 |
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| Directed by | Matthew Vaughn |
|---|---|
| Produced by | Gregory Goodman Simon Kinberg Lauren Shuler Donner Bryan Singer |
| Screenplay by | Ashley Edward Miller Zack Stentz Jane Goldman Matthew Vaughn |
| Story by | Sheldon Turner Bryan Singer |
| Starring | James McAvoy Michael Fassbender Rose Byrne Kevin Bacon January Jones Oliver Platt Jennifer Lawrence |
| Music by | Henry Jackman |
| Cinematography | John Mathieson |
| Editing by | Eddie Hamilton Lee Smith |
| Studio | Marvel Entertainment Dune Entertainment Bad Hat Harry Donners' Company Ingenious Media |
| Distributed by | 20th Century Fox |
| Release date(s) |
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| Running time | 132 minutes |
| Country | United States United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $140–160 million |
| Box office | $353,624,124 |
X-Men: First Class is a 2011 American superhero film, based on the X-Men characters appearing in Marvel Comics. The fifth installment in the X-Men series, the film was directed by Matthew Vaughn and produced by Bryan Singer, and acts as a prequel to the original X-Men trilogy. The story is set primarily in 1962 during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and focuses on the relationship between Charles Xavier (Professor X) and Erik Lensherr (Magneto), and the origin of their groups—the X-Men and the Brotherhood of Mutants, respectively. The film stars James McAvoy as Xavier and Michael Fassbender as Lensherr, leading an ensemble cast that includes Kevin Bacon, January Jones, Rose Byrne, Jennifer Lawrence, Zoë Kravitz, Nicholas Hoult and Lucas Till.
Producer Lauren Shuler Donner first thought of a prequel based on the young X-Men during the production of X2, and later producer Simon Kinberg suggested to 20th Century Fox an adaptation of the comic series of the same name, though the film does not follow the comic closely. Bryan Singer, who had directed both X-Men and X2, became involved with the project in 2009, but he had to only produce and co-write First Class due to other projects. Matthew Vaughn, who was previously attached to both X-Men: The Last Stand and Thor, became the director, and also wrote the final script with his writing partner Jane Goldman.
First Class entered production in August 2010, with principal photography concluding in December and additional filming finishing in April 2011, just a few weeks before the film's premiere in June 2011. The tight schedule proved a challenge to the six companies responsible for the extensive visual effects, which included computer-generated sets and digital doubles for the actors. Locations included Oxford, the Mojave desert and Georgia, with soundstage work done in both Pinewood Studios and the 20th Century Fox stages in Los Angeles. The depiction of the 1960s drew inspiration from the James Bond films of the period. First Class received positive reviews, being considered a well-written and fresh revival of the franchise, and was a box-office success with earnings of $353 million worldwide. A sequel titled X-Men: Days of Future Past is set for release in July 2014.
Plot
At a World War II concentration camp in occupied Poland in 1944, scientist Dr. Klaus Schmidt observes young Erik Lensherr bend a metal gate with his mind when the child is separated from his mother. In his office, Schmidt orders Lensherr to move a coin on a desk, killing his mother when Lensherr cannot. In grief and anger, Lensherr's magnetic power manifests, killing two guards and destroying the room. Meanwhile, at a mansion in Westchester County, New York, young telepath Charles Xavier meets young shape-shifter Raven whose natural form is blue. Overjoyed to meet someone else "different", he invites her to live with his family as his foster sister.Eighteen years later, Lensherr is tracking down Schmidt, while Xavier is graduating from Oxford University with a thesis about mutation. In Las Vegas, CIA officer Moira MacTaggert, disguised as a stripper, follows U.S. Army Colonel Hendry into the Hellfire Club, where she sees Schmidt (now known as Sebastian Shaw), telepathic Emma Frost, and teleporter Azazel. Threatened by Shaw and teleported by Azazel to the War Room, Hendry advocates the deployment of nuclear missiles in Turkey. Hendry later is killed by the energy-absorbing mutant Shaw.
MacTaggert, seeking Xavier's advice on mutation, takes him and Raven to the CIA, where they convince the Director John McCone that mutants exist and Shaw is a threat. Another CIA executive sponsors the mutants and invites them to the secret "Division X" facility. MacTaggert and Xavier find Shaw as Lensherr is attacking him, rescuing Lensherr from drowning as Shaw escapes. Xavier brings Lensherr to Division X, where they meet young scientist Hank McCoy, a mutant with prehensile feet, who believes Raven's DNA may provide a "cure" for their appearance. Xavier uses McCoy's mutant-locating device Cerebro to seek recruits against Shaw. Xavier and Lensherr recruit stripper Angel Salvadore. Later, taxi driver Armando Muñoz, Army prisoner Alex Summers, and Sean Cassidy join, and code-name themselves Darwin, Havok, and Banshee, respectively. Raven dubs herself Mystique. Xavier and Lensherr also approach Wolverine, who declines with a profanity.
When Frost meets with a Soviet general in the USSR, Xavier and Lensherr capture her and learn of Shaw's intentions to start World War III and trigger mutant ascendency. Meanwhile, Azazel, Riptide and Shaw attack Division X, killing everyone but the mutants, and asks them to join him. Angel accepts; when Havok and Darwin retaliate, Shaw absorbs Havok's energy blast and uses it to kill Darwin. Xavier takes the mutants to his family mansion for training. In Moscow, Shaw compels the general to have the USSR install missiles in Cuba.Shaw, wearing a helmet that foils Xavier's telepathy, shadows the Soviet fleet in a submarine to ensure the missiles arrive.
Raven thinking mc coy likes her in her natural form tells him not to use the cure, when he tells her that she is not attractive she attempts to seduce Lensherr in the shape of possible girl, when he tells her that she is as beautiful as she is, stealing a kiss with her. Using the cure on himself backfires, rendering McCoy a blue beast. McCoy pilots a variant jet to take the mutants and MacTaggert to the blockade line. Lensherr uses his magnetic power to lift Shaw's submarine from the water to a nearby island. During the ensuing battle, Lensherr seizes Shaw's helmet, allowing Xavier to immobilize Shaw. Lensherr tells Shaw that he shares Shaw's exclusivist view of mutants but, to avenge his mother, kills Shaw—over Xavier's objections—by forcing a Nazi coin through his brain.
Fearing the mutants, both fleets fire their missiles at them, which Lensherr turns back in mid-flight. In a struggle, Xavier keeps Lensherr from destroying the fleets with the missiles, but when MacTaggert shoots at Lensherr, a deflected bullet hits Xavier in the spine. Lensherr leaves with Angel, Riptide, Azazel, and Mystique. A wheelchair-bound Xavier and his mutants return to the mansion, where he intends to open a school. MacTaggert promises never to reveal his location and they kiss; at a CIA debriefing later, she says she has no clear memory of recent events. Lensherr frees Frost from confinement, now calling himself "Magneto".
Production
Development
During the production of X2, producer Lauren Shuler Donner discussed the idea of a film focusing on the young X-Men with the crew, which was met with approval; the concept was revived during the production of X-Men: The Last Stand.[35] One of The Last Stand's writers, Zak Penn, was hired to write and direct this spin-off,[36] but this idea later fell through.[37] Penn explained in 2007 that "the original idea was to have me do a young X-Men spin-off, a spin-off of the young X-Men characters. But someone came up with a pretty interesting idea [...] it was this guy who worked with me named Mike Chamoy, he worked a lot with me on X3. He came up with how to do a young X-Men movie which is not what you'd expect."[37]As producer Simon Kinberg read the comic series X-Men: First Class, he suggested studio 20th Century Fox to adapt it. Kinberg, however, did not want to follow the comic too much, as he felt "it was not fresh enough in terms of storytelling", considering them too similar to Twilight and John Hughes movies, and also because the producers wanted an adaptation that would introduce new characters.[35] Both Kinberg and Shuler Donner said that they wanted characters with visuals and powers that had not been seen and that worked well as an ensemble, even if they did not work together in the comics.[12] Shuler Donner later said that the original idea was to green-light First Class depending on the success of X-Men Origins: Magneto.[38]
In 2008, Josh Schwartz was hired to write the screenplay, while declining the possibility of directing X-Men: First Class.[39] Fox later approached Bryan Singer, director of X-Men and X2, in October 2009.[40] Schwartz later said that Singer dismissed his work as "he wanted to make a very different kind of movie",[41] with the director instead writing his own treatment which was then developed into a new script by Jamie Moss.[40] Singer denied using Sheldon Turner's script for Magneto as inspiration to write his draft of First Class,[42] but the Writer's Guild of America arbitration still credited Turner for the film's story, while Moss and Schwartz's collaborations ended up uncredited.[43][44] Singer set the film in a period where Xavier and Magneto were in their twenties, and seeing that it was during the 1960s, added the Cuban Missile Crisis as a backdrop, considering it would be interesting to "discuss this contemporary concept in a historical context". Shuler Donner suggested the Hellfire Club as the villains.[35]
In addition to Moss, Ashley Edward Miller and Zack Stentz were hired to rewrite the script. Miller compared it tonally to Singer's work on the first two X-Men films.[45] The pair centered the film on Xavier and Magneto's relationship, and wrote the other characters and storylines in terms of "how they fit in the tension between Erik and Charles".[35] Singer dropped out of the director's position in March 2010 due to his commitment to a Jack the Giant Killer adaptation. He formalized his duties from director to producer.[46]
The producers listed various possible directors, but at first did not consider Matthew Vaughn because he started working on The Last Stand before backing out. After seeing Vaughn's satirical superhero film Kick-Ass (2010), Kinberg decided to contact Vaughn to see if he would be interested in First Class.[35] When Fox offered Vaughn the "chance to reboot X-Men and put your stamp all over it", he first thought the studio was joking, but accepted after discovering that it was to be set in the 1960s.[47] The director stated that First Class would become the opportunity to combine many of his dream projects: "I got my cake and ate it, managed to do an X-Men movie, and a Bond thing, and a Frankenheimer political thriller at the same time".[4] Vaughn signed on as Singer's replacement in May 2010, and Fox subsequently announced a June 3, 2011 release date.[48] Vaughn also rewrote the script with his screenwriting partner Jane Goldman, adding new characters and changing existing character arcs and dynamics—for instance, the idea of a love triangle between Xavier, Magneto and Moira MacTaggert was cut.[35] The character of Sunspot was also cut, as the director felt that "we didn't have enough time or money" to make the character work. Vaughn and Goldman considered including mentions to the Civil Rights Movement, but ultimately the director felt that "I had enough political subplot in this movie". Vaughn stated that his biggest concern was to both make Erik and Charles' friendship believable given the short timespan of the film, and on how the character of Magneto was built - "Shaw was the villain, but now you're seeing all those elements of Shaw going into Magneto."[4] An action scene that was to have been set in a dream sequence with revolving rooms was scrapped after the release of Inception (2010).[49]
Describing his thought process towards the material, Vaughn said he was motivated by "unfinished business" with Marvel, having been previously involved with the production of both X-Men: The Last Stand[47] and Thor.[50] Vaughn declared that he was more enthusiastic about First Class than The Last Stand due to not being constrained by the previous installments, and having the opportunity to "start fresh", while "nodding towards" the successful elements from those films.[50] Vaughn compared First Class to both Batman Begins (2005), which restarted a franchise with an unseen approach,[51] and the 2009 Star Trek film, which paid homage to the original source material while taking it in a new direction with a fresh, young cast.[52] Regarding continuity, Vaughn said his intention was "to make as good a film that could stand on its own two feet regardless of all the other films" and also that could "reboot and start a whole new X-Men franchise".[50] Goldman added the film was kind of an "alternate history" for the X-Men, saying that while rebooting, the writers did not want to go fully "against the canon of the X-Men trilogy", comparing to the various approaches the comic had in over fifty years of publication.[53]
Filming
The 1960s setting of X-Men: First Class was technologically inspired by the James Bond films of that era, also added to the international feel of the characters.[59] Kinberg said the series was a major influence for the way they "did a cool job representing the period, in a way it still felt muscular and action-oriented", and Vaughn added that Magneto was his attempt to recreate Sean Connery's Bond in both style and the "badass, charming, ruthless and sweet" personality.[61] The director said his goal was to "feel like a '60s Bond film, but with a little bit of reality it could be grounded in. I wanted there to be just a hint of this world of the mutants coming through. A mutant in this world having powers needed to be the equivalent of you or I sneezing, as normal as possible, at least until the humans start seeing it for the first time."[7] At the same time, Vaughn tried to do the "bloody hard balancing" of modern and antique to recreate the 60s in way it was "not so alien to the kids that it looked like a period piece."[61] The director also tried to depict the era still in a realistic way, particularly "that 60s misogynist vibe" with women in skimpy suits, and McTaggert's reliability as a CIA agent being questioned.[4]
Vaughn said he shot the film in a way it resembled the productions of the 1960s, with "very traditional framing, and camera movement when it needs to move, not just throwing it around and whizz-bang",[4] and using the anamorphic format "to create a widescreen experience, which is emblematic of '60s movies, such as the James Bond films".[20] The director had to hire five cinematographers - with sole credit being given to John Mathieson, who came halfway through the shoot and did "forty-five percent, fifty-five percent" of the film - and four assistant directors to successfully convey the look he wanted for the film.[4][7] Visual effects supervisor Matt Johnson added that for the lighting of the digital interior of Cerebro, "keeping with the '60s vibe, we put in some old school elements such as lens flare and chromatic aberration and edge fringing."[20] The aesthetics of the decade were also invoked by designers Simon Clowes and Kyle Cooper of Prologue Films, who were responsible for the end credits and tried to do something that "could be done with traditional optical". The credits animation depicts DNA strands through simple geometric shapes, drawing inspiration from both Saul Bass and Maurice Binder's work in the Bond films.[65]
The origin story made the X-Men costumes resemble the ones in the original comics, while still being functional, with the yellow parts resembling Kevlar and the blue looking like ballistic nylon, and resembling 1962 apparel in both the fabrics and the "Space Age fashion". The costumes tried to convey the character personalities—for instance, Xavier wore loose clothes, and Emma Frost's costumes were white and shimmery. Magneto's costume at the film's ending also closely resembled the original version from the comics, and three versions of his helmet were made, two to fit Fassbender's head and one for Bacon's.[66]
Effects
First Class employed 1,150 visual effects shots,[67] which were done by six companies:[20] Rhythm & Hues was responsible for Emma Frost, Mystique and Angel, as well as set extensions; Cinesite handled Azazel, the visuals for Cerebro and environment effects; Luma Pictures did Banshee, Havok and Darwin; Moving Picture Company did Beast, Riptide, and the scene where Shaw's yacht is destroyed and he escapes in a submarine; Digital Domain created Sebastian Shaw's powers, and Weta Digital was responsible for the climactic battle in Cuba.[27] The overall coordination was provided by visual effects designer John Dykstra, who said the biggest difficulty was the tight schedule: "It was slightly less than a year and I've never done anything like that before (Spider-Man was frequently two years)."[67] British company 4dMax employed special 3D scanners to digitize data of the sets and actors which would be used by the effects companies.[20] This allowed for computer-generated sets such as the mirrored nuclear reactor where Magneto battles Shaw[67]—for which the effects team used the mirror maze fight in Enter the Dragon as a reference—and the domed walls of Cerebro. Digital models of Washington and Moscow were also created based on photographs of the actual cities,[27] with the Russian one in particular having vehicles and military hardware based on videos of a 1962 Red Square, and a digital army doing an actual Soviet-style march. With the exception of scenes featuring the actors on ships (shot on a small bridge set) and the X-Jet (done on a set replicating the front two-thirds of the aircraft, which was mounted atop a roller wheel so it could be spun) the naval battle was entirely digital, featuring a simulated ocean and high resolution 3D models of the X-Jet, Shaw's submarine and 16 warships. The designs were mostly based on real vehicles, with the jet being a modified SR-71 Blackbird, the submarine a combination of various models from the 1940s and 50s, and replicas of the actual US and USSR fleets in the 1960s — though a few were not in service in 1962. A particular Soviet cruiser was a larger version of the Kresta I and II, leading Weta to dub it the Kresta III.[20] Practical effects were still used whenever possible, such as having on location most of the objects young Erik throws after his mother's death, actors and stuntmen dangled from wires, and real explosions and light effects as reference for Havok's beams.[10]While in the comics Shaw's absorption power was depicted by having him grow up to ten times his original size, First Class instead does what company Digital Domain called a "kinetic echo", where a digital Kevin Bacon would be rippled, deformed and at times multiplied in repeated "iterations" that appear in a short period, to "see [Shaw] displace and deform in a kinetic and organic way".[10] According to Dykstra, the biggest problem with Frost's diamond body was depicting it "without looking like she was made of Jell-o or the polygon model of a human being".[67] The morphed Frost, which the visual effects tried to make look more like a faceted crystal than glass,[67] was rotomated into Jones in the live-action plates, while still retaining the actress' eyes and lips.[20] As the character kept on going in and out of her diamond form, a motion capture tracking suit could not be employed, so instead the effects team used both gray and chrome balls and a jumpsuit covered in mirrors—which also served as a lighting reference.[10][27] For Angel's digital wings, the animators studied slow-motion footage of dragonflies to create the wing pattern in a realistic way,[20] and the designers added iridescence to "make the wings prettier".[68] The visual of Banshee's screams was done through a digital ring-like structure based on renderings of sound waves such as Schlieren photography.[20][27] The visual for Havok's blasts employed similar rings,[27] concentrated in beams or rings of light which were then match moved into Till's mimed throwing.[20] For Banshee's flight, the visual effects team used digital doubles only for distant shots, with closer ones employing Jones shot in a special flight rig.[20] Azazel's teleporting was made to resemble the "inky smoky effects" used with Nightcrawler, who appeared in X2 and is Azazel's son in the comics.[20] However, while Nightcrawler only left a smoke trail, the visual effects team had Azazel accompanied by digital fire and smoke "because he was more closely aligned with the devil". The fire was also used "as a mask to hide or reveal the body", according to effects supervisor Matt Johnson.[27] Since the visible part of whirlwinds are the dust and dirt sucked up by them, the ones Riptide produces were made to resemble "a tornado of gas, made out of nothingness" by visual effects supervisor Nicolas Aithadi. The final product was mostly a practical effect made with dry ice, which was augmented by computer-generated imagery.[20] The visual effects team portrayed Mystique's abilities slightly differently due to this being a younger version, with "the scales being slightly longer and the transformation being slightly showier than when she became the more mature Rebecca."[67] For Beast, computer graphics depicted his simian-like feet, the transformation sequence, and a few facial replacements for when Beast opened his mouth wider than the mask on Hoult's face allowed.
Release and reception
Box office
The premiere for X-Men: First Class took place at the Ziegfeld Theatre in New York City, on May 25, 2011,[71] and a week later, on June 3, the film went on general release. In North America, the film opened on approximately 6,900 screens at 3,641 locations, debuting atop the weekend box office with earnings of $55.1 million across the three days,[72][73] including $3.4 million in its Friday midnight launch.[74] This opening was much lower than the opening weekends of X-Men: The Last Stand ($102.7 million), X2 ($85.5 million), and X-Men Origins: Wolverine ($85.0 million), but slightly higher than the original film ($54.5 million).[73] Executives at 20th Century Fox stated they had achieved their goal by opening with about the same numbers as the first X-Men film and that it was an excellent start to a new chapter of the franchise.[72] First Class also opened 8,900 locations in 74 overseas markets, which brought in $61 million during the weekend—standing third in the overseas ranking behind Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides and The Hangover Part II. The film opened atop the box office in twenty countries, with the biggest grosses being in the United Kingdom ($9 million, including previews), France ($7.1 million), Mexico ($5 million), South Korea ($5.4 million) and Australia ($5.1 million).[75] In its second weekend X-Men: First Class dropped 56.2 percent, the second smallest second weekend drop in the franchise behind X-2: X-Men United (53.2 percent), and came in with $24.1 million, in second place to Super 8.[76] Overseas, it rose to number two behind Kung Fu Panda 2, with $42.2 million.[77]The film grossed $146,408,305 in the United States and Canada and $207,215,819 in foreign markets, bringing its worldwide total to $353,624,124.[3]
Critical response
The film had received generally positive reviews, with the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes showing 87 percent positive and a rating of 7.4 out of 10 from 231 reviews. The critic consensus was that "with a strong script, stylish direction, and powerful performances from its well-rounded cast, X-Men: First Class is a welcome return to form for the franchise."[78] On another review aggregator, Metacritic, the film received a score of 65 out of 100 based on 37 reviews.[79]Among the major trade publications, Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter described the film as "audacious, confident and fueled by youthful energy", and said that "director Vaughn impressively maintains a strong focus dedicated to clarity and dramatic power ... and orchestrates the mayhem with a laudable coherence, a task made easier by a charging, churning score by Henry Jackman...".[80] Justin Chang of Variety said the film "feels swift, sleek and remarkably coherent", and that "the visual effects designed by John Dykstra are smoothly and imaginatively integrated..."[81] Frank Lovece of Film Journal International lauded "a wickedly smart script with a multilayered theme that ... never loses sight of its ultimate story, and makes each emotional motivation interlock, often shockingly playing for keeps with its characters. This is not a kids' movie."[82]
In consumer publications, Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly praised "the kind of youthful, Brit-knockabout pop energy director Matthew Vaughn absorbed from his previous collaborations as producer of director Guy Ritchie's bloke-y larks", and found McAvoy and Fassbender "a casting triumph. These two have, yes, real star magnetism, both individually and together: They're both cool and intense, suave and unaffected, playful and dead serious about their grand comic-book work."[83] Peter Howell of the Toronto Star called it "a blockbuster with brains" and said Vaughn "brings similar freshness to this comic creation as he did to Kick-Ass, and manages to do so while hewing to the saga's serious dramatic intent."[84] However, Betsy Sharkey of the Los Angeles Times bemoaned its "misplaced and misplayed ambition", and felt that its "moments of greatness ... are fleeting, ultimately undone by a frustrating mire of multiple plots, overreaching special effects, leaden ancillary players and world-ending military standoffs that have all the tension of a water balloon fight."[85] Roger Ebert, straddling, called it "high-tech and well-acted" but merely "competent weekend entertainment. It is not a great comic book movie."[86] David Denby of The New Yorker considered that besides the sequences where the mutants are drafted and trained, "the rest looks and feels like a very cheesy Cold War-era B movie, especially when the villain, Shaw, shows up grinning and wearing a plastic helmet that prevents his mind from being read".
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