X2: X-Men United

by Shari L. Rosenblum

Slicker, crisper, and icier than the first, X2: X-Men United effectively eliminates the third dimension from its characters and its franchise, diligently chipping away at any illusion of depth.

Whereas the original creates a tapestry of textured emotional threads -- the second chooses not to take advantage of the delicate and elaborate groundwork. Instead, it repeats expositional details already established - e.g., muggle families have trouble adjusting to mutant offspring (my theory is they're just jealous 'cause mutants are so damned hot) -- and almost entirely reduces both personalities and conflicts to mere reference and suggestion, gutting the human angle and trivializing the social and political subtexts: a scene in which Bobby/Iceman (Shawn Ashmore) "comes out" to his parents is reminiscent of the early AIDS-era one-liner that the hardest thing about being HIV+ is telling your parents you're Haitian. So hold our breath though we might, what parades before us on the screen in X2 are comic book cut-outs unworthy of the sourcework mythology from which they were quickened.

The acting is fine, and even good, but the writing and direction cheat the characters and the audience (do we blame Bryan Singer? 20th Century Fox?). Wolverine (Hugh Jackman, a man with delicious arms who often makes poor film choices) gets to show little evidence of his animal side (apart from his sniffing here and there and his Clint Eastwood sideburns), or even the bad boy instinct that makes his conflict with himself (so nicely visualized in the first) so brutal. His stretching of the Jean Grey (Famke Janssen, less appealing than in the first)/Cyclops (James Marsden) dyad back to a triangular point (enviable from where I was sitting, thinking I could be a phoenix if I wanted) is done without finesse or humor, albeit with some weak, and failed, attempts at both. Rogue (Anna Paquin), so perfectly adolescent/fille fatale in the first, seems less conflicted here than Joey Potter choosing between Dawson and Pacey, even when she's wavering on the potentially killer kiss with Bobby, while wearing his grandmother's divine four-button gloves (does she never get to triangle between Iceman and Pyro (Aaron Stanford)? -- 'cause I'm guessing that would be a blast.).

Mystique (Rebecca Romijn Stamos) becomes a parlor trick (sort of like the one Storm (Halle Berry) appears to conjure when she stands aside, takes a deep breath, and concentrates really hard on wind). It's a trick to be envied or coveted, no doubt, and sometimes make us smile, as in her Femme Fatale reprise with Magneto's prison guard, but without anything but wait-and-see-what-happens-next to make us care about her antics. And while Magneto's (Ian McKellen) dull plastic torture takes over all of his early scenes, the film extends Professor Xavier's (Patrick Stewart) paralysis to subsume his entire being.

Only Nightcrawler is utterly divine, well-tuned and perfectly turned. Alan Cumming embraces the teleporter role wholeheartedly (with just the right dashes of Gazoo and Fegan Floop, if you ask me), and gives the film the tenderness it tries so hard to do away with. And he's got the coolest special effects -- although I did like Mystique's attempt at seducing Wolverine, and I kind of loved Deathstrike's (Kelly Hu) claws coming out of her fingernails -- hints of something sharper the film didn't want to get into.

The plot is also relieved of any depth. Wolverine's search for his past, Xavier's desire for peaceful coexistence, Magneto's burn-baby-burn activism get sublimated in a storyline that is more Bond-like-cold-war-gone-bad, with the ubiquitously annoying as-if-Clancy-designed Brian Cox (a homosexual predator in L.I.E., a logorrheic pater in 25th Hour, a didactic screenwriter/teacher in Adaptation) leading the charge as the evil genius/McCarthyite megalomaniac with a personal stake in the undoing of nature's ways, who (of course) got his training back in Nam.

There is plenty of action in X2, sure, and it can be fun to watch (the opening sequence is far too long, but when it's on target, it's the best balanced, most energetic, utterly neatest scene of the film), but it's lacking in the animated angst that kept us at the edge of our seats in X-Men. Quite like the substance-less and disappointing Two Towers, X2 replaces complexity with schtick, so that it is often pretty to look at (the visuals within Cerebro are wonderful), and may keep the kiddies from bouncing in their seats despite its overlength, but it has little to grab the thinking part of the adult body.

I look forward to the next installment, if only to see how the boys are doing, but I'm not sure I'll be standing in line on opening day.

©2003 Shari L. Rosenblum
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