Release date:
|
May 23, 2014
|
Director:
|
Bryan Singer
|
Cast:
Language:
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Jennifer
Lawrence, Hugh Jackman, James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Evan Peters, Patrick
Stewart, Ian McKellen, Ellen Page, Nicholas Hoult, Peter Dinklage, Halle
Berry
English
|
Here’s a sci-fi franchise taking its fan base for granted.
Why bother with novelty and intensity when you know Wolverine and Mystique have
just to turn up to drive audiences wild? X-Men:
Days of Future Past brings us the older and younger versions of most of the
characters that have inhabited the series from the start, in a story about time
travel and altering the course of history. One murder committed by
Mystique/Raven in 1973 set ‘normal’ humankind on a collision course with
mutants, which has led to a present-day war that will destroy all the X people.
Wolverine is sent back in time to stop her. Resting on a wafer-thin story are
shootouts and human-mutant clashes throughout, but little that we’ve not already
seen.
The strength of the earlier X-Men films was that the
special effects complemented the characters’ emotional turmoil and moral
quandaries. Here, it’s SFX all the way with little by way of human drama. Plus
the premise is so puerile that a suspension of disbelief – so essential in
fantasy films – becomes tough to achieve as a viewer. Changing one historical
wrong won’t ensure world peace forever. I’m sure even Miss World contestants
know that. Yet in the universe created by writers Simon Kinberg, Matthew Vaughn
and Jane Goldman, time travel is given the most simplistic treatment and
straightforward interpretation you can imagine.
Also, a majority of the heavyweight cast are given so
little to do that frankly, they end up looking like over-qualified recruits. Hugh
Jackman has his moments – just a few – when he relives 1970s America with
barely disguised amusement. That he can bring a light touch even to the job of
being the tragic Logan/Wolverine is a measure of his formidable talent. Jennifer
Lawrence looks lovely and has a flawless figure, but brings little else to her
expressionless rendition of Mystique who happens to be the central character of
this film (even though those MCPs persist in calling it X-Men).
Halle Berry has even less to do here as Storm than she did
in her over-hyped role right after her Oscar win, as the Bond girl Jinx in Die Another Day. Ian McKellen and Patrick
Stewart give her close competition for the least screen time in the film,
though their characters are far more significant to the plot.
The best of the writing comes out in the early back-to-the-past
interactions between Charles Xavier/Professor X (James McAvoy) and his one-time
bête noir, the young Erik Lehnsherr (Michael Fassbender) before he became
Magneto. In the dilemmas of Xavier we get a glimpse of what has made some of
the other X-Men films such a delight.
Should he accept a loss of his mutant powers as a side effect of the serum that
gives him use of his legs, or should he willingly adopt a wheelchair to hold on
to that other strength? Now this is
the stuff that good X-Men films are
made of. There’s also some fun to be had noticing the uncanny similarity
between actor Mark Camacho and US President Richard Nixon.
The stand-out character and performance in this film is Evan Peters’ Quicksilver, the mutant with the ability to move at
unimaginable speeds. Peters lends an air of mischief plus an uneasy energy and restlessness to his
character, even when he’s sitting still. For his efforts, he’s rewarded with
the best, most entertaining, funniest, most well-executed scene in Days of Future Past, involving flying
dishes and diverted bullets.
The top-of-the-line special effects in that scene are
matched by another involving the White House. Honestly, that latter scene is
SFX for the heck of SFX, if you think about the fact that Magneto’s reasoning
for his behaviour at that point is somewhat indecipherable. Still, the thought
of the US President’s home with an essential part lopped off and the entire
complex encircled by an I-won’t-say-what is cause for some chuckles.
The rest of the special effects are of high quality, but
lack imagination. In short, X-Men: Days
of Future Past is rather flat. “Humanity has always feared that which is
different,” says a character during the course of the film. Yeah yeah, we’ve
heard it said in different ways in a ton of superhero films; if you don’t take
that forward it’s just cliched, intellectually pretentious blah blah. Superficial
writing, predictable background score, under-used actors and a downright silly
ending … we deserve better than that.
Rating (out of five): **1/2
CBFC Rating (India):
|
U/A
|
Running time:
MPAA Rating (US):
|
122 minutes
PG (for sequences of intense
sci-fi violence and action, some suggestive material, nudity and language)
|
Release date in the US:
|
May 23, 2014
|
