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The "Jesus" miniseries a few months ago was nothing. Compared to the scrutiny that this, the most geekticipated movie ever (that not necessarily being a pejorative phrase), underwent since it was a mere gleam in Fox's eye, TV's latest take on the Gospels got a free ride. The Son of God could have danced the "Hokey Pokey" and delivered His parables in Esperanto and not prompted an outcry from the faithful on the order of what would happen if the denizens of Marvel Comics' bestselling universe were perceived by their fans as being rendered on the big screen in anything less than devoutly pious fashion.
You gotta understand -- and I'm speaking as a visitor to this campfire, having indulged in few such illustrated serial addictions through the years -- X-Men are a big deal. Really big. After 20 years of reasonable success, they took off right proper in the early 1980s, and now encompass twelve different monthly series, three of which each outsell former top Lycra dogs Superman, Batman, and Spiderman. Readers have lived with them, issue-in, issue-out, since back before Pop Tarts were invented, and the older ones would just as soon see their own children grow up to become Balkan despots or tobacco executives as see their favorite brooding, psychologically complex, heat-vision mutants sullied by Hollywood.
The opening matinee I attended filled up quickly with an interesting mix of races and ages. But compared to last summer's geekfest The Phantom Menace, this crowd was decidedly edgier, and almost entirely y-chromosomal. Fox obviously risked the eternal wrath of these guys by trusting the script to first-time writer David Hayter (coincidentally, provider of the voice for Captain American in the most recent "Spiderman" cartoons); director Bryan Singer, who despite finding both critical and box-office success with The Usual Suspects had not only never done an expensive, FX-driven film, but had never even heard of these characters until the producers waved an earlier script, by one of four previous writers who gave it a go, under his nose. Not exactly the traditional formula for recouping a sizable cinematic investment.
So, you ask, how's it work, mister self-important long-winded movie critic? Taken with the canon of all the comics adaptations that have come before, X-Men is -- not bad. But then I'm a sucker for any movie featuring a lithe female villain wearing little but orange contact lenses and dark blue paint.
In a brief 1944 prologue set in a Polish concentration camp, we meet adolescent Eric, whose separation from his parents prompts a sudden inexplicable mangling of all the barbed wire nearby. Jump to near-future Meridian, Mississippi, where a girl's (Anna Paquin) first serious kiss puts her boyfriend into wheezing, comatose hypertension. Meanwhile in Washington, Senator Kelly (Bruce Davison) is whipping up public and political sympathy for legislation that would single out the burgeoning minority class of genetic mutants, whose unique gifts run the gamut from walking on water to sweating fire, for legal discrimination. Kelly's tirade is witnessed by two old friends turned enemies, beneficent, mind-reading Professor Xavier (Patrick Stewart), and the now aged Eric Lensharr (Ian McKellen), alias Magneto, who's more attractive than ever.
The pair have opposing ideas how best to deal with being the vanguard in the next evolutionary jump. Xavier runs a New England boarding school for the "gifted" -- "Freaks and Freaks" -- while Magneto envisions nothing short of war allowing for mutant survival. And both have their acolytes. Aiding the professor are telekinetic Dr. Jean Grey (Famke Jannsen), tele-meteorological Storm (Halle Berry), and Cyclops (James Marsden, from Gossip), whose eyes are like laser pointers from Hell. In Magneto's camp are a prehensile-tongued, wall-climbing fellow named Toad (the first role in which martial artist Ray "Darth Maul" Park gets to show his face), and animalistic leonine giant Sabretooth (6'10" pro wrestler Tyler Mane). Oh, and the indigo girl, Mystique (actress and Sports Illustrated model Rebecca Romijn-Stamos; it would have made for an interesting caption if she'd been so attired for the swimsuit issue: "suit by Sherwin Williams"), whose power, besides triggering the immediate onset or recurrence of puberty throughout the audience (give me a break -- you see the byline on these reviews, so don't expect an apology for unabashed maleness; you want a distaff opinion, ask Rosie O'Donnell), is the ability to duplicate the appearance and abilities of another person, mutant or otherwise.
Joining this mix, and unsure exactly where their allegiances lie until opposing forces square off in the inevitable battle to save New York City from being turned into a quivering mass of protoplasm, are the aforementioned Southern lass, who now call herself Rogue, and fan favorite Wolverine (Australian stage actor Hugh Jackman). He's a rowdy, brawling sort with miraculous recuperative powers and no memory of his life before fifteen years ago, when he woke up one day with an indestructible metal skeleton and foot-long blades that extend from his knuckles. When Wolverine dons his leather uniform (far more subdued than the print character's skintight nuclear yellow outfit), he looks remarkably like something from a Tim Burton movie, and I don't mean Batman -- more like Edward Ginsuhands.
If you were to read the last two paragraphs aloud, you'd get the problem with X-Men: overcoming the inherent incompatibilities of movies and comic books is a challenge few have successfully overcome. It's one thing to accept as perfectly sensible on the pulp page a set of characters with vintage sci-fi Wu-Tang names, but repeating so many of them aloud through all the necessary exposition, while keeping a straight face, isn't easy. And it doesn't help that there's a lot of that typical "can't -- reach -- lever -- must -- try -- " deal on display, as well as the essential climactic round of tag-team cooperation, as was finely dissed in last summer's underrated Mystery Men. But for those who didn't come into the theater already getting it, or who maybe like myself just picked up a little familiarity through cultural osmosis, there are a few excellent low-keyed dramatic exchanges between Stewart and McKellan (although their voices are so similar it sometimes seems like maybe one of them has possessed the other) to distract from all the larger-than-life posturing, as well as eye-popping, athletic fight scenes choreographed by Hong Kong master Corey Yuen (Romeo Must Die).
If you think you can tolerate all the gee-whiz, X-Men is certainly worth seeing. Just ask the geeks who stood up and cheered when it was over. B-
*From David Bowie's "Oh You Pretty Things".
So...nearly exclusively male crowds pony up almost $60 million in the first weekend to watch a film featuring people whose looks (animation and television won't figure heavily in this essay, mainly because it doesn't take any particular chutzpah for a cartoon to dress up like an eggplant and shout "Onward, my faithful legumes!" and TV stars are mutants in their own right who are born without shame ) would in the real world prompt at best serious ridicule and at worst gang-stomping were they displayed in public on any day except Halloween, Cinqo de Mayo, or Fat Tuesday. What's happening here? How long has this kind of thing been going on? And just what distinguishes a superhero from a measly old run-of-the-mill hero anyway? Is it a matter of unnatural abilities, staggering financial resources, scientific genius, an admirable work ethic, a titular monthly publication, or simply an imaginative tailor?
Outrageously heroic figures have been around since cave paintings, making regular appearances in the mythology, poetry, literature, and drama of every ancient civilization. But best as I can figure out, the first movie character to rightfully deserve superhero status** was -- ironically, since he came from a novel written by a woman, Baroness Emmuska Orczy -- the Scarlet Pimpernel. Debuting onscreen in a 1917 silent film, he manifested several elements that would become common among his ilk: a secret identity, a mask, a cape, masculine gender, enough money to do stuff normal people couldn't, cleverness, bravado, considerable athletic prowess, and the ability to generate sequels and remakes. Nevermind that in fighting to save noblemen from the guillotine during the French Revolution his backdrop was an historical event most Americans rank in importance right below the Soccer War of 1969. He had the cape. Much the same could be said for that savior of Mexican oppressed, Zorro, initially embodied by Douglas Fairbanks in 1920 and still going strong at the millennium (look for Antonio Banderas to be slashing Z's again by next year).
Movie superheroes really took off in the 1930s, thanks to cross-pollination from three new sources, the youngest of which is today going stronger than ever: radio serials, newspaper comic strips, and comic books. The Golden Age of feature-length and serialized movie daring ensued for two decades. A startling variety of new heroes emerged, many of whom would turn up again generations later: Flash Gordon (first portrayed by Buster Crabbe, who in 1933 played Tarzan -- a pretty talented character in his own right when you remember he could command animals -- and would later be Buck Rogers), Dick Tracy (who had no special powers, but did wield then-hightech gadgets and a really impressive jaw), the Green Hornet (whose 1930s Kato was played by Charlie Chan's "number one son" Keye Luke; Luke would in the 1970s play tutor to grasshopper David Carradine in "Kung Fu," a series that had been developed by 1960s TV Kato Bruce Lee; and current burgeoning chopsocky star Jet Black Mask Li is rumored to be playing the chauffeuring henchman in an upcoming film treatment of The Green Hornet), Captain America, the Lone Ranger, the Phantom, Captain Marvel, King of the Rocket Men (modernized in 1991's wonderful period adventure The Rocketeer), Superman (vibrantly realized in cartoons by animator Max Fleischer, and in pre-George Reeves live-action serials by Kirk Alyn), and Batman (whose cut-rate serial outing had Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson living in an apartment, driving a Buick, and hiding their costumes in a filing cabinet).
Then came the 60s, Vietnam, and a skeptical generation that didn't put much stock in any demigod who couldn't figure out how to end the war, sending superheroes in retreat back to the comics. There, Marvel breathed new life into the genre with a horde of new characters who provided a much-needed infusion of real-world angst to the medium. Meanwhile on the small screen the campy "Batman" series ensured that no one would be ready to take costumed crusaders seriously again until ten years later, when Christopher Reeve's Superman reestablished the bankability of tights, as long as said hero exhibits some realistic insecurities, that continues today. Together the Man of Steel and Batman franchises, now resting at four films each after going astray in the later chapters, boast a box-office total around $2 billion.
It's been hit and miss the past few years (although nothing to rival 1986's Howard the Duck for sheer unmitigted disaster). For every Blade there's been a Steel (showing that ethnic superheroes aren't immune either to stellar success or abysmal failure); for every Men in Black, a straight-to-video Captain America or Fantastic Four (which may yet get a worthwhile treatment, possibly by James Cameron). For every Spawn, a Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. For every The Crow, a The Crow: City of Angels.
There are only a couple things you can say for sure about the future of superhero movies. They remain, onscreen and off, chiefly a male domain (you'll notice there weren't any sequels to Supergirl or Tank Girl). And as long as something like X-Men comes along now and then to collect those testosero-dollars -- be looking for Sam Raimi's still-uncast Spiderman this time next summer -- there will always be plenty of actors lining up to put on tights.
**You might be able to make an argument for Robin Hood, who first turned up in a 1912 French film. He wore tights, had a special talent (archery), was brave and smart, and in some versions of the story was a rich nobleman with a secret identity. But I couldn't bring myself to give too much credit to the French.
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