These are remarkable times for
Marvel comic fans as film effects have enabled story and imagination to produce
a visually stunning, realistic experience. With X Men: Days of Future Past, a
strong team of writers and director Bryan Singer have created a highly
entertaining quasi-sequel/prequel which reinvents
the X Men world from all the previous versions. A logistical challenge from
the get go, this film has accomplished the near impossible and approaches the excellence
of The Avengers.
In a bleak vision of the
future, mutants are being hunted down along with any human sympathizers by
enhanced, robotic Sentinel hunters. With the last vestiges of hope at a remote
location, Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and Erik Lehnsherr AKA
Magneto (Ian McKellen) join forces in a last ditch effort to alter the timeline
using Kitty Pryde’s (Ellen Page) transferring powers to send Logan AKA
Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) back to his body in the 1970s. His desperate mission is to convince the
younger Charles (James McAvoy) and Erik (Michael Fassbender) to stop Raven AKA
Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence), from carrying out a vendetta against humans
including a scientist named Dr. Trask (Peter Dinklage), who holds the key to
the Sentinel army. However, tracking Raven is problematic while the younger
Charles has lost his purpose having withdrawn into seclusion, and a young, embittered
Erik is locked away for a significant crime. How Wolverine can ‘put the band back together’ is just the beginning of
a convoluted storyline that not only involves time travel but exposing old,
emotional wounds and the fleeting hope of salvation from a doomed future.
From the opening 20th
Century Fox fanfare with its highlighted ‘X’, you know Singer has got his mojo
back (after the misfire of Superman
Returns). Having started the current Marvel era of filmmaking with X Men (2000), he knows these characters
better than anyone, and the screenplay has a strong narrative with some
genuinely funny lines. Like X Men: First
Class, this film crisscrosses the globe from Vietnam to Paris to Washington
D.C., and much of the early period parallels actual historic events and figures
as in Watchmen.
Fate and destiny: can history
be altered and can people change? The
film has such a complex plot you wonder if it will shortchange the emotional
content. It doesn’t. In fact, you could almost have made this a two part film
and expanded the possibilities. By trying to link the old with the new into one
cohesive plot was challenge enough, but by sprinkling in bits of references to
the Marvel canon and providing a great ending, comic fans should be giddy and
thrilled. You don’t have to have seen every X
Men film, but it helps to enrich the experience for fans of Marvel lore by
connecting a lot of dots.
Once again, the interplay
between the younger Charles and Erik forms the core of a paradoxical love/hate
relationship. First, Charles must find his way back from his self-imposed exile
amid personal loss, and then it becomes a fascinating triangle of wills; Raven
may be the target, but Erik and Charles struggle for her soul. Stewart lends
authority (as the older Charles) as he narrates in grim tones the opening
sequence which has parallels (as in the first X Men) to the Holocaust and human intolerance.
The large cast shines especially
McAvoy and Lawrence, who gets to speak in Vietnamese much as Fassbender
espoused German in First Class. You
wish there were more of Stewart and McKellen, who are so good together, and
despite relegating some cast members (including Halle Berry as Storm) to brief
cameos or short scenes, plenty of familiar faces reappear from previous films
to lend an air of continuity, and you feel the casts of both past and present
are adequately represented.
New characters are introduced with cool powers particularly Evan Peters
as Quicksilver, whose rapid speed proves instrumental in the film’s standout
sequence that ranks up there with X 2’s
opening White House assault by Nightcrawler. The special effects are that good.
Just watching the final showdown where the mutants utilize all their unique
powers to do battle with the Sentinels is a treat. Mystique’s
special morphing powers are on full display along with her acrobatic fighting
style, and Magneto’s powers are dead on as he literally raises RFK Stadium when
the action shifts to DC and The White House.
Ambitious and well executed, X
Men: Days of Future Past reaches the heights of X 2 and successfully merges two different universes both past and
present, resets the timelines and events in a massive reboot, and results in a
cohesive, entertaining story with an expanded, marquee cast. By
applying equal parts reverence and boldness with the X Men mythology, Singer
and company have accomplished a nearly impossible juggling act. With visionary
directors like Joss Whedon (whose The
Avengers is the gold standard) and Singer, the Marvel brand is likely to be
an exemplary force of film entertainment for many years to come.
(Yes, stay until the end of the credits for
a brief, elaborate setup for the next film!)
***1/2 of **** stars (add ½* for Marvel
fans)
