would've been fine with me if we were allowed to see more of what's going on in Jean Grey's head, but in the next scene we see of Jean Grey break out of the X-Men and basically totally succumb to the Phoenix side of her personality. Before she's captured, we see her arise from the water at Alkali Lake and attack Scott. We see like a 2 second shot of Scott apparently being hurt and then later an explanation by Wolverine that he suspects that she killed him, but that's it. Cyclops is the leader of the X-Men and is at the forefront of both of the previous two films, and yet he's killed in an emotionless scene maybe 20 minutes into the film. This point is entirely ignored until we see a brief shot of his grave next to Jean's at the very end of the movie. Really, the Phoenix effect didn't really work for me. They tried to give Jean a very demonic sort appearance with the help of some CGI, but I thought it was one of the least effective effects in a movie that really had some pretty good ones.
Ian McKellon is good again as Magneto, and he manages to at least keep his side of the story fairly interesting. Magneto has always been an effective villain because he doesn't see himself as one, and there are several good scenes to that effect in X-Men 3, like when he takes the stage at an underground mutant rally trying to convince its audience that the so-called voluntary mutant cure will actually be used to exterminate the mutant population. Kelsey Grammer wasn't bad as The Beast, but not much was done with him. People would weren't familiar at all with X-Men would've gotten the whole "he looks really scary, but he's actually really smart" concept, but that's about it and The Beast is a much deeper character than that.
The movie does have some good moments. The opening scene with a much younger Professor X and Eric Leinshier going to visit Jean Grey was a good scene to get the audience primed again for the X-Men universe after a couple years layoff since X2. I thought the scene where Logan fights his way up to Jean and kills her not only looked cool, but was probably the most moving scene of the movie (in comparision to Professor X's death, where he just sort of shatters into a million pieces in a fairly cheesy effect).
The movie's ending(s) in particular left a bad taste in my mouth. Firstly, we see Magneto seemingly able to move a metal chess piece just as the credits begin to roll. If you remove the last shot of Magneto moving the piece, I think it becomes an excellent scene that brings the tragedy of his character full circle. Instead it becomes a dime a dozen cheesy cliff-hanger ending. Then for good measure they added an "after the credits" scene where it is implied at Professor X is still alive. I think its also very much noteworthy that Scott's dead body is never seen, nor anything to suggest to the audience "Yeah, he's gone for good." Watching the ending I could almost hear the studio execs sitting around saying "Okay, we need to leave ourselves an out in case we want to make X-Men 4."
Is X-Men 3 a horrible movie? I would say no (I do know some people who would say a resounding yes). The climactic action sequences genuinely did hold my interest, and it retained at least a glimmer of what made the Singer movies work. But to me it was somewhat sloppily done, the focus seemingly more on cool special effects rather than fleshing about the story. I'm not going to pretend like SFX sequences don't make for an exicting movie because they do, but X-Men at its core for all its laser blasts and adamantium claws has always been a very human story, with ethical and philosophical issues. The sense of humanity wasn't there in this movie and it needed to be at least 20-30 minutes longer for any of the characters to properly develop. X2 will always been one of my favorite movies from this era of superhero movies, but oh what could have been with X-Men 3.
Saturday, May 27, 2006
Wednesday, May 17, 2006
Dark Victory
Just finished reading Dark Victory last night and liked it a lot. It's sort of an unofficial sequel to The Long Halloween, another excellent Batman miniseries by the same creators. Like its predecessor, Dark Victory follows Batman on the trail of a serial killer, in this case targeting former acquaintences of Harvey Dent. I've always found Batamn more interesting when he's confined to Gotham City as a detective. As cool as it is seeing him fighting alongside a crapload of Justice League members in stuff like Infinite Crisis, he always seems a little out of place. It's hard to imagine Batman as anything except a lone wolf type of character.
Like Long Halloween, the mafia syndicate in Gotham is again involved and there are a lot of references taken directly out of The Godfather films. This combined with the noir sort of feel that Sale's art has gives the series a great atmosphere. The plot of Dark Victory is less convoluted than Long Halloween. There is one definite identity of the killer, and the payoff at the end when all has been revealed comes together pretty well.
Dark Victory sets itself in the year after Long Halloween, "Year Two" you could say, and thus Robin shows up towards the end of the book. His presence feels a little tacked on. The circumstances in which his parents are killed vaguely ties into the larger plot of the story, but it doesn't really feel necessary, and when he and Batman finally team up and the end of the book it doesn't really seem to have much emotion behind it. This is a very minor complaint though, and Dark Victory as a whole is every bit as enjoyable as its predecessor.
P.S.: Tim Sale's Catwoman is hot.
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
First post / E3 / M review
Yeah... hey. I have no idea if anyone is actually going to read this, but I'm going to start a blog nevertheless for the following reasons:
1. Some guy actually recommended keeping a blog as a way to hone your writing skills.
2. As Bender would say, "Everyone was doin' it, I just wanted to be popular!"
Perhaps I should use this first post to introduce myself, but that would make entirely too much sense. A lot of what I post here is going to be cross-posted with the blog I started on IGN, and thus if I start ranting about something that you don't know or care about (the next 2 paragraphs perhaps) you can probably chalk it up to that.
Anyway, the first E3 press conference was tonight, as Sony sort of meandered through a montage of farily ho-hum looking first party games, followed by some more interesting looking third party games, notably MGS4. Then there was the inevitable moment that seems to happen every year that turns normally rational people into crazed morons. In this case, it was Sony's announcement that the Playstation 3 will be able to be tilted, allowing for 6 direction movement by moving the controller itself. This is, of course, less than a year removed from the reveal of the Revolution (or Wii, whatever) controller which is entirely based off of its motion sensing.
Personally I think this is a non-issue and a cool addition to the Dual Shock design which I've always liked, (moreso than a lot of other people from what I hear) but as soon as it was announced people started flipping out, accusing Sony of stealing Nintendo's idea. Personally, I think this is absurd, as the two controllers aren't that similar, and the concept of sensing motion certain didn't begin with the Revolution controller, and this is far from the first example of companies in the game industry acting purely as a reaction to what another company did. At any rate, I don't see why people take this stuff so personally.
M
***1/2
I've developed quite a bit of interest in film, and I forsee a large portion of this blog, if I keep up with it, being devoted to movie reviews. I'm currently in a May Term course (if you're not familiar with this concept, some schools have a 4-4-1 schedule where after spring semester you take one course for like a month) on film noir and today we watched the German film M, which is not really a film noir, but its certianly a precursor to it.
The premise of M is set up for us early on as we see a notice posted in the street explaining that a serial killer has been targeting children. In this scene we first see the killer as a shadow against this poster as he approaches in unsuspecting little girl. From this point, the film branches off in a number of different directions, following the frightened citizens, who begin to point fingers at one another, the police investigation, a separate investigation carried out by members of a mob syndicate, who wants to get rid of the killer to end the police raids that are hampering their business. Many of these scenes are interesting, but I think the film jumps around a bit too much, and begins to lose momentum after the first hour or so.
To me, the film's real strength was the end, which allows the viewer to see the killer up close and in the light of day and allows him a chance to speak. It reveals that the killer is actually pretty pathetic, compared to his ominious presence earlier. He pleads that he's insane and that he can't control his actions, and it seems genuine. At this point a degree of moral abiguity is added to the film, which to this point cast the killer in a purely villainous light. Most everyone, understandbly wants the killer dead. The head of the mob syndicate, Safecracker, has a particularly empassioned speech at the end of the film in which he claims that the killer's insanity is actually more of a reason for him to be executing, saying that he believes that people such as him have no place in society and should be exterminated. His speech conjures up images of speeches given by Hitler, and it may not be coicidetal that this film was made in 1931, just as the nazi movement began. Thus, the proper fate of the killer, which seemed cut and dry at the beginning of the film, becomes a provocative debate at the film's conclusion. This more than anything is what I believe makes M an effective movie.
And I'm done.
1. Some guy actually recommended keeping a blog as a way to hone your writing skills.
2. As Bender would say, "Everyone was doin' it, I just wanted to be popular!"
Perhaps I should use this first post to introduce myself, but that would make entirely too much sense. A lot of what I post here is going to be cross-posted with the blog I started on IGN, and thus if I start ranting about something that you don't know or care about (the next 2 paragraphs perhaps) you can probably chalk it up to that.
Anyway, the first E3 press conference was tonight, as Sony sort of meandered through a montage of farily ho-hum looking first party games, followed by some more interesting looking third party games, notably MGS4. Then there was the inevitable moment that seems to happen every year that turns normally rational people into crazed morons. In this case, it was Sony's announcement that the Playstation 3 will be able to be tilted, allowing for 6 direction movement by moving the controller itself. This is, of course, less than a year removed from the reveal of the Revolution (or Wii, whatever) controller which is entirely based off of its motion sensing.
Personally I think this is a non-issue and a cool addition to the Dual Shock design which I've always liked, (moreso than a lot of other people from what I hear) but as soon as it was announced people started flipping out, accusing Sony of stealing Nintendo's idea. Personally, I think this is absurd, as the two controllers aren't that similar, and the concept of sensing motion certain didn't begin with the Revolution controller, and this is far from the first example of companies in the game industry acting purely as a reaction to what another company did. At any rate, I don't see why people take this stuff so personally.
M
***1/2
I've developed quite a bit of interest in film, and I forsee a large portion of this blog, if I keep up with it, being devoted to movie reviews. I'm currently in a May Term course (if you're not familiar with this concept, some schools have a 4-4-1 schedule where after spring semester you take one course for like a month) on film noir and today we watched the German film M, which is not really a film noir, but its certianly a precursor to it.
The premise of M is set up for us early on as we see a notice posted in the street explaining that a serial killer has been targeting children. In this scene we first see the killer as a shadow against this poster as he approaches in unsuspecting little girl. From this point, the film branches off in a number of different directions, following the frightened citizens, who begin to point fingers at one another, the police investigation, a separate investigation carried out by members of a mob syndicate, who wants to get rid of the killer to end the police raids that are hampering their business. Many of these scenes are interesting, but I think the film jumps around a bit too much, and begins to lose momentum after the first hour or so.
To me, the film's real strength was the end, which allows the viewer to see the killer up close and in the light of day and allows him a chance to speak. It reveals that the killer is actually pretty pathetic, compared to his ominious presence earlier. He pleads that he's insane and that he can't control his actions, and it seems genuine. At this point a degree of moral abiguity is added to the film, which to this point cast the killer in a purely villainous light. Most everyone, understandbly wants the killer dead. The head of the mob syndicate, Safecracker, has a particularly empassioned speech at the end of the film in which he claims that the killer's insanity is actually more of a reason for him to be executing, saying that he believes that people such as him have no place in society and should be exterminated. His speech conjures up images of speeches given by Hitler, and it may not be coicidetal that this film was made in 1931, just as the nazi movement began. Thus, the proper fate of the killer, which seemed cut and dry at the beginning of the film, becomes a provocative debate at the film's conclusion. This more than anything is what I believe makes M an effective movie.
And I'm done.
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