Quick Blurb Review: X-Men: First Class

Hey, everyone! We finally have the internet back so the blog is back up and running and I'm here with a big one. Tonight, we're looking at X-Men: First Class, one of the most positively reviewed movies of the year...much to my surprise.

And with one flex of an eyebrow, you will forget all about the Wolverine movie...

Now, even though I did enjoy X-Men Origins: Wolverine for the performances from the cast, I'll admit it was not a great film and was aimed more at the "Hurr need more 'splosions" crowd. It was fun, but wasn't good for you either. However, since Wolverine drew in a tremendous box office intake, I was concerned that there would be more movies along the same vein, so when First Class was announced, I was a little skeptical. Once the film hit theatres and the feedback began to spread, I was surprised how positive said feedback was. Having seen the film now, I can see why it got the reception it did.

Badass: Noun, Awesome to an extreme level, thereby leveraging unquestionable authority. Example: Michael Fassbender as Erik Lensherr/Magneto.

The story of First Class follows Charles Xavier/Professor X (James McAvoy) and Erik Lensherr/Magneto in their polar opposite beginnings and how their lives manage to intertwine when Charles is recruited by Moira MacTaggert (Rose Byrne) & the C.I.A. to catch a sleazy dictator mutant named Sebastian Shaw (Kevin Bacon), the same man who killed Erik's mother in Poland during WWII. Together, they bond a friendship and recruit other mutants to assist them and the government in stopping World War III, although their conflicting beliefs begin to come between them.

While Wolverine had great performances, First Class matches that and then proceeds to do right what Wolverine didn't: be a good movie all around. I loved seeing the younger side of Xavier as quite a flirty charmer and James McAvoy really hits it home here. As mentioned earlier, Fassbender is totally badass as Magneto and to be honest, I wouldn't have minded if this film kept with the original idea of being X-Men Origins: Magneto so long as he was still in the title role. That being said, I don't think you can tell one character's origins without touching base on the other since they are so intertwined with each other, so I think the final product is the only way this film would've truly worked.

Nicholas Hoult as Hank McCoy/Beast. He's no Kelsey Grammar, but come on, those are some tough shoes to fill.

Along with Professor X, Magneto & Beast, other mutant appearances include (but aren't limited to) Raven Darkholme/Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence), Angel Salvadore (Zoe Kravitz), Sean Cassidy/Banshee (Caleb Landry Jones), Alex Summers/Havok (Lucas Til) and Emma Frost (January Jones), who actually looks like Emma Frost instead of Tahyna Tozzi's representation in Wolverine. My knowledge of the entire X-Men universe is limited to what I've learned from the early 1990s cartoon and some of the video games, but I was really happy to see the characters that I did recognize. Each of the above mentioned characters actually have a purpose within the story and don't feel shoehorned in for the sake of having more mutants. Not that there were some characters that did feel like shoehorns. Azazel (Jason Flemyng) and Riptide (Alex Gonzalez) seemed like they were just there to look mean and intimidating when I would've liked to have seen those characters developed a bit more (I didn't even know Riptide's name until I looked it up on IMDB). Instead, most of the villain focus goes to Emma Frost and Sebastian Shaw, which don't get me wrong, it's great to see Kevin Bacon in a large and sinister role like this, but in hindsight, why not add some depth to the henchmen? Just a little?

Oh, I can't stay mad at you, Mr. Six Degrees Of Separation. You were just too awesome in this movie.

Honestly, this is one of those reviews that was hard for me to put together because I spent less time taking notes on what to discuss in the review and more time losing myself in the film, which is usually a good sign that I am really digging what I'm watching. X-Men: First Class is a great way to show that not all comic book movies are complete over-the-top spectacles. Not only does this movie retcon the Wolverine film by pretending that it didn't happen (although a certain cigar-toting mutant does make a three word cameo in this film, which was great) but First Class also comes off as a very adult film, giving little to no camp value and treating its source material very seriously. If you took the mutant powers out of this movie, you would still be left with a well worth viewing suspense thriller that'd keep your eyes glued to the screen. Because of this, I think X-Men: First Class was better than Thor (which, for the record, was better than Captain America) and is not only the best 2011 film I've seen this year nor is it merely one of the better comic films in recent time, but it's easily, in my opinion, one of the best comic book films ever made. If you enjoyed the first three X-Men films or didn't get a chance to see this film during its theatrical run, you must check out X-Men: First Class. Trust me when I say, "It's well worth it."

-The Cynic

Quick Blurb Review: The Princess & The Frog

Okay, so I haven't really touched base on films intended for much younger audiences on either here or my YouTube account with exception of two posts. It may come as a surprise to some who read this, but I have a soft spot for kids movies. Many great films immediately come to mind: All Dogs Go To Heaven, The Land Before Time, the first couple of Shrek films, Aladdin, A Goofy Movie, An Extremely Goofy Movie (which is the only direct-to-video Disney sequel actually worth watching and could've done well in a theatrical run), Robin Hood, The Aristocats, Peter Pan. It's no coincidence that the last six films that I mentioned are Disney films because let's face it, there's a reason why people keep calling animated movies, regardless of what company produces them, Disney films, because Disney does it best. Lately, you can chalk that up to their collaboration with Pixar Studios to keep churning out well rendered hit after well rendered hit, but something about those films were missing something. Before you start sharpening your knives and flooding the comments with hate (provided you haven't closed this tab by now), I have a lot of respect for the Disney/Pixar films. Anyone who questions the impact that the Toy Story franchise has had on the animation world is a damn fool, even if the 3rd movie was a tad over-dramatic. Yet, after 5 years of CG Disney movies, the whole thing was starting get a little old. I remember saying to my brother, "The next generation doesn't know what they're missing with the older style animation films." Sure, Disney gave the hand drawn stuff a rest after the painfully mediocre Home On The Range but then they decided to dust off the drawing board and gave us The Princess & The Frog, Disney's first hand drawn film in five years.

The plot behind The Princess & The Frog is that Tiana (Anika Noni Rose) was raised in a work work work lifestyle and as an adult, she works two jobs to try and help bring her father's dream of opening a restaurant in New Orleans. Meanwhile, Prince Naveen (Bruno Campos) has come to New Orleans to try and find a wealthy wife to get himself out of a financial bind. There, he and his assistant are confronted by The Dancing Shadowman, Dr. Facilier (Keith David) who spins some voodoo magic to convince them that he can give them everything they ever wanted. Long and short of that, Naveen gets turned into a frog and in order to break the spell, he has to kiss a princess. At a costume party, he mistakes Tiana for a princess and makes her kiss him, accidentally turning her into a frog as well. They then go on a mission through the bayou to set things right.

Tiana is also the first Disney Princess to be African-American.

I'm not going to lie, I didn't really take a lot of notes of things to talk about while watching this movie because I was having way too much of a nostalgia trip with Princess & The Frog, so I'll talk about the movie as a whole instead. This movie continues the fine Disney tradition of leaving our main character with only one parent (father's gone seven minutes into the film. Wasn't surprised) but while it carries on this odd tradition, it also pulls out a lot of stops from the hand drawn Disney films that we loved. Elaborate musical numbers with people who can actually sing (Anika Noni Rose was in Dreamgirls), talking animals (including a Jim Cummings voiced Cajun lightning bug), really cartoony sight gags, large ballroom dances, wishing upon stars, it's all here. Not surprisingly, the movie takes a bit of a darker turn in the final act to bring in an element of peril and suspense, but when your villain is a voodoo twirler voiced by Goliath, then I'd be disappointed if it didn't get a little dark (seriously, the things that Fecilier summons to find the heroes are kinda freaky shit!). Watching this movie honestly gave me the sensation that I had back in 1992 when I first saw Aladdin in theatres.

Cynic Fun Fact: This was the first movie I ever saw in theatres. Too bad it was followed up by Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III.

However, as much fun as I had watching Princess & The Frog, the film is not perfect. There's one scene where three hideously inbred hunters try and catch our heroes for supper that I felt was really stupid and not necessary. Being aimed at a younger audience, I can see why that scene was in there and will even let it go. There might have been a couple of parts trimmed down a bit to shorten the run time slightly and Tiana's friend was really annoying, but I think that was the whole point of her. Fortunately, those gripes don't overshadow the rest of the superb quality found in this film. If you've been wanting to revisit hand drawn Disney, give Princess & The Frog a shot. I don't think you'll be disappointed.

If nothing else, YouTube the song "Got Friends (On The Other Side)." It's quite the spectacle and shows that Keith David has a pretty decent singing voice, too.