X-Men: First Class, or Hasn't Hollywood Gotten the Memo About the Whole "Less Is More" Thing?

There is a very solid movie at the heart of X-Men: First Class. As with every superhero flick, the greatest thrill comes from seeing an origin story--the moment when a character has to come to terms with the fact that he's something more than human. In this film's case, the origin story is that of Erik Lehnsherr (Michael Fassbender), more commonly known as Magneto. Unlike many other superhero origin stories, though, this isn't primarily about him discovering his powers; it's about him understanding himself in relation to essentially his perfect foil, Charles Xavier (James McAvoy)--the person he might have been had he been born under different circumstances.

That story, the story of the relationship between these two very compelling characters, is really interesting, and it props up the rest of this sometimes embarrassing goliath of a movie. It's clear from its four (credited--I'm sure there were more) screenwriters that a lot of writing and rewriting and passing around happened in this film's development. The secondary and tertiary storylines are all over the place. It seems strange to me that there wasn't a less convoluted way to set up the concept "mutants cause the Cuban Missile Crisis." As it is, it's a mess of nameless Russian generals, Ray Wise trolling it up in the Situation Room, January Jones' boobs, and Kevin Bacon's all-white submarine. 

The whole thing ties vaguely into Magneto's storyline, but to me it smacks of just being a way to set up suspenseful situations involving (totally obvious spoilers) the magnetic manipulation of a large number of missiles. It's a shame that it took up so many minutes that could have been more satisfyingly dedicated to exploring the relationship between the two central characters. For god's sake--practically the best interaction they have is forced to take place during a training montage!

There are a slew of other new (and familiar) mutant characters, most of whom are kind of passably interesting, as well as Rose Byrne being a total trouper and making the best of the very little she is given to work with as the mutants' CIA handler.

All in all, it's an entertaining two hours, due largely to the solid work by Mr. Fassbender and Mr. McAvoy, who--like their counterparts Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart--put all of their admirable, classically-trained British acting chops into making Magneto and Professor X eminently relatable. As for the rest, as long as you try not to think too hard, you'll probably have fun.