Film Review: The Wolverine + premiere bonus!
Monday, July 22, 2013
If you scroll through past posts, you'll know that I have a strong fondness for movie premieres and have been lucky enough to attend a few in the past. In 2012 there was War Horse, The Hunger Games and Now Is Good but it's been nearly a year since my feet have been near any red carpets. Fortunately, thanks to the awesome guys at Indie London, I had the opportunity to attend last week's premiere of The Wolverine, starring the even more awesome Hugh Jackman. Which means you lovely chaps on Beview get an exclusive review before the film hits cinemas later this week!
Let's start with the basics; the film primarily takes place in Japan, after the events of X-Men: The Last Stand. Another basic, Wolverine is immortal. (Kudos to Jackman for looking eternally young. After all, the first X-Men was 13 years ago.) Insanely cool metal claws pop out from his knuckles. Moving onto the slightly more complex elements...our poor hero has been struggling with his immortality and the loss of his one true love Jean Grey. And now to make things even more mind-boggling, Jean Grey (played by Famke Janssen) appears in this film, and Wolverine is stripped of his immortality! I don't feel bad for saying that as it's there in the trailer and plot key words, but from here on now I'll keep things helpfully as spoiler-free as I can.
Ahead of the big X-Men flick Days of Future Past, we are not reunited with too many familiar faces. Instead, there are new characters like Mariko Yashida (played by Tao Okamoto in her first film), a young woman Logan/Wolverine is assigned to look after - in a way very reminiscent of The Transporter. Then there's her grandfather Shingen Yashida, who meets Wolverine in a very crucial point during the 19th century. These events come back to the forefront when Mr Yashida offers Mr Wolfman a chance to lose his immortality and live a normal life as a thank you for Mr "Young" Wolfman saving his life. Gift, blessing or curse? There's also a jealous dad with a sword, numerous ninjas, a dodgy fiance, an equally dodgy ex-boyfriend, a lizard woman, and one of my favourites of the film, Yukio, a bright-red-haired kick-ass side-kick.
Add all this together with fascinating Japanese culture and some very decent action scenes, and you have a compelling action film. More on the action, there are the confrontations you can see in the trailer, and then some. There's the train sequence, a full-on fight on the fastest high-speed train of Japan...Wolverine vs robot...Wolverine vs sword-wielding man....Wolverine vs everyone. You get the picture. What's nice about this, however, is that we as an audience are so fond of the Wolverine character, that a film just about him is not out of place at all. We saw this with X-Men Origins: Wolverine. He can fight, he can heal (usually), and he has a friggin' cool superpower. And that hair. The action scenes are pretty darn cool, but if being totally honest, I would say they were stronger than the story itself.
The story has culture and structure, but I wasn't totally convinced the whole way through, especially about the reasons we were given for why Wolverine is doing what he does. I don't want to give away too much, but I will say that I'm not a big fan of The Transporter films either. Also, I guessed part of the plot and was right, and some of the characters could have had more character development to show more of why they're there. There are a few moments where they are simply characters in a film, without actually having character. It's a little hard to explain! Having said all that, it's still a good film. There is no denying or taking away from that. Maybe I'm being overly picky and shouldn't be pulling threads at a franchise which is based on action, but the superhero bar has been set very high by your Batmans and Iron Mans of the past.
And also, you may be wondering why "The" precedes "Wolverine". "Did they simply run out of film names?", you wonder. Watch it and you'll find out the significance!
In general, I thoroughly enjoyed watching The Wolverine, and enjoyed it even more due to the fact that Mr Hugh Jackman and co. were watching alongside in the same cinema! Hand on heart, he really does look better in the flesh, and I don't think I ever saw him not smiling. Miles away from his moody angsty character, Hugh Jackman is loveely.
Premiere bonus snaps from the night! (Spot the Jackman if you can)
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