Movie Review: X-Men: The Last Stand

[Monotreme]

I have to admit, I came into this movie with preconceived notions. The hiring of Brett Ratner as the director daunted me, and the preview clips and trailers really weren’t doing it for me. I came into the film expecting it to be lackluster – and my low expectations ended up working to my advantage. Coming out of the film, I must say that I was very pleasantly surprised.

As it has been put in better words than I could, the film isn’t nearly as bad as it should be. The screenplay was written in a rush, and yet, it manages to remain fairly focused. The character development was also far better than I expected, the stories of Rogue, Iceman, and of course, Jean Grey properly developed and advanced. The film retains a very perfect plot arc; the climax is especially climactic and apocalyptic. But most importantly, Brett Ratner, the director who replaced Bryan Singer who did an absolutely wonderful job on the first two installments, does a much better job directing than I thought he would.

The film is far more focused than I expected it would be. Fresh off directing the Rush our movies, I really didn’t think Brett Ratner was the right choice for the job of directing an epic special effects-driven action-adventure film. I underestimated his work on Red Dragon, though, and Ratner manages to craft a much darker, serious and more dramatic film than I expected. The film is merciful to no-body, and at first it would definitely seem as if this would indeed turn out to be the final installment – I was especially sad at the fate of Mystique, who was always my favourite character from the first and second films. But alas, the final shot and the short post-credits sequence pretty much seal a sequel.

As an entertainment, I definitely must say that the film delivers. The action scenes (and they are plentiful) are as cool as they are thrilling, the filmmaking not overly confusing or messy but pretty well focused. As a summer blockbuster entertainment, the film works extremely well, far better than any other film from the genre released this year so far. I suppose it is simply because this is the first film that actually has an “epic” feel to it. The special effects, of course, are top-notch. Considering the relatively short amount of time this film was made in, I am definitely impressed – the CGI work is particularly impressive and totally convincing, and the stunt work and set pieces all work very well.

As an ensemble character piece (what made the first two films, and especially X2 so masterful), the film works to some extent. Some of the characters are perfectly explored, including newcomer Beast and recurring characters Iceman, Storm and Wolverine. Magneto and Xavier’s characters are even further explored and emphasized, although X2 did a better job at exploring their relationship. The character that receives the most attention, though, is Jean Grey, and the film takes perfect care of developing her deeply, perfectly and hauntingly. At some points of the film, her character can become really disturbing, and the filmmakers treated this with seriousness and professionalism.

Unfortunately, though, the film does have its faults, starting with this very aspect – character development. One of the announcements that made me most anxious about the quality of the film was its runtime. X2 needed 2 ½ hours in order to create that perfect balance between character development, action and plot. When I heard that X-Men 3 was to be barely over an hour and a half long, I had a feeling that something would be missing. And unfortunately, I was right – the film definitely feels short, and there were so many more places the film could have gone, dug deeper, explored further, that it really is a shameful miss. The film brings back older characters putting them more in the spotlight (Shadowcat, Colossus, Pyro, etc), and also introduces new characters (Angel, Jubilee, Callisto), all of which the film begins to explore but backs out in the last minute, missing out on far more potential character development. Also, the lack of Nightcrawler, arguably one of the coolest characters introduced in the films, was another miss that extra running time would have solved.

Another aspect of the film that bothered me was the camp. Bryan Singer did a perfect job at creating a totally realistic and believable X-Men world. Brett Ratner tries his hardest to retain this serious tone and look, and yet, just couldn’t help himself at some parts. Some of the one-liners and witty comebacks are actually funny and serve for some good comic relief, but others come across as ridiculous, the prime example being the now infamous “I’m the Juggernaut!” line. Also, another really small detail that bugged me was the fact that all of the bad guys had tattoos and had very distinct and quite freaky looks, with torn leather clothes, coloured hair and weird hairdos, and other such attire.

Another major flaw is seeing just how hard Brett Ratner tries. With all due respect to the man, it becomes very obvious pretty early on that he is trying his hardest to retain the look and style that Bryan Singer so perfectly set in the first two installments. And yet, something is always missing, that special Bryan Singer touch of magic, that makes the first two films, especially X2, so masterful.

X2 retains its position as the best comic book movie ever in my opinion, and X-Men 3 is certainly lacking in comparison to that film, but it is good enough to not warrant its being sorted into the “bad comic book movies” category, which includes such films as Fantastic 4, Daredevil, and other such fiascos. Perhaps the film merely benefits from the richness of the X-Men comics: The movie definitely makes perfect use of the social issues the X-Men comics bring up, thus giving itself that extra special punch of relevance that most of your average summer action-adventure blockbusters lack.

Ultimately, while far from perfect, X-Men: The Last Stand is certainly a very pleasant surprise, and is much better than I expected it to be.

SCORE: 7/10.

[mouldy311]

http://joblo.com/forums/showthread.p...hreadid=101226

[stvnsn_kvn]

I don't know about u guys out there but i loved this movie. However i feel that people who see this movie should come inot to it knowing that it's very different from the other two films. Visual effects are fantastic. The only downfall is in my opinion the lack of character developement, and the amount of people that died. If u haven't seen it or want to see it again i would advise you stay past the credits, their is a little more of more afterewards.


I doubt this is the "last stand"