By Dave Montalbano
AdventuresOfCinemaDave.com
The Bucks 30-year class reunion has been set, starting with an informal get-together at Bru’s Room on Friday, Aug. 19. The formal/informal reception is confirmed for August 20 from 7-11 p.m. at Deer Creek Country Club, with dinner, open bar and music.
This is quite an achievement, considering that the world almost ended before my classmates and I were born. The Cuban Missile Crisis and JFK assassination weighs heavily upon our prenatal and post-natal years.
The Cuban Missile Crisis is an important plot point in the recent box office champion, X Men: First Class.
Given that X-Men: First Class is a reboot/origin story, producer Lauren Shuler Donner and Bryan Singer acknowledge the preconceived notions of the fan base. Like the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962; the audience knows the final results, the suspense derives from the mystery of the moments.
In this case, we learn why old friends Professor X (James McAvoy) and Magneto (Michael Fassbender) become arch-enemies. We learn how the Xavier School of Gifted Youngsters works in partnership with the American government. We uncover the reason why Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) likes to walk around naked in her scaly blue skin.
Much like the original X-Men, this science fiction parable opens in stark seriousness; Erik Lehnsherr (the future Magneto) is dragged into the gates of Auschwitz. Lehnsherr’s metal manipulation ability comes into the focus of Sebastian Shaw (Kevin Bacon), a German scientist who believes that mutants are the next step of human evolution. Adopting the methods of the Nazis, Shaw tortures Lehnsherr, who spends the rest of the movie plotting revenge.
Shot in the style of a Sean Connery/James Bond adventure, X-Men: First Class is entertaining from beginning to end. It contains a globetrotting narrative that avoids a major pet peeve of this columnist; this showdown culminates during daylight in wide open spaces.
Since 1997, it seems as if most big-budgeted summer releases save their climatic scenes for nighttime in claustrophobic settings.
The success of the X-Men franchise is its multidimensional characters. From the first X-Men, sides of good and evil were easily drawn. Director/co-writer Matthew Vaughn reverses these expectations and finds a way to find a satisfying conclusion. A clever cameo links all five movies.
Granted, there is free drama on TV, as the Miami Heat strive to reclaim their NBA Championship. But take time to see X-Men: First Class at a matinee price.
