X-Men (2000)

Succeeded by: X2 (2003)

Cast includes:
CHARACTER	ACTOR/ACTRESS	RATING
Logan/Wolverine	Hugh Jackman	½
Professor Charles Xavier	Patrick Stewart
Eric Lehnsherr / Magneto	Ian McKellen	½
Jean Grey / Phoenix	Famke Janssen	½
Scott Summers / Cyclops	James Marsden
Ororo Munroe / Storm	Halle Berry
Marie / Rogue	Anna Paquin
Sabretooth	Tyler Mane	½
Toad	Ray Park	½
Mystique	Rebecca Romjin-Stamos
Senator Kelly	Bruce Davison

Review

The first installment in the X-Men series isn't as exciting and sterling as the two follow-ups, even if the characters and atmosphere show great potential. The introduction of the realm, the school and the predicament is done in a very conventional manner for this genre, hence removing a lot of the potential for tension and surprise elements. Compared to his work in the brilliant X2, Bryan Singer's work here is disappointingly pale. And he gets only minimum help from a useful, but improvident screenplay from David Hayter. The secondary characters are a little bit all over the map, the action set-pieces somewhat overdone, and the narrative presentation a little too dichotomic. Despite all this, X-Men has enough promise, intelligence and interesting aspects to be well worth a view. Jackman/Paquin and Stewart/McKellen play well off of each other in the leads.