Short Review: You have Wolverine, the coolest of all superheroes. You have him in his own origin movie completely unleashed from those stupid X-Men movies. How do you screw this up?

Well, apparently just like this.



Have you have seen a basketball player break away with the ball and sprint down the court all alone, no one in sight? They carefully, and skillfully approach the hoop and go for a simple layup.

And miss.

That is this movie.

If you have any expectations just assume they will not be met. Hugh Jackman fronts this, what should be the first in a series of Wolverine films. Instead of launching a new franchise, he's the captain on a rocket that explodes on the pad. I take that back, it pathetically fizzles and slowly falls over.

What's wrong? The film never gains any lift, it feels tired and slow. The main conflict doesn't have enough weight behind it because the narrative needlessly shifts from place to place from character to character without settling on a solid, meaningful path.

There's nothing wrong with the performances and there is certainly nothing wrong with the production in general. This is a well made film in many respects. The problem completely lies in the script by David Benioff (Troy) and Skip Woods (Swordfish). If this film would have had a straight, good guy/bad guy storyline and dropped all of the pitstops this would have been a watchable wad of Hollywood nonsense.




Related Reviews:
Hugh Jackman movies
X-Men (2000)
The Fountain (2006)


Other Critic’s Reviews:
DarkMatters
Christianity Today

Labels: Dominic Monaghan, film, Gavin Hood, Hugh Jackman, Liev Schreiber, Lynn Collins, movie review, Ryan Reynolds, superhero