X-MEN: FIRST CLASS (Rated PG-13 for intense action sequences with violence and some totally unnecessary profanity, partial nudity & suggested sexual situations): What can I say? It's summertime, which in movie theatres means blockbusters in the "Superman" or "Star Wars" vein. Read that as everything big, big, BIG! All stops out! Even the length, 132-minutes, is needed to cram into this prequel to an earlier quartet based on the Marvel Comics team of mutants who turned their talents to solving crimes and saving the world from arch-madmen.
As with the first (and best) of the series, we are back in the 40s, now hopping from a Nazi concentration camp in Poland, where we meet a sensitive boy with powers to move objects, to various other parts of the world - England, the US, Switzerland, Argentina - to find other mutants, at first alone and confused or ashamed of their physical & mental differences from "normal" people, but who together become the (Do I dare say it?) iconic X-Men.
Created for the screen by a team of writers with material based on a story by Sheldon Turner & Bryan Singer (and the Marvel Comics series by Stan Lee & Jack Kirby), and directed by Matthew Vaughn, who is adept at blending smarts, action, and familiar with the retro style of the 60s comic strip successes; the movie is both campy & sexy (in a lesser James Bond way), with a dual focus: proving that being different doesn't mean being wrong, and revealing it in their combined talented ways become successful in combat with people like the wily, dastardly evil Shaw/Dr. Schmidt character (beautifully underplayed by Kevin Bacon, who almost runs away with the show).
Back to the 60s: an explanation of what went on during the Kennedy/Soviet clash over the missiles in Cuba - a sideline in one serious event after another that brings the mutant team together (and at times divided) in motivation; do they exist to save the world or join evil forces and gain personally by doing so?
With a top-notch production team - John Mathieson's impeccable photography; Lee Smith & Eddie Hamilton's extremely clever editorial leaps; Henry Jackman's bombastic music and Denise Davis's state-of-the-art sci-fi designs - the movie can't lose.
"We shouldn't have to try to fit into society; we must be accepted for what we are and what we can accomplish," becomes the theme that thrusts the team into fame, developing X-Men of the past and setting them up for - what? - the 6th in the series next summer? It's highly possible. It's a feel-good movie for light summer's immediate gratification in the dark - no more, no less. (Grade: B+)
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