Mutant and Proud

X-Men First Class
Matthew Vaughn, 2011

4 Stars

This Monday found me, for the first time in a few years now, once again doing my legendary “I’m Going to See X-Men” dance, a dance that has, alas, on its last two outings brought nothing more than disappointment and heartbreak.

Damn you Last Stand.

Damn you Wolverine.

And so, with an acrid mix of utmost excitement and impending doom, I ventured with a fellow beardy into Chiba’s Keisei Rose Theatre for an evening of telepaths and teleporters. And did my dancing pay-off? By golly, gee whiz did it!

After losing momentum by the end of the hogwashy Last Stand, FOX took the brave decision to drop their superstar cast and take the X-Men franchise right back to its beginnings, telling the tale of just how Xavier’s School and Magneto’s Brotherhood came to be, set to the backdrop of the swinging sixties and thus, finally, bringing to the big screen those iconic yellow jumpsuits, as well as bucket-loads of continuity errors and all the fade-to-white death-scenes you could ever wish for! Hazah!

Beginning in the Nazi concentration camps (in a scene, if I’m not mistaken, taken straight from the opening of the first movie…), First Class follows the young Erik Lehnsherr, played with the perfect blend of sympathy and malice by Michael Fassbender, as he reaps vengeance across the globe (in a plethora of different languages, thus requiring me to dredge my old linguistic memory banks – the subs in these woods are all Japanese!) on the ex-Nazis who killed his friends and family. Meanwhile, living up the cushty student life are soon to be Professor Charles Xavier (a charming and oft hilarious James McAvoy) and his painfully beautiful, in human form at least, foster sister Raven (Jennifer Lawrence).

Eventually, of course, the two find each other, recruited by the government to spearhead a new department of mutants under the watchful eye of Moira McTaggart (Rose Byrne), who has rather impressively not a single hint of the Scotch accent that she will have developed by X3.

An intriguing and delightfully fresh collection of mutants make up their new ensemble, from the well-known to the down right obscure.

Nicholas Hoult, who is not, to be quite blunt, one of my favouritest people in the world was surprisingly impressive as The Man Who Would Be Beast, giving a touching and yet amusing performance as the young Dr McCoy struggles with his demons within. Yeah, he’s no Kelsey Grammer, but at least he got some lines. Lucas Till and Caleb Landry Jones as the young Havok and Banshee respectively put in solid performances, whilst the stunning Zoe Kravitz was a sexy joy to watch as the winged stripper Angel (who will always be Pixie in my mind thankyouverymuch).

The Young Mutant of the Year Award, however, must go to Edi Gathegi as the disappointingly short-lived Darwin, who certainly had the most interesting power of the boys, and possibly one of the most touching scenes in the movie – spoilers avoided.

And the baddies? Hmm… Well…

As a long-time fan of Sebastian Shaw and his scantily-clad White Queen, I must say I had been rather unsure of the casting of Mr Kevin Bacon from the outset. Neither a dandy, nor a brick shit-house, Bacon also managed to lack the signature mutton chops that truly make Shaw the most dastardly of villains. That said, he did make a good baddie… Not a good Shaw exactly, but a good baddie nonetheless. January Jones as the so-very-sixties Frost, meanwhile, was both sexy and believable (and somehow much older in ’67 than when she escaped from Weapon X twenty years later in Origins…), although perhaps not quite cool enough… I dunno… I’m sure there are thousands out there ready to disagree, but she just didn’t quite cut it. Jason Flemyng (always a joy) rocked my socks as the crimson-skinned teleporter Azazel, father to Nightcrawler, and I can only hope that he gets a smidgeon more screen-time in the second class outing.

Truly a morality tale, First Class does a fantastic job of showing the meanings of good and evil, whilst at the same time blurring the area in between into all matter of shades of grey. The film’s examination into what it means to be “normal” is also touching and fresh as more physically estranged team members Beast, Mystique and Angel each do what they must to gain acceptance within their society. Indeed, First Class succeeds in this aspect where The Last Stand so epically failed before it. Well done scripty-team chaps!

As the final battle rages, and the Cuban Missile Crisis looks like it can only be solved by Charlie’s Angels and Demons, X-Men First Class delivers its real punches however, asking us to consider just who is “in the right”; is it Charles, with his ironically all-white ideals of peace and unity, or Erik, the murderous concentration camp escapee with his multi-race band of Latinos and redskins (literally)? It’s a toughy, but even as Erik and his Brotherhood leave the crippled Charles (wasn’t he up and about on his feet in Origins…?), one does struggle to choose sides…

That said, Magneto’s got all the pretty ladies. And Jason Flemyng. So, you know what Chuck? As Mr Jackman said (in possibly the greatest cameo in movie history), “Go fuck yourself”.