Would you want to be a mutant?
That’s one question presented by the third film adapted from the Marvel Comics
series. All of the mutants return from the second film, even the one, Famke
Janssen’s Jean Grey, who seemed to have been killed. She doesn’t seem herself,
though, and the movie spends some time explaining why, utilizing in part a
helpful childhood flashback. In contrast to the second film, which I felt
strained under the need to demonstrate all of the mutants’ powers, this one
does a pretty good job of making everyone seem part of the story. Most of them
seem to like being mutants, but it makes some of them, like Rogue (Anna
Paquin), feel blue. Or look blue, in the case of the newly introduced character
of Dr. Hank McCoy/Beast, who’s become first mutant appointed to a cabinet post.
As played by Kelsey Grammer, he somehow reminded me of a hairy Hubert Humphrey,
a moderate figure trying to placate two constituencies without much success.
Which returns us to the recurring theme of the series as a whole. Are humans
and mutants natural enemies? The mutants themselves speak in language
reminiscent of the gay-rights movement. There’s nothing wrong with us, some of
them say, when told they can be “cured.”
But I was thinking of another
metaphor, the gun-control debate. These superpower-possessing humans are like
people with ultra-powerful, unlicensed weapons. Jean Grey herself has the power
of whole armies, although the movie doesn’t explore the implications of this as
thoroughly as it might. In a world where they represent an increasing
proportion of the population, are “ordinary” humans bound to end up as
endangered as chimpanzees? Does the mere existence of these superhumans
inherently threaten everyone else, because inevitably some will do great harm,
even if most don’t? Having posited these questions, at least implicitly, the
film actually gives them less consideration that I had hoped for. It’s the rare
thriller that I wish had been just a little bit longer. Instead, the film
rather tidily uses Patrick Stewart’s Professor Xavier and Ian McKellen’s
Magneto as symbols of the accomodationist and confrontational approaches to the
issue. The penultimate sequence is a big special-effects action extravaganza
(there’s very few action scenes before that) that mostly works, even if it
wraps things up too tidily. Perhaps the more straightforward plotting is due to
the replacement of director Bryan Singer with Brett Ratner (Rush Hour).
Notwithstanding the caveats above, I found this at least as absorbing as the
other two films. Stay to the very end of the credits for a hint about the plot
of a potential fourth movie.
posted 8/16/13
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