Most people and critics regarded “Dark Phoenix” as a bad stumble to end the X-Men franchise -- at least for the time being, as it may be rebooted under anew banner. While the film has its failings, I think it stands up to most others in the superhero game.
I remember years ago interviewing Famke Janssen, who played Jean Grey in the original films, and hearing her disappointment that her group didn’t get around to depicting the Dark Phoenix Saga. Comic book fans speak reverentially about the DPS as one of the greatest storylines told, in which pure-hearted telepath/telekinetic Jean turns into one of the most malevolent forces of evil ever seen.
Sophie Turner takes over the role, and while I can’t help thinking Janssen would’ve been better, I think Turner acquits herself just fine. The important thing is that the relatively meek Jean discovers a taste for power she never knew she had.
It seems that her mentor, Professor Charles Xavier (James McAvoy), has hidden some aspects of her past from her, which sets off a chain of events that will see her square off with her fellow X-Men, including Cyclops (Tye Sheridan), Storm (Alexandra Shipp), Quicksilver (Evan Peters), Nightcrawler (Kodi Smit-McPhee), Beast (Nicholas Hoult), Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) and even nemesis/occasional ally Magneto (Michael Fassbender).
This is a lean, mean superhero story without much preamble or contemplative downtime. With so many overwrought, overlong flicks these days -- yeah, I’m lookin’ at YOU, “IT: Chapter Two” -- it’s nice to experience one that prefers the straight-ahead approach.
Bonus features are good, anchored by a feature-length video commentary by wrier/director Simon Kinberg and producer Hutch Parker. There is also an expansive five-part making-of documentary, “Rise of the Phoenix: The Making of Dark Phoenix,” five deleted scenes and the following featurettes:
I still think the first iteration of the X-Men would’ve done a great job with the Dark Phoenix Saga, one of the most storied arcs in comic book history. That cast of the superhero outcast mutants -- Hugh Jackman, Famke Janssen, Halle Berry, Patrick Stewart -- felt the most emotionally true of any super-franchise.
You could feel their sense of alienation and conflict about whether they should serve the humans who hated their kind, or dominate them.
But I’m pleased to say the “new” X-Men still pull it off with plenty of emotional and action oomph. “Dark Phoenix” will reportedly be the final film in the series produced by 20th Century Fox, though my guess is eventually it’ll be merged with the Marvel Comics Universe (MCU) the way Spider-Man was, and we’ll see more X-films with yet another cast.
The Dark Phoenix story is well-known to even casual comic book fans. Jean Grey (Sophie Turner), a telepath/telekinetic and protégé to Professor Charles Xavier (James McAvoy), is irradiated with alien energy during a rescue mission. She seemingly dies but is resurrected with fantastically heightened powers, dubbed Phoenix like the mythical bird that rises from its ashes.
But great power brings great temptation, and Phoenix begins to use her abilities for less-than-benevolent purposes. Eventually her own team of X-Men turns on her, seeing her as a threat to their hard-fought peace with humans.
This film time-jumps to 1992, seven years after “X-Men: Apocalypse.” The X-Men have become accepted by mainstream society and hailed as heroes. Professor X has gotten bit drunk on his status, both figuratively and literally, swilling from omnipresent tumblers and enjoying a direct phone line to the President.
“The way the women keep saving the men around here, you might consider changing the name to X-Women,” one veteran needles him.
After the accident, Jean goes searching for clues to her long-buried past, and the terrible accident that killed her parents and brought her into Professor X’s charge at his school for mutant children. She gets angry when she learns the truth, things escalate, and collateral damage soon becomes an existential threat that brings multiple power centers to bear.
Writer/director Simon Kinberg, a veteran producer and screenwriter directing his first feature (after Bryan Singer exited the franchise in a cloud of controversy), has a good eye for action scenes, though some of the talkie scenes are rather clanky.
(He also knows how to shoot Turner to beneficial effect in a way her myriad “Game of Thrones” directors never seemed to grasp, aka chin down.)
Michael Fassbender turns up again as Magneto, conflicted former villain now maintaining an uneasy peace with humans. Other familiar faces are Tye Sheridan as Cyclops, who shoots energy beams from his eyes and is Jean’s beau; Alexandra Shipp as weather-controlling Storm; and Evan Peters as max-speed Quicksilver.
And then, of course there’s the “blue trio”: Jennifer Lawrence as shape-shifting Mystique; Kodi Smit-McPhee as teleportation devil Nightcrawler; and Nicholas Hoult as the Jekyll/Hyde scientist/monster, Beast. It’s weird that it never struck me before they all share the exact same shade of midnight sapphire.
Jessica Chastain is the chief villain as Vuk, the icy blonde leader of a mysterious alien race known as the D’Bari that has a nefarious interest in Phoenix and her dark power.
There’s not a lot of subtext, humor or wasted energy in “Dark Phoenix,” just a straight-ahead thrill-seeker about a woman everyone had dismissed as timid who finds she enjoys the taste of power too much. I admit that if I had that kind of cosmic control in my hands, I’d be inclined to command some more X-Men movies.
“Not an utter embarrassment” is unfortunately the new bar for films in the “Alien” franchise, and I’m pleased to say the latest iteration manages to clear that low threshold quite easily.
It breaks no new ground and gives us no character as compelling as Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley. But it puts the people through their familiar paces with technical and emotional vitality in a way that will leave audiences not exactly thrilled, but surely not disappointed.
It’s nice that original director Ridley Scott, after seeing his movie pass through the hands of multiple imitators, finally took back the reins himself with “Prometheus” and now this film, which exists as its sequel within the (admittedly somewhat murky) timeline.
The set-up is that a space ship is carrying thousands of hibernating humans (and some fertilized embryos) to a distant solar system to colonize it. When a solar flare damages the vessel, the crew is awakened early – all except the captain, who is incinerated in his sleeping pod.
Not wanting to face the prospect of living and dying before they reach their destination, and too scared to go back into hibernation, the crew settles on a nearby planet that appears to be able to sustain life. Billy Crudup is the fickle second-in-command calling the shots, while Katherine Waterston is the more sensible subordinate who we know will eventually take over.
The rest of the cast includes Carmen Ejogo, Demian Bichir, Amy Seimetz and Danny McBride. Interestingly, the crew is made of matched romantic pairs, so there’s a lot of tension about protecting loved ones and, soon enough, mourning them.
Michael Fassbender returns as an android named Walter assigned to help the humans. He previously played another, more malevolent “synthetic,” David, in “Prometheus,” and that character turns up again, a bit implausibly. Their clashes and ruminations about the mystery of human behavior represent the movie’s high point.
When the planet turns out to be populated with the iconic aliens -- face-huggers that give way to two-mouthed killers -- the blood starts flying, the character clashes grow more intense and the aliens start spreading.
Taken purely as a popcorn flick, “Alien: Covenant” is filled with plenty of creepy, moody sequences set apart by bursts of high-octane action. It’s not like it was in “Alien” or “Aliens,” but it gets a passing grade.
But seriously, when are people going to figure out the thing that made the first two “Alien” movies great was not the critters, but Ripley? Maybe Scott or somebody will realize Weaver is still around, and still pretty spry.
Bonus features are pretty substantial, starting with a feature-length commentary track by Scott. It’s bothersome that so many storied directors -- Spielberg, Coppola, etc. -- have refused to do commentaries. He also takes part in a “Master Class” documentary on making the film.
There are also a dozen deleted or extended scenes, gallery of production photos, and six making-of featurettes.
Everyone knows the “Alien” franchise stopped being good after the second movie, reaching its nadir when the iconic mouth-within-a-mouth critter squared off against the Predator.
Original director Ridley Scott, no doubt grumpy about the state into which other filmmakers had led his creation, came back in 2012 with the moody, dizzy “Prometheus,” which he coyly declined to describe as a prequel, saying it “shared DNA” with his 1979 movie.
Well, now Scott has made a sequel, “Alien: Covenant,” and there’s no more doubt remaining about where the two latest films fall within the canon. (Squarely.) These events take place 10 years after “Prometheus,” and still some decades before “Alien.”
It’s energetic and fast-paced, covering familiar territory with (mostly) new characters playing out a lot of the same scenarios and musing upon the same themes. Despite the lack of originality, I liked it better than any of the other “Alien” movies since 1986.
It’s probably the closest inheritor to the story and mood of the original, with a crew of woefully unprepared humans exploring an unknown planet where alien bugaboo will infect them, releasing larger versions that grow rapidly and kill even quicker.
Again, a female junior officer chafes under the yoke of clearly less competent male superiors, having to wait her turn until a sufficient number of them have died to place her in command. Here it’s Katherine Waterston as Daniels. As before, characters are known simply by their last names, and share a sort of martial comradery.
There are some differences, however. The ship Covenant is traveling to colonize a far planet, carrying 2,000 colonists in cryo-sleep and another 1,400 or so human embryos to speed up the population-building. Interestingly, pretty much all of the crew are paired off into romantic couples – an arrangement better suited to starting a new life far, far away.
“Alien: Covenant” has lots of fascinating ideas like this that it never bothers to really explore. Such as the captain, Oram (Billy Crudup), being a man of faith whose leadership is questioned by a crew more typical of an agnostic future.
Actually, they doubt him because he’s a squirrelly, inconsiderate weakling who was never meant to be the leader in the first place. The real captain (a cameo by James Franco) dies in the opening sequence, in which a solar flare damages the Covenant, necessitating the early awakening of the crew, and his hyper-sleep pod fails horribly.
They receive a strange signal they believe is human from an uncharted planet. Since no one wants to brave the sleep pods after the accident, and this planet can sustain human life, they decide to go there to check it out as an alternative to their destination. Daniels and Oram clash over this, and we know who is going to turn out to be right.
Demián Bichir plays the chief of the security squad (along with his husband – hey, it’s the year 2104, people); Amy Seimetz plays Faris, the hyperventilating one; Carmen Ejogo is Karine, Oram’s mate and the science chief. Danny McBride shows he can not be goofy as Tennessee, the cowboy hat-wearing pilot who gets to show his right stuff.
Michael Fassbender reappears playing Walter, the creepy “synthetic” – aka android – assigned to the Covenant. He’s a later model of David, the trouble-making synthetic from “Prometheus.”
Mild spoiler alert: Fassbender also has a dual role playing David himself, whom we might have dismissed, seeing as how he was decapitated in the last movie and all. The two get to have a number of philosophical conversations about the nature of humanity before the inevitable square-off.
“Alien: Covenant” doesn’t break any new ground or raise the bar for the franchise. But it’s entertaining and doesn’t embarrass itself in front of its forbears.
“X-Men: Apocalypse” continues the saga of the mutant super-heroes in their brave new retconned world, in which the course of history has been altered and new, younger actors have taken over (nearly) all of the roles.
(Comic book heroes may be able to bench-press buildings or regrow their own flesh. But their Hollywood counterparts are still batting .000 in the long war against their arch-nemesis, Father Time.)
It plays out a lot like “Captain America: Civil War” – a messy but vigorous smackdown between super-powered beings. The mayhem definitely overpowers the characterization here, as we jump from one action set piece to another, with little pauses for talkie scenes that tend to drag.
The story here is that an ancient Egyptian evil has been unleashed in the form of Apocalypse (Oscar Isaac), who has the ability to absorb the powers of other mutants. He quickly forms himself his own team of henchmen, including Storm, Angel and others. Magneto (Michael Fassbender) is also recruited after a personal tragedy while trying to live a normal life.
The good guys are less organized, led by Professor Xavier (James McAvoy) and Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence), who’s taken on the mantle of the outlaw voice of reason in the mutant community. Sophie Turner takes over the role of Jean Grey, while Tye Sheridan and Nicholas Hoult are Cyclops and Beast, respectively.
The movie is overlong at nearly 2½ hours, though it’s more a matter of emphasizing stuff that didn’t deserve so much screen time to the detriment of things that did. Still, I’d call it the best of the lot of a weak field of 2016 superhero movies.
Bonus features are quite robust. Director Bryan Singer and screenwriter Simon Kinberg do a feature-length audio commentary track. Singer also introduces a handful of deleted and extended scenes. It also comes with a gag reel, an hour-long making-of documentary, concept art and photo gallery plus a wrap party video.
This film is not going to fare well at the box office, I fear. People just don’t seem to want to go to sad movies anymore, or at least not like they used to. And “The Light Between the Oceans,” while in many ways excellent, is definitely what you’d call a four-hanky picture.
Based on the novel by M.L. Stedman and adapted by writer/director Derek Cianfrance (“Blue Valentine”), it’s a tender, deliberately paced movie that takes the time to build the emotional world of its characters, so we can see how deeply events and their own tragic decisions etch themselves into their souls.
Some people will simply call it slow. Some people will call it mushy. Some people should probably go check out “Suicide Squad” in the next theater over.
Michael Fassbender plays Tom Sherbourne, a survivor of the trenches of World War I who returns to his native Australia without much purpose for living. He takes a job as lighthouse keeper on the remote island of Janus, which like the two-face god of mythology sits overlooking opposite directions, atop the convergence of two oceans.
On a trip back to the mainland he runs into Isabel (Alicia Vikander), a jolly lass who’s as full of life as Tom’s cup is dry. Through letters they have a long romance and courtship from afar, resulting in a happy marriage. The mainlanders are ecstatic for Is and Tom, since so few young men are left after the war and the prospect of a new generation leaves everyone giddy.
They return to Janus and set about building a jubilant life together. The island is stark and lonely, but they fill it with their passion. Is grows more independent and resourceful after a sheltered life; Tom shaves off his mustache (Is doesn’t like the prickles) and begins to set aside his guilt at living when so many have died.
But fate has its grim whirlpools and undertows. Is miscarries their baby. Most movies would skim over this with a mournful montage, but Cianfrance gives the event and its aftermath its full measure. We witness how losing their child permanently alters their approach to life and capacity for happiness. With time, they recover. They move on.
Then, it happens again.
This may be the end of things, at least for Is, when a tiny boat washes up on shore. Inside is a dead young man and a newborn baby girl. Tom prepares to do his duty and report in by telegraph. But Is, full of a furious maternal need, pleads for him to delay – for just a day or two, she says. He knows what this really means.
Fassbender and Vikander do a tremendous job of communicating much in between the dialogue. Some of the film’s most powerful scenes are the two simply staring at each other. Cianfrance carefully frames the actors so we’re often looking over their shoulders, as if stealing in on moments of intimacy rather than having them staged for us.
Things go on. The baby becomes a toddler and then a little girl, Lucy, all blonde curls and joy. Life on the island becomes idyllic, as if something from a storybook.
We know such pure happiness must end, like a tide reclaiming the beach. Much of the later developments center around Hannah (Rachel Weisz), the daughter of the rich fellow (Bryan Brown) who paid to build the lighthouse. But I’ll say no more.
“The Light Between the Oceans” is not the sort of movie you see much of anymore. It’s slow-moving and contemplative, and dares to present the possibility that people can do things out of love but still cause immeasurable harm. Logically, many of the characters’ actions make no sense. But the actors and filmmakers paint such a rich emotional portrait, we feel like they could have come to no other decisions.
So here is the other other big Marvel Comics film franchise, though don’t expect any crossover between mutants and Avengers anytime soon.
“X-Men: Apocalypse” is a big, rousing, sprawling and often messy epic, the sixth in the series and the fourth directed by Bryan Singer. (Not including the “Wolverine” spinoffs.) Still, it hits its themes of alienation and xenophobia solidly, brings in an effective new villain to threaten humanity and gives us some entertaining super-vs.-super scraps.
I liked it about as much as I did “Captain America: Civil War,” which plumbed similar subject matter. What’s different here is that with the previous film, “X-Men: Days of Future Past,” the entire franchise has been retconned, i.e. reimagined with an entirely different flow of history and events.
Essentially, they hit the “Restart” button on the X-Men. This is their first adventure in a new universe.
Part of this was simple logistics: the actors playing Storm, Jean Grey, Beast, Cyclops, etc. were getting a mite long in the tooth to play characters who are supposed to be stuck in that comic book realm of perpetual late 20s to early 30s. (Let’s face it, watching Kelsey Grammer trying to hump around in a blue suit was getting downright embarrassing.)
So now the cast is led by Jennifer Lawrence, James McAvoy and Nicholas Hoult as Mystique, Professor Xavier and Beast, respectively. We also introduce a bunch of new actors to take over other roles: Tye Sheridan as Cyclops, who has uncontrollable killer beams projecting from his eyes; Kodi Smit-McPhee as transporting shadowman Nightcrawler; and Sophie Turner as Jean Grey, a telekinetic/telepath with untapped power.
The story is set in 1983, 10 years after the last movie. Humanity has begrudgingly come to accept the existence of super-powered folk. Though, as one character notes, “Just because there’s not a war doesn’t mean there’s peace.” Mystique, previously a villain, is actually held up as a role model by many young mutants, such as Storm (Alexandra Shipp), here a fledgling thief in Cairo.
Meanwhile, Magneto (Michael Fassbender) has moved on from his vengeful ways, working as a humble steelworker in Poland, and even has a wife and young daughter. But, as always with him, dark urges beckon.
Events are brought to a head with the resurrection of Apocalypse, though he does not call himself that, an ancient being who regards himself as the father of mutants. Over the centuries he has transferred his consciousness into new mutant bodies, acquiring their abilities. Played by Oscar Isaac in impressive purple/black armor and makeup, he’s determined to cleanse the world of weakness and rule those he deems strong enough to live.
The story (screenplay by Simon Kinberg) is all go-go-go. We jump from one threat to the next, one confrontation to another. Along the way there will be many deaths and wholesale destruction, including Xavier’s entire School for Gifted Youngsters.
Quicksilver, who made such an impression in a brief spot in the last movie, gets a bigger role here, again played by Evan Peters. He can move so quickly that to him it seems the rest of the world is moving in slow motion – even bullets and explosions. If you thought his hyperactive exploits were impressive last time, wait till you see how he lends a hand now.
“X-Men: Apocalypse” is a big, big movie -- 2½ hours long, dozens of characters. I haven’t even mentioned who makes up the Four Horsemen. If you’re like me, you may lose track of the names and faces. Plus there are brief cameos, including a certain bestial fellow with a harsh point to make. From a pure entertainment perspective, it gets the job done.
Let's be clear: although "Steve Jobs" is based on a biography by Walter Isaacson, who received the official blessing of the Apple computer pioneer, the movie is an utter fabrication from beginning to end.
Well, maybe not totally. It is about Steve Jobs. And includes conversations with several key figures in his life, spaced out over the years. And it shows the launch of actual iconic Apple products, including the original Macintosh and iPhone.
And the film depicts Jobs as both visionary and bully -- qualities that everyone who dealt with him agreed he shared in equal, plentiful quantity.
But beyond that, screenwriter Aaron Sorkin and director Danny Boyle have not really tried to make a factual biopic of Jobs. Rather, they are staging a sort of Shakespearean rumination on the man and the myth. Jobs encounters the most important people in his life, nearly all of whom have turned against him, almost like Scrooge with his sundry ghosts.
The movie is not just an exaltation of Jobs the technology visionary, but also an examination of how his personal failings brought him low. "Steve Jobs" is more about the idea of the man than the flesh-and-blood one who left this mortal coil in 2011.
Michael Fassbender is commanding and slithery in the title role. Perhaps deliberately, he looks and sounds absolutely nothing like the real incarnation we know from video, usually talking about how some expensive new gadget was going to forever change our lives. Fassbender's Jobs is hyper-smart, super aggressive and views every social interaction as a contest to be won.
Kate Winslet is terrific as Barbara Hoffman, his right-hand woman and fixer. Other recurring characters are Michael Stuhlbarg as Andy Hertzfeld, an early Apple developer; Jeff Daniels as John Sculley, Apple CEO and Jobs mentor-turned-nemesis; Seth Rogen as former partner Steve Wozniak; Katherine Waterston plays his resentful ex-girlfriend.
This fictional version of Steve Jobs may or not bear much relation to the real guy. But "Steve Jobs" is a gripping tour de force portrait of an overpowering personality.
Bonus features aren't terribly extensive, but they are quite meaty.
There is a lengthy making-of documentary. And not one but two feature-length commentary tracks: one by Boyle, the other by Sorkin and editor Elliot Graham.
It's too bad that actors are so rarely included in these conversations, because it makes for some wonderful insights. Maybe that'll come in "Steve Jobs 2.0."
"Steve Jobs" is the second screenplay by Aaron Sorkin that peeks behind the fabricated legend of an Information Age titan and finds a small boy bearing many scars who lashes out at those around him. It's not quite on the level of the Oscar-winning "The Social Network," but even a half-step below is pretty rarified territory.
Michael Fassbender plays the title role of Apple co-founder Jobs, a man who was equal parts visionary and bully. As one character points out to him, he couldn't write code or create circuit boards or really do much of anything practical, but was a master at getting those who could to synthesize products in dynamic new ways.
Jobs didn't believe in letting the customer tell you what they wanted; he would invent a need they didn't know they had, then construct a product and marketing bombardment to convince people to satisfy it.
Directed by Danny Boyle ("Slumdog Millionaire"), "Steve Jobs" is already being attacked as a largely fictional version of the man and those around him. I don't doubt that. Although based on the book by Walter Isaacson, a mostly friendly portrait in which Jobs willingly participated prior to his 2011 death, Sorkin conducted extensive interviews and research on his own, and has used the text as a mere springboard.
What we're seeing is less biography than cogitation.
Start with the story structure, which is divided into a three-act play format, each centered around pivotal product launches in Jobs' career: the Mac in 1984, the NeXT cube in 1988 and the iMac in 1998. Each time Jobs is visited by key people in his life, and spars with them, like Scrooge and his ghosts. They difference is that here the man rejects the lessons his interlocutors would impart.
There's a whole lot of big speeches and emotional tirades, always in the minutes leading right up to the moment Jobs is supposed to go on stage and wow the audience. Pretty amazing coincidence, that.
Some of what is put forward is pure bullshit. For instance, Jobs' marketing chief and major domo, Barbara Hoffman (Kate Winslet), is shown putting out fires all three times, when she actually retired in 1995. And Jobs is shown as using the NeXT launch to springboard himself back into the Apple camp, when really that didn't happen until a decade later.
So keep in mind as you watch Jobs battling with co-founder and rare friend Steve Wozniak (Seth Rogen) or Apple CEO John Sculley (Jeff Daniels) that we're not seeing stuff that actually happened. These are Sorkin's words, not the real people's.
This is Hollywood-style high art here, folks: 'Lying in order to impart a greater truth.'
That's reflected by Fassbender in the title role, a sterling actor who does not resemble or sound like Jobs in the faintest. But it's still a whiz-bang performance, portraying a man of limitless imagination and stunted emotions. Here was a guy who denied the paternity of his daughter, Lisa, for years, allowing her and her mother to subsist on welfare while he became worth billions.
The movie is essentially a series of dialogues between Jobs and one other person. With each he has a different motivation and mindset, and that evolves over time along with events. He starts out friendly with Sculley, even seeing him as a father figure, but that changes when dad orchestrates his ouster from Apple. (Though, as the movie claims, it was a mutual assured destruction scenario.) For "Woz," there is affection tempered with resentment, each man recognizing and desiring qualities in the other they themselves lack.
Michael Stuhlbarg plays Andy Hertzfeld, a key figure in the early days of Apple, who is bullied and berated by Jobs but somehow attains a sort of geeky grace with time. The relationship with Hoffman is probably the deepest, as she seemed to be the one person in his life who didn't need anything from Jobs and could stand up to him without endangering her own position.
The face-offs with his daughter's mother (Katherine Waterston) are more rote than the others and therefore less interesting; we know how it's going to play out, with recriminations and eventual demands for money, and wait for them to pass. His interactions with Lisa probably best mirror reality: halted, fractured, but gradually moving toward warmth.
"Steve Jobs" reminds me of a phrase used in another context but pertinent here: "Fake but accurate." It's a remarkable film that gets to the essence of a person largely by making things up.
“Slow West” is a paean to the Old West: its limitless opportunities and blood-soaked reality. It’s a story of hope and true love… except many people go to early graves along with their hopes. And love takes many forms, but not always the one desired.
Written and directed by John Maclean in his feature film debut, the film was shot in New Zealand and features Brits, Germans, South Africans and Aussies in the main roles. It’s a vision of the American West as seen through the dream of foreigners, and ambles between sharp verisimilitude and a trance-like wonder.
This is the sort of movie in which a Scottish boy riding through 1870s Colorado comes across three Congolese men sitting by the side of the trail singing in their native tongue, and none of them seem out of place.
At a taut 84 minutes, it’s minimalist storytelling where the actors sketch out their characters from just a few lines of dialogue and how they act – usually under deadly duress. Maclean sets up main characters and antagonists chasing each other on the plains, but wanders freely between their camps. He seems as interested in the greybeard bandit as the winsome young hero.
Kodi Smit-McPhee is pensive and naïve as the boy, Jay Cavendish, a minor nobleman who left Scotland to chase his lady love, a commoner named Rose. She’s played by Caren Pistorius, who commands our attention in her few scenes. Rose and her father (Rory McCann) fled their home a year ago because of some unnamed trouble; now Jay is following, riding a horse all alone across the land with death at every turn.
What Jay doesn’t know is that there’s a $2,000 reward for the pair, and that attracts the attention of some fearful types – men like Silas, a bounty hunter when he needs to be and an outlaw otherwise. He’s played by Michael Fassbender, who wears the cowboy rig like he was born to it.
Silas is an amoral “brute,” in Jay’s words, but he agrees to chaperone the greenhorn for money. It soon becomes clear that Silas is hoping Jay will lead him right to his quarry, but he takes a shine to the earnest lad.
He’s a man of few words, rarely responding to Jay’s jabbering with more than “Sure, kid” or “Let’s drift.” He’s been around and seen things in his rambling life; there are dark deeds in his past -- and probably in his future, too.
“Survival ain't just how to skin a jackrabbit. It's knowing when to bluster and when to hush. When to take a beating, and when to strike,” Silas says.
Others are on parallel journeys, such as an enigmatic man in black who wears a white collar and carries a curiously long suitcase. Then there’s Payne (Ben Mendelsohn), an outlaw legend who leads a large gang of throw-offs. They track Silas and the boy, patiently, waiting.
It’s a feast for the senses. The cinematography by Robbie Ryan has a bleak beauty to it, and Jed Kurzel’s musical score trips easily between jaunty and mournful.
“Slow West” may be puzzling to some people, with its mix of worship and irony for the Western genre. I found it a haunting vision, darkness and light sliding across the far horizon in equal measure.
Once storytelling franchises have been around while -- especially ones involving science fiction and/or super-heroes -- it can be hard for filmmakers to find enough creative real estate to let their imaginations sprawl. After all, histories have been set, great and terrible deeds done, characters evolved or killed off, and it's a bad notion to retread over familiar territory.
So what to do? More and more, these movies are going retcon.
Retconning is when a new set of creators essentially reboots everything we know about a mythos, blanking the slate so they can start over from a zero point of their own choosing. "Star Trek" did this recently, and now the X-Men comic book heroes have, too.
This bold new film, the best super-hero flick since "The Avengers," looks at a post-apocalyptic world where nearly all mutants have been destroyed by the menacing robotic Sentinels. Clawed, nearly unkillable warrior Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) is sent 50 years into the past to occupy the mind of his younger self, and must convince the Professor X of that era (James McAvoy), who is wallowing in a pit of self-pity, to take action to prevent the terrible tide.
That means diverting power-mad frenemy Magneto (Michael Fassbender) and shape-shifting skulduggerer Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) from their mission to make mutants the master of regular humans rather than the object of their hatred. Needless to say, they're not happy to go along.
There's one scene that may just be the most entertaining action sequence of the summer, and it involves a new mutant named Quicksilver who is so fast he practically lives in his own dimension of time.
A satisfying mix of action, convincing characterizations and plot twists, "X-Men: Days of Future Past" delivers one for the ages.
Video extras are quite hefty, and include deleted scenes with audio commentary by director Bryan Singer, a gag reel, gallery and several making-of featurettes.
I am the guy who has been known to complain about superhero movies being too somber and serious. But I don't think it's a contradiction to celebrate that same quality in the new X-Men film.
In other comic books and movies, superheroes were usually regular folks who acquired powers through happenstance. Even if they might struggle with controlling them or the implications of their newfound responsibilities, these stories rode an underlying fantasy about becoming special.
The X-Men were always different. They were mutants, born the way they were, and their powers were not a source of joy but an instrument for prejudice and even hatred. And the stakes were always higher: X-Men comics were the only ones I read as a boy where people died on a pretty regular basis.
"X-Men: Days of Future Past" is based on the concept of a 1981 storyline in which a future was envisioned where mutants had lost the war against their kind, with most of our favorite characters having been killed by monstrous Sentinel robots. It also attempts -- quite successfully in my estimation -- to combine the original X-Men trilogy from the last decade with the 2011 "First Class" movie that depicted the nascent days of the mutant movement in the 1960s.
Pop culture aficionados will recognize this as "retconning," in which storytellers retroactively alter the mythology of a franchise to fit their new schemes. (They recently did this with the "Star Trek" flicks.) But this is the mother of all retconning, in which both the present and future of the X-Men, as established in the previous films, are cleverly made to go kerbloowie.
In tackling this ambitious new project, they brought back original director Bryan Singer, who along with screenwriter Simon Kinberg manage to make a movie that is at once entertaining and sobering.
There's a darkness and a grandiosity to "X-Men: Days of Future Past" that has been missing from these movies.
Initially set in the near future, we witness a world where telepath Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and his few surviving students fight against the Sentinels, which can adapt to and even copy the powers of mutants. Losing seems inevitable, so they hatch a plan to send the consciousness of animalistic warrior Logan (Hugh Jackman) 50 years into the past, inhabiting his younger self in 1973.
There, he must convince a distraught Xavier (now played by James McAvoy) to join with his friend-turned-arch-enemy Magneto (Michael Fassbender) to prevent the assassination of a power-mad scientist named Trask (a terrific Peter Dinklage) that sets off the war against mutants.
At the center of the mission is heading off Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence), a shape-shifting assassin whose loyalties lie somewhere between the just-get-along sentiments of Xavier and the them-or-us creed of Magneto.
What makes this movie work is that even as we bounce through all these intrigues about robots and time travel and telepathy, the filmmakers never forget to focus on the characters. So the emnity between Xavier and Magneto feels personal, and Logan's battle between his berserker side and his better instincts has a tragic note.
Not that they forgot to include some terrific action scenes. Some of the best involve Quicksilver (Evan Peters), a super-fast teen who lives in a world that's almost another dimension, since he can do dozens of things in the blink of an eye. One scene where the team is breaking Magneto out of an impregnable prison is an utter delight.
Where do the X-Men go from here? Wait until after the credits for a (vague) glimpse. All I know is this movie blows up the franchise while also delivering the best film we've seen in the series.
It caused quite a sensation when it came out, but since 1853 the book “12 Years a Slave” by Solomon Northup has largely faded from memory. The movie adaptation by director Steve McQueen and screenwriter John Ridley brings the sin of slavery back into our faces with searing honesty about the brutality and dehumanization of an entire people.
Chiwetel Ejiofor, in an Oscar-worthy turn, plays Northup – an educated and talented musician and engineer from Saratoga, New York, kidnapped and sold into bondage in Louisiana, where he toiled and struggled to survive. Forced to take on the persona of “Platt,” he hid his abilities, including reading and writing, to pass himself off as a field laborer.
Over the next dozen years he experiences untold degradation and torture, having his back flayed until it is little more than a crisscross patchwork of scars. Separated from his wife and children, he can only imagine their own pain and torment. And he must submit to the rule of white Southerners who view him as a piece of chattel to be used and discarded as needs or whims serve.
Ejiofor brings an earnest grace to the role, an ordinary, intelligent man placed in hellish circumstances that defy logic. He holds onto his pride with great care, even violently defying an especially cruel overseer (Paul Dano) who can’t stand that a slave knows more about building houses than he does. Even though he eventually learns not to make waves, he never loses track of his inner soul. Because of that, hope never truly dies.
If the film has a weakness, it’s that McQueen and Ridley overplay their hand. Northup’s life prior to his ordeal is an idealized existence in which whites and blacks live in perfect harmony -- eating at each other’s tables, shopkeepers enthusiastically offering their handshake and assistance.
Ironically, it’s only in traveling to our nation’s capital (where slavery was still allowed in 1841) that he exposes himself to nefarious types who make a business of carrying off free blacks to the deep South, where they can fetch prices of $1,000. A decent, law-abiding man, Northup at first reacts with disbelief and threats to sue his oppressors. Defiance is soon (literally) beaten out of him, and a host of merchants warn him upon threat of death never to mention his real name or origin again.
At first Northup is placed in the hands of a genteel owner named Ford (Benedict Cumberbatch), who treats him with respect and makes use of the engineering skills of “Platt.” He even gives him a violin out of patriarchal devotion -- both to soothe the slaves and please his own ear.
But circumstances change, and Platt is sold to a vile man with a reputation for being stern with his slaves. The film reaches its greatest emotional heights -- and depths -- under the reign of Epps, a plantation master played by Michael Fassbender. Conflating his religious beliefs with his inhuman instincts, Epps is a caricature of a character, frightening to behold but difficult to accept as truthful.
Fassbender is leering and electric, not content to just subjugate his slaves but fawn while doing so. A favorite move is putting his face right into theirs, practically nuzzling Platt or his favorite, Patsey, before putting them to the whip, or indulging his sexual cravings, or both.
Lupita Nyong’o is a terrific presence as Patsey, a slender reed of a woman who can pick three times as much cotton in a day as most men. But she must navigate the tumultuous river of jealousy springing forth from Mrs. Epps (Sarah Paulson), who fears that her husband values a slave more than his wife.
“12 Years a Slave” is a mesmerizing cinematic experience, easily one of the best of the year. I couldn’t help feeling, though, that the filmmakers would’ve better served the audience by exercising a little more restraint. By making the villain better resemble an actual human, the crucible of slavery would have had the weight of authenticity, and been made even more harrowing.
Cormac McCarthy is a glorious novelist, and many of his books have been turned into exceptional films -- "The Road," "No Country for Old Men." But his first attempt, at age 80, at an original screenplay falls flat on its Gucci boot heels.
This story of drug intrigue along the U.S./Mexico intrigue is a murky mess, all character but little plot. The movie at one point actually loses track of its main character, an amoral (and never-named) attorney played by Michael Fassbender. In the final act, McCarthy and director Ridley Scott start introducing a bunch of new characters played be recognizable actors, who say a few lines and disappear with little consequence to their appearance.
It's almost as if there was a raffle entered by a bunch of thespians who wanted to say they were in a Cormac McCarthy film.
A strange undercurrent of sexual energy runs through the movie, with many encounters between characters having the feel of a power-trip seduction. There's very little actual sex, though, and one comes away believing these people like to talk about sex more than actually engage in it.
Penelope Cruz plays his girlfriend and soon-to-be wife, a sweet and unsullied woman who has no idea her man is in deep with the Mexican drug cartel. He provides her the high life of magnificent houses, cars and meals, and she's innocent enough to accept that he earns his pile defending low-rent criminals (like Rosie Perez, who has a strong, single scene).
The counselor has an association with Reiner (Javier Bardem), a flashy club owner and drug kingpin, and decides to go in with him on a big narcotics deal. The lawyer thinks this will be a one-off, but Reiner knows better. The two men like each other's company, so going into business seems like the next step.
Hanging around the edges is Malkina, Reiner's cruel cat of a girlfriend, played by Cameron Diaz in a performance shockingly devoid of any nuance. Malkina is a predator in every way -- for money, sex and attention. As if the filmmakers hadn't made this point clearly enough, they gift her with a cheetah pattern tattoo all over her body, and a pair of the actual animals as pets/guardians.
My biggest problem with this movie is that all the characters speak as though their dialogue was written for them. Everything sounds very arch and constructed, as if we're supposed to revel in the resplendence of McCarthy's prose instead of believing these words would actually fall out of somebody's mouth. It's the sort of thing that works on the page but not on the screen.
Example: "Isn't that a little cold?" "The truth has no temperature."
Considering the story revolves around drug trafficking, the actual mechanics of the plot are left rather unclear. We never actually see or hear from the cartel people, though shadowy go-betweens turn up and depart without much rhyme or reason. The truck hauling the drugs -- we're never even told what kind it is, other than it's a lot -- has all sorts of adventures on the road, changing hands several times. The counselor and Reiner get blamed for the loss, even though they were just victims, and spend the rest of the movie on the run.
Brad Pitt appears a few times as Westray, a slithery associate of the counselor who also has some skin in the game and delivers apocryphal warnings about what's to come.
This is the sort of movie in which early on, we are told about a particularly nasty way for someone to die. And we know we're just marking time until one of the people we're watching meets that grisly fate.
This is the sort of movie that is bewitching to actors, since they get to speak a lot of pretty dialogue and wear cool clothes and engage in conversations where everyone's trying to pretend how smart they are. But for audiences it's a listless wander through the desert, where the scenery is pretty but the map was lost long ago.
Narratively speaking "Prometheus," director Ridley Scott's long-awaited prequel to his seminal 1979 space/horror film "Alien," is one big mess. But it's still a worthy cinematic experience, a potpourri of Scott's flair for sumptuous visuals and sly, creepy mood-building.
Set some decades before Ripley and her gang encountered the black and spidery beasties, Scott and his screenwriters take us back to those same dangerous locales and unnerving themes. The protagonist is again a female, archaeologist Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace), who thinks she's found an invitation from the creators of all life. It turns out to be more of a deathtrap, as the crew is slowly dwindled one by one.
Along for the ride is Charlize Theron as a hardcase representative of the profit-minded company financing the mission, the usual collection of disposable crewmates, and an android assistant named David (Michael Fassbender) who, like all of his ilk, turns out to be less helpful than his cheery nature might suggest.
Things really get strange when they discover a massive alien ship filled with vials of black goo, video records of an accident killing most of the crew, and a 10-foot-tall bald humanoid with a seriously bad attitude. At one point Elizabeth finds herself with an alien creature growing inside her, though in a different method than we've seen in the other movies, and has to submit herself to a horrifically invasive medical procedure to get it out.
The experience of watching this film is akin to wandering in a daze, as you find yourself constantly asking questions, and receiving responses that only provoke more questions. But even if the movie is on some levels unsatisfying, that's because it leaves you wanting more.
"Prometheus" is a real head-scratcher, a riddle of a movie that doesn't really care about finding any answers. The odd, discomfiting journey is its own reward.
Ridley Scott is (in)famous for releasing director's cuts of his movies, but if you want one you'll likely have to wait a few years. Although the video packages being released now contain about 15 minutes worth of deleted/extended scenes, including a new opening and ending, the theatrical version of "Prometheus" is all you'll get.
Interestingly, the film is only being released as a Blu-ray/DVD combination -- there isn't an option for a solo DVD.
The two-disc version comes nicely loaded with features, including two separate commentary tracks by the filmmakers and access (via tablet computer) to a database on the alien culture.
Spring for the four-disc collection, and you'll also receive all sorts of making-of goodies, including pre-visualization drawings and videos, behind-the-scenes peeks and more.
"Haywire" is a gimmick movie, and not a very good one. Its entire premise is built around the now-ubiquitous figure of the globe-trotting super-spy, a la Jason Bourne, who has amazing hand-to-hand combat skills. Except in this case, the butt-kicker supreme is a woman -- specifically, novice actress and MMA star Gina Carano.
Director Steven Soderbergh doesn't do anything particularly bold or imaginative with this tired genre other than flip the gender of the protagonist. It's almost as if he and screenwriter Lem Dobbs are saying, "See! We can make a movie with a female lead where the characters are just as stilted, the combat is just as repetitions and the plot just as much a nonsensical bramble as one starring a dude."
Imagine any Jason Statham movie with long hair and breasts, and you've pretty much got the flavor.
The film stars a lot of recognizable male actors -- Channing Tatum, Ewan McGregor, Antonio Banderas, Michael Fassbender -- most of whom get into fisticuffs with Carano, seemingly just to see them get pasted by a girl.
Carano, who resembles Rachel Weisz on human growth hormones, isn't asked to do much beyond scowl and kick. If the movie's entire reason for existence is to prove that a woman can be convincing as a brutish action star, then Carano certainly passes muster.
If, on the other hand, the idea is to create a believable, identifiable character and see how they react to seemingly insurmountable circumstances, then this mixed martial artist is out of her league.
Soderbergh keeps threatening to retire from movie-making, and un-clever projects like this don't exactly give us a reason to convince him to stick around.
Extra features, which are the same for both Blu-ray and DVD editions, are mercifully brief. There's "Gina Carano in Training," a 16-minute featurette whose title says it all, and the 5-minute "The Men of Haywire," which also pretty much says it all.
Brandon is a sex addict. This may sound like a set-up for juvenile joking -- "What man isn't!" -- but the new drama "Shame" contains not an ounce of smirk. Its cinematic cousins are not T&A comedies but other dramas about addiction, and how it sucks all the joy out of people's lives.
The irony for Brandon is that one of the most beautiful, pleasurable experiences in human existence is the source of his pain. For him, the thrill of sexual intercourse plays like a dirge -- assisted by the film's dour, almost numbing musical score by Harry Escott.
German-born actor Michael Fassbender, best known to American audiences for playing young Magneto in last summer's "X-Men" reboot, gives a harrowing and haunting performance as Brandon. It's a revealing portrait, both physically -- the film's unabashed nudity and sex scenes earned an NC-17 rating -- and at its emotional core.
There's one amazing scene where we see Brandon engaged in vigorous sex with two prostitutes, and Fassbender shows us that the fleeting satisfaction of his physical urges only saps his soul.
Brandon lives alone in a fabulous Manhattan apartment, and works at an upscale ad agency where the boss (James Badge Dale) is a walking sexual harassment lawsuit waiting to happen. Brandon is more circumspect about his desires, though, surreptitiously watching porn on his office computer and masturbating in the men's restroom.
He also takes care to avoid becoming the office lothario, generally shying away from the women he works with, until Marianne (Nicole Beharie) sidles up to him one day and makes her attraction clear. The sequence of their brief courtship is perhaps the most difficult thing to watch in the movie -- Brandon, presented with a genuine woman of wit and soul and charming awkwardness, struggles to relate. It's like a shark trying to go vegetarian.
It becomes clear exactly how alone Brandon is when his sister Sissy arrives unannounced and begs him to let her crash there. Their meeting is revealing: he catches her naked in the bath, thinking a burglar has broken in, and Sissy makes little attempt to cover herself up.
The suggestion that Brandon's obsession has touched even this sibling relationship is like a shadow that lingers over the entire movie.
Sissy is played by Carey Mulligan, in a tender, brittle performance that underlines her status as one of the best actresses of her young generation. The scene where she sings a sad, slow rendition of "New York, New York" at a nightclub while Brandon tearfully looks on is genuinely touching.
Director Steve McQueen (no relation to the screen legend), who co-wrote the screenplay with Abi Morgan, paints an unflattering picture of sexual obsession, though the sex scenes are clearly designed to be titillating -- with the exception of Brandon's foray into a gay club when his addiction reaches its nadir.
(I don't think McQueen is attempting to portray homosexuality as ugly, just a sick straight man who will do anything for sex, even if he doesn't enjoy it.)
"Shame" isn't a great movie, but quite a good one showcasing an amazing performance by Michael Fassbender that should get some attention when Academy Award nominations arrive.
I greatly enjoyed "A Dangerous Method," though I recognize it's not for everyone. It's a fictionalized version of the relationship between three pivotal figures in the development of psychoanalysis: Sigmund Freud, his protégé Carl Jung and Sabina Spielrein, a patient of Jung's who became his lover and then a pioneering psychologist in her own right.
The movie is a mixture of esoteric discussions on the nature of the human mind and depictions of tortured sexuality. One minute, the characters are debating the way their budding discipline is being ostracized by the greater scientific community; the next, they're engaging in kinky sex -- one getting whipped while she watches herself in the mirror, etc.
I found the juxtaposition of intellectual and carnal impulses delightful, but then I'm a very thin slice of the movie-going demographic -- a psychology major my first two years in college, before switching to film and journalism. "A Dangerous Method" is based on the play "The Talking Cure" by Christopher Hampton (who also penned the screenplay).
For me, it was like watching dry history from my old textbooks brought to vivid, neurotic life. A terrific trio of actors illuminate the (supposed) private lives of these stuffy figures, their collaborations and conflicts.
Others, though, may simply dismiss it as high-brow erotica with a brainy bent.
The film is directed by David Cronenberg, and if ever there were a filmmaker made to delve into the psycho-sexual labyrinths of Freud & Co., it's him. Cronenberg ("Dead Ringers") has had a career flitting between mainstream and art films, straight-out horror and deeply disquieting dramas. His movies ("Videodrome") have always had a healthy dose of id-driven fear and loathing slithering under their slick surface.
Michael Fassbender plays Jung, who in 1904 was a 29-year-old doctor practicing the still-revolutionary "psychanalysis" invented by Freud. He is assigned as a patient Sabina, a 19-year-old Russian Jew who's had thoughts of becoming a psychologist herself, but is currently suffering from crippling mental instability.
Knightley, with her willowy beauty and fierce, large eyes, makes quite an impression as Sabina, contorting her body and unhinging her lower jaw in a convincing physical manifestation of her mind's anguish. She looks like her soul is so offended by the stain of her mortal failings, it's trying to shunt off its own fleshy sheath.
Eventually Sabina's psychosis is brought under control using classic Freudian theories about sexual repression, and she becomes Jung's student. Frustrated by trying to understand sex-based impulses when she has no intimate experience herself, she initiates as affair with Jung, who is married to a very wealthy woman (Sarah Gadon).
Things really get crackling when Freud steps into the picture. Played by Viggo Mortensen with magisterial authority, Freud views himself as both a pioneer and victim, attempting to rewrite the laws of science regarding the human mind, yet stubborn in his insistence that a psychologist's role is not to cure his patients but merely help them understand themselves.
"I can assure you than in a hundred years time, our work will still be rejected," he tells Jung at their first meeting. "Columbus, you know, had no idea what country he'd discovered. Like him, I am in the dark. All I know is I've set foot on the shore, and the country exists."
The two men's philosophies clash in time, with Jung feeling constrained by Freud's view of all psychoses as sexual in origin. "There must be more than one hinge to the universe," he tells Sabina.
Again, thrilling stuff from my vantage point, but maybe not yours.
"X-Men: First Class" was a totally unnecessary but thoroughly engaging reboot of the super-hero franchise that kicked off the current cinematic craze for costumed do-gooders. It takes the story back in time 40 years earlier than the original film, and focuses on the relationship between Charles Xavier, aka Professor X (James McAvoy), and Erik Lehnsherr, otherwise known as Magneto (Michael Fassbender).
The motivations for the time shift are suspect. The first set of films fixed very specific timelines for Magneto and Dr. X, which would put them now in their early 80s. Fanboys tend to like their mutants young and attractive, so going back four decades accomplishes that. Even though it requires characters previously seen in the other films, like Logan and Mystique, to play the old "they're-mutants-so-they-age-slowly" card to explain their lack of aging. Convenient.
The central conflict is how mutants should view their relationship with regular humans. Magneto, a victim of Holocaust camps and Nazi torture chambers, prefers to strike the first blow in what he sees as an inevitable war. But Professor X seeks integration and acceptance. It's not unlike the divergence between the approaches of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X: Both shared noble goals, with radically different methods for achieving them.
I don't think the cinematic world really needed a new go-round of "X-Men" movies, but I liked this one enough that I can actually say I'm looking forward to another. And maybe another.
Please note, "X-Men: First Class" hits video stores Friday, Sept. 9.
Video extras are somewhat sparse in the DVD edition, but grow in power upon upgrading to Blu-ray.
Both versions contain "Children of the Atom," a making-of documentary split into eight featurettes touching on various aspects of production, from pre-production to special effects.
The Blu-ray version adds deleted/extended scenes and a number of goodies. There's Cerebro Mutant Tracker, with a database of mutant heroes and villains; behind-the-scenes footage and interviews about specific scenes; 10 digital X-Men comics; and a digital copy of the film.
I was away on a trip and missed the press screening for "X-Men: First Class." That's the bad news, and the reason for the lateness of this (brief) review. The good news is that there even was a press screening. 20th Century Fox has imposed a virtual ban of screenings of any kind in Indianapolis for nearly two years, so the fact that they relented -- after much lobbying by the Indiana Film Journalists Association members, I should add -- is in of itself a wonderful mutation of the status quo. Thanks, Fox.
A reboot of the "X-Men" franchise has both wisdom and foolishness behind it. Foolish, because it has not been that long since the first film essentially kicked off the current comic book movie mania 12 years ago. It has the reek of desperation about it, the familiar tale of a Hollywood bereft of ideas and falling back on recycled ones.
The wisdom is that ... well, the last X-Men movie was something of a disaster, and the spinoff of the wildly popular Wolverine character flopped. So the movies really didn't have anywhere else to go. It sort of built itself up for a dive into the Phoenix Saga, but then backed away.
Not to mention, time is a factor. The first set of films fixed very specific timelines for the Magneto and Dr. X characters, which would put them now in their early 80s. Apologies for pointing out the obvious, but fanboys like their mutants young and attractive, so by going back to the roots of the X-Men the filmmakers are able to accomplish that.
However, there are some timeline issues. We are introduced to Alex Summers, aka Havoc, as one of the new mutants who join Charles Xavier's team of mutant do-gooders. Of course, anyone familiar with the comics world of X-Men knows Alex is the younger brother of Scott Summers, aka Cyclops, who we saw in the original movies as a young man nearly 40 years hence.
Other characters who were contemporaries of the original X-Men -- like Beast, aka Hank McCoy -- are transported back to his early time for convenience. For others who appeared in both films, like the shape-shifting Mystique (now played by Jennifer Lawrence), they simply fall back on the old "they're-a-mutant-so-they-age-slowly" trick. Convenient.
All that said, I thoroughly enjoyed the new flick. At its center is the conflict between Magneto and Dr. X, now played by Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy. Xavier is a deeply empathetic character who uses his mind-reading abilities to nurture his students and nudge Magneto away from the path of anger and pain that has ruled his life. For his part, Magneto cannot let go of the horrors of the Nazi laboratories, or ignore the growing fear regular humans have for their mutated kin.
Director Matthew Vaughn, who helmed last year's (in some ways) anti-comic book superhero movie "Kick Ass," has a good feel for this conflict. The movie does tend to waver when the focus slides too long away from the two men's relationship. I found the dilemma of Hank McCoy rather silly -- he works on creating a serum to make fantastic-looking mutants appear normal. In his case, his mutation consists of large monkey-like feet. Put on some shoes, problem solved.
Things are tougher for Mystique, whose natural form is blue and scaly. In this movie Xavier and Mystique have a long sibling-like relationship going back to childhood, but she feels more of a connection with the self-aware Magneto. It doesn't hurt that Xavier is sexually ambiguous about her appearance, while Magneto encourages her to let her freak flag fly.
I don't think the cinematic world really needed a new go-round of "X-Men" movies, but I liked this one so much that I can actually say I'm looking forward to another. And maybe another.
