X-Men Origins: Wolverine Review

X-Men Origins: Wolverine

Release Date: 8th April 2009 - Australia
(premiere)

Production Companies

20th Century Fox (presents)

Marvel Enterprises (in association with)

Dune Entertainment (in association with)

Donners' Company
Seed Productions

Ingenious Film Partners (produced in association with)

Big Screen Productions (produced in association with)

Distribution

20th Century Fox Australia

Genre: Action

Rating: M

Runtime: 107 minutes


Budget: $150,000,000

Box Office Gross: $373,062,864 (Worldwide)


Plot Summary

Logan and Victor are two mutant half-brothers, born 200 years ago, suffered a great deal of childhood trauma and have always depended on each other. They're fighters and killers, as they've been through a few wars in American history due to their regenerative and self-healing abilities. In

modern times, a U.S. colonel

named William Stryker

recruits them and the other

mutants as part of a team

of commandos.

Logan then quits and becomes a logger. He falls in love with a local teacher. When Stryker offers Logan to rejoin his crew, he turns it down. However, the murderous Victor murders the love of his life, which causes Logan to seek revenge.

Cast

Hugh Jackman - Logan/
Wolverine

Liev Schreiber - Victor Creed

Danny Huston - William Stryker
Lynn Collins - Kayla

Ryan Reynolds - Wade Wilson
Scott Adkins - Weapon XI

Taylor Kitsch - Remy

LeBeau/Gambit
Will.i.am - John Wraith
Kevin Durand - Fred J. Dukes/Blob

Dominic Monaghan - Chris
Bradley/Bolt
Daniel Henney - Agent Zero
Tim Pocock - Scott Summers

Julia Blake - Heather Hudson

Max Cullen - Trevor Hudson

Troye Sivan - James

Michael-James Olsen - Young Victor

Peter O'Brien - John Howlett

Aaron Jeffery - Thomas Logan

Alice Parkinson - Elizabeth Howlett

Myles Pollard - Phelan

Stephen Anderton - Marcuse

Chris Sadrinna - Van Mier

David Ritchie - Dr. Cornelius

Asher Keddie - Dr. Carol Frost

Stephen Leeder - General Munson

Henry Brown - Curtis

Tahyna MacManus - Kayla's Sister/Emma

Jade & Joelle Tang - Mutant Twins

Phillip A. Patterson - Firing Squad Leader

(Cameo)

James D. Dever - Platoon Leader (Cameo)

Daniel Negreanu - Poker Player (Cameo)
Patrick Stewart - Charles Xavier/

Professor X (Cameo) (Uncredited)

Crew

Director - Gavin Hood
Screenplay - David Benoff and

Skip Woods

Executive Producers - Richard Donner,

Stan Lee and Avi Arad (Uncredited)

Producers - Lauren Shuler Donner,

Ralph Winter, Hugh Jackman

and John Palermo
Co-Producer/Unit Production Manager -

Louis G. Friedman

Co-Producer/Second Unit Director: Australia/

New Zealand - Peter MacDonald

Co-Producer - Marsha L. Swinton

Military Tech Advisor - James D. Dever

U.S. Casting - Debra Zane

Australian Casting - Christine King

Production Designer - Barry Robson

Supervising Art Director - Ian Gracie

Art Directors - Karen Murphy and Brian Edmonds

Art Directors: North American Main Unit -

Helen Jarvis and Michael Diner

Art Director: New Zealand Unit - Mark Robins

Assistant Art Directors - Simon Elsley,

Jacinta Leong and Michael Turner

Assistant Art Director: New Zealand Unit -

John Allan

Assistant Art Director: North American Main

Unit - Kirsten Franson

Set Decorator - Rebecca Cohen

Property Master - Richie Dehne

Costume Designer - Louise Mingenbach

Assistant Costume Designers -

Christine Bieselin Clark and Eliza Godman

Special Makeup Effects Designers and

Creators - Alec Gillis and Tom Woodruff, Jr.

Key Makeup Artist & Hair Stylist -

Nikki Gooley

Special Makeup Effects: Amalgamated

Dynamics - Yuri Everson, Garth Winkless,

Steve Frakes, David Penikas, Tim Leach,

Karen Keener Manzel, Tamara Woodard,

Jan Pearce, Mike Larrabee, Justin G. Ditter,

Michael Heintzelman, Suma Adams,

Jason Barnett, Michael Broom, Peter Clarke,

Brian Clawson, Connie G. Criswell,

Dawn Dininger, John Donahue, Davis Fandino,

David Fedele, Hiroshi Katagiri, Matt Killen,

Steve Koch, Tim Martin, Matt Mastrella,

James McLoughlin, Kevin McTurk,

Ratna Pappert and Chris Walker

Director of Photography - Donald M. McAlpine

Helicopter Aerial Director of Photography:

New Zealand Unit - Hans Bjerno

Director of Photography: Second Unit - Brad Shield

Director of Photography: North American

2nd Unit - Larry Blanford

Cable Camera Operator: Second Unit -

Keir Beck

First Assistant Camera - Tov Belling

First Assistant Camera: North American

2nd Unit - Taylor Matheson

Location Manager - Gareth Price

Location Manager: North American Unit -

Ann Goobie

Unit Production Manager: North American

Unit - Ross Fanger

First Assistant Directors - Phillip A. Patterson

and Chris Soldo

First Assistant Director: North American

2nd Unit - James Bitoni

First Assistant Director: Second Unit -

Edward Brett

Second Assistant Director - Paul Barry

Second Second Assistant Director - Scott Lovelock

Second Assistant Director: Second Unit -

Drew Bailey

Second Assistant Director: North American

Unit - Misha Bukowski

Second Unit Director: North American

2nd Unit/Stunts - Brian Smrz

Stunt Coordinators - Glenn Boswell,

Dean Choe and Mike Mitchell

Fight/Action Design - David Leitch and

Chad Stahelski

Additional Fight Choreographer - J.J. Perry

Helicopter Pilots - Rick Shuster

and Frédéric North
Special Effects Supervisor - Dan Oliver

Special Effects Coordinator - Monika Stankowski

Special Effects Coordinator: North

American Unit - Cameron Waldbauer

Visual Effects Supervisor - Pat McClung

Visual Effects Supervisor: Hydralux - Erik Liles

Visual Effects Supervisor: Soho VFX - Allan Magled

Additional Visual Effects Plate Supervisors -

Christopher Townsend and Robin Hackl

Visual Effects Designers: Hydralux -

Colin & Greg Strause

Additional Visual Effects Supervisor - Craig Lyn

Visual Effects Producer - Greg Baxter

Visual Effects Producer: Soho VFX - Ryan Stafford

Visual Effects: Luma Pictures - Patam Shohadai,

Vincent Cirelli, Steven Swanson, Steve Griffith,

Justin Johnson, Pavel Pranevsky, Oliver Arnold,

H. Harden Hammond, Glenn Morris,

Raphael A. Pimentel, Alexandre Cancado,

Jared Smith, John Cassella, Loic Zimmerman,

Thanapoom Siripopungal, Joey Sila,

James Waterson, Michael Cashore,

Jason Locke, Ryan Sivley, Jennifer Gutierrez,

Christopher Sage, Anthony Grant,

Safari Sosebee, Mathieu Aerni, Julie Garcia,

John Riggs, Elaine Wu, Marcos Romero,

Andy Burmeister, Jessica Bakke, Erik LaPlant,

Katie Godwin, Chad Dombroya, John Hazzard,

Richard Sutherland, Satoshi Harada,

Sonia Yu, Dawrath Phoue, Jacob Harris

and Madiek Sokalski

Visual Effects: Rising Sun Pictures -

Thomas Proctor, Mara Hamilton, Dan Bethell,

Gemma James, Keith Herft, Nick Pitt-Owen,

Eric So, Laura Ingram, Norma Mulroney,

Timothy Jones, Campbell McGrouther,

Sam Hancock, Nick Murphy, Les Turner,

Premamurti Paersch, Martin Wiseman,

Rob Dorris, Justin Long, Damien Thaller

and Ian Cope

Editors - Nicolas De Toth and
Megan Gill

Supervising Sound Editor - John A. Larsen

Supervising Sound Editor & Sound Designer -

Derek Vanderhorst

Sound Designer - Ted Caplan

Sound Mixing - Paul Massey and David Giammarco

Additional Sound Mixing - James Bolt
Music - Harry Gregson-Williams

Review

As a true fan, X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE was a mild disappointment. Despite this movie being below average, it inspired me to do the X-Men movie marathon, excluding the two I've already done. Most of you have expected Days of Future Past to arrive in cinemas for viewing, but let's move on to X-MEN ORIGINS. The film suffered from numerous production issues, such as rewrites to the story, executive decisions, clashes between Fox executive Tom Rothman and director Gavin Hood over its direction, etc. It would explain why Hugh Jackman is disappointed with the movie when he admitted that it fell short of his expectations. It has an unoriginal and confusing plot with poor execution and lacklustre CGI (such as Logan's metal claws and the part of the ending with the digitally de-aged Patrick Stewart, which looks too weird). Even the addition of Cyclops is redundant to the spin-off. Despite the forgetfulness and problems of the film and its continuity, there are a few strengths, like the action, which was good and the acting. But sadly, those aspects weren't enough to redeem the movie of its lesser quality.

For a few big surprises in the cast, we have Ryan Reynolds, and people think he's a good actor who wasted his potential in mediocre films. Reynolds is perfect as one of the mutants, the motormouth mercenary Deadpool. I complained that Reynolds' character (when he's not often portraying it in all of his scenes) is butchered from the comics and has completely undergone an unnecessary transformation in the climax that left him mute. In all fairness, it wasn't his fault. Liev Schreiber demonstrates his top-notch acting by playing Wolverine's half-brother/rival Sabertooth, his nemesis in the comics. Most movie audiences may have seen Taylor Kitsch in films like the overlooked sci-fi bomb John Carter. He debuted as fan favourite Gambit before becoming a major underrated star.

It's a shame that the first Wolverine movie did not meet the expectations of many fanatics eager to see the character's tragic backstory. X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE is not the film that the Marvel and X-Men aficionados had promised. I re-rank the second Wolverine feature, which would surpass the first with a better storyline. Still, it would be best to see this movie just once.

Star rating: (4/10) Below Average

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