X-Men: First Class (2011) ***/*****
This is a super hero movie that plays more like one of the early James Bond films or an episode of a Playboy Television late night talk show than it does the usual effects heavy action movies that comic books are often adapted as. It has a 60s swagger that is so swinging and fun that it’s practically Austin Powers. Or at least the first act is. Somewhere in the middle the pacing gets weird and the build of the action gets a few stop and start stammers. Also, there’s some character building and clunky dialogue that falls down closer to the cheesy side than it does the slick and cool one. But the things that work end up working so well that it takes away a lot of the sting of the things that don’t.
Primarily, the thing that works best is the casting of Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy as the leads. Every time they are acting as a duo and playing off of one another the movie soars. And even better than their chemistry, just Fassbender alone as a young Magneto is by far the best thing that this film has to offer. There are a smattering of cinephiles that have been singing the man’s praises for a while now, but with this magnetic of a performance in this mainstream of a movie, I would be very surprised if this European actor didn’t have a very large career ahead of him in Hollywood. Kevin Bacon also shines, especially in the first act of the film, as the decadent, self involved antagonist Sebastien Shaw. In an early scene he offers a young Magneto a bite of chocolate in a manner so ridiculously awesome that it had to be homage to Christoph Waltz’s performance in Inglorious Basterds. Less impressive is Jennifer Lawrence, who didn’t do much other than be a mopey teenager as Mystique. Much of the blame can be put on the way her character was written, but this is by far the least impressive performance I’ve seen from the usually impressive young actress.
X-Men: First Class is a film with a handful of moments so strong that they almost elevate the entire movie into being something sublime, but with enough problems in the script department that I can’t consider it a total success. Which is a shame, because all of those early bits with Magneto as a rogue Nazi hunter and Bacon as a deranged Hugh Hefner seemed like they should have added up to something great. I probably liked this movie better than Thor in many ways, but that film gets a better rating because it didn’t try as much and hit everything it did try out of the park. First Class tries a little too much to be grandiose and poignant, and falls on its face several times as a result.
