X-Men: Days of Future Past

My family is big on movies.  My parents used to load us into the back of the family VW Beetle with blankets and pillows and head to the drive-in theater(we were supposed to be asleep, but I was back there quietly watching the screen).  Growing up near a theater in Germany, my brother and I were at the movies at least once a week, dollar in hand.  Once we returned to the States, our movie days were curtailed by cost...until the dawn of the Beta-Max.  That machine, attached to our television, meant that my family could spend entire weekends happily snowed in, watching movie after movie. Other families weren't that different from mine. My husband can remember watching Beastmaster over and over, just because it was on a fledgling HBO. 

Nothing beat the theater experience, however.  Some movies just have to be experienced on the big screen.  Star Wars wouldn't have been nearly as vivid if my first experience of it had been on the tiny screen of a television.  And I can't imagine being as transported by Raiders of the Lost Ark if I saw it on television, can you?

These days, I'm much more picky, because it costs so much.  There are certain things that we will not even consider seeing in a theater, like "chick flicks", or Academy Award pieces.  Those films can be viewed in the comforts of our home, where I can cry my eyes puffy and not worry about scaring small children as we leave the theater. We also have to consider whether a film is R-rated or appropriate for our son to see.  Lots of thought and discussion is involved.

Except for movies about superheroes.  Those require the theater experience.  The geek in our house had been hearing about the new X-Men film since forever, and his enthusiasm was infectious.  While I was never a big fan of the Marvel universe, the X-Men world intrigued me.  It intrigued most of my extended family, too.  So one Sunday after lunch, the eight of us drove to the theater to see X-Men: Days of Future Past. 

My knowledge of the X-Men has been limited to what I've seen in the movies and on Saturday morning cartoons.  If you've never seen any of the previous X-Men films and want some of the back story before you hit the theater, I am sure that you can find X-Men: First Class on Netflix.  That should help get you up to speed. On the main characters, anyway--Wolverine, Professor X, and Magneto.

Wolverine has always been my favorite, mostly because he gets to smack people around and he heals very quickly. And he always has snappy dialogue. What this particular movie did, more than the previous films, was to solidify the relationship between Charles Xavier, played by James McAvoy, and Magneto, played by Michael Fassbender. 

The film reveals more about why these two are the way they are, how they became who they become. Their friendship, after all, is where the entire X-Men universe begins, even though they end up on opposite sides of an ideological war. Professor X and Magneto join together at some point in the future to send Wolverine back into the 70s, to change history. 

I recommend this film.  Even if you've never had any interest in the Marvel universe, there's lots to enjoy.  X-Men: Days of Future Past moves very quickly from one point to another, so there is little downtime.  The dialogue is snappy, the fight scenes are well choreographed, and there is a scene with Jim Croce's "Time in a Bottle" that left me breathless with laughter.  And the film got the seventies.  They got the horrid clothing, the music, the huge gas guzzling cars, and the Cold War fear of the unknown.  I was transported by the authenticity, and it made the film so much more vibrant. 

So, this movie is entertaining, exciting, and funny.  Go see it.  

  
3.) Tell us about the last movie you saw...do you recommend it?