The Wolverine Story

2.5/5

I'm not sure why I allowed myself to become hyped up over yet another movie. Sometimes after I finish watching a movie that did not live up to my unrealistic expectations my judgments quickly swing in the opposite direction and I become hyper critical. I enjoyed my time watching the movie, but because of my overly heightened expectations I left with a sense of longing. There have been several movies in the past that have exceeded my expectations, but they have been few and far between.... And alas, X-Men Origins: Wolverine is not one of them.

The opening credits were wonderfully stylized and edited, possibly my favorite part of the movie. The cinematography was often times very epic in scale and there were quite a number of great panning vistas that laid out the next "battlefield". However, as the movie wore on the grandiose landscapes became less of a focus and the special effects took center stage. And this was one of my first gripes, with all of the money that was spent to create this movie some of the special effects moments were very poorly executed. In one scene Wolverine is looking at his "new" claws for the first time... And though we've seen them in three other movies and already seen them in this movie, for just this scene they look terribly fake.

As an action movie I was hoping for more action. Though the action scenes are plentiful, most of them were short and didn't draw me in. Again, the opening credits had more machismo and appeal than did the rest of the movie. The choreography for the fighting was adequate at best, but especially with talent like Hugh Jackman and Ryan Reynolds both of whom have experience with fighting and action sequences I expected much more. I did find Gavin Hood's decision to do a low angle, close up of Sabretooth and/or Wolverine's claws coming out nearly every fight scene to be an interesting one. At one point I thought to myself, "Enough is enough, but then again it's still pretty cool."

The dialogue was quite well written and unlike many movies of this genre which can have lines or moments that completely remove you from the reality they are trying to create, never once did I feel detached because of the script. Many of the humorous moments were very well written and nicely tied into the different characters' personalities. Some of the earlier dialogue that both Wolverine and Wade Wilson have was clever and wonderfully delivered.

It is important to remember that this was a "Wolverine" movie, not an X-Men movie or even a "mutants" movie and because of this many of the peripheral characters suffered. It was great to see so many other characters on screen (Agent Zero, Wade Wilson, Gambit, Wraith, The Blob and others), but none other than Wolverine and Sabretooth have any depth at all. Even the attempt at giving Styker's character some depth seemed too shallow.

Whenever anything is adapted for the silver screen there is an expectation that things will change. In X-Men Origins: Wolverine the changes were plentiful. Some were quite frustrating (even for a non-diehard like myself), others were smaller and easier to overlook. The changes to the character of Deadpool was the most irritating. Ryan Reynold's character of Wade Wilson was dead on, but the story given to him and then ultimately the character of Deadpool were so far removed from the existing canon that it may have been better to have given him a different name.

Pros:
Well shot cinematography, especially earlier in the movie. Wolverine's character was very well fleshed out. The script was at times very engaging and humorous.

Cons:
Poor special effects. Adequate fight scenes. Shallow peripheral character development.

Bottom Line:
Wolverine is like three boxes of puzzles thrown together and each puzzle is missing pieces. There are elements of the movies that are enjoyable and there are other parts that are quite lacking. Unfortunately none of them seem to piece together very well. If you find yourself caring enough at the end of the film there are two post credit clips.

Wife quote:
"It was great, great, but it was really nice just for the Hugh."