Since "X2: X-Men United" in 2003 when Jean Grey disappeared, a few other X-Men movies were made with Wolverine gaining more onscreen presence. "The Wolverine" made a decade later, is sort of a spin-off movie due to Hugh Jackman's excellent portrayal of the character.
After what appeared to be Jean's death, Wolverine went into hiding out of guilt. His recurring nightmares of Jean beside him, night after night, turned him into a recluse. That was when he was brought to Japan and met Mariko, his love-interest in the comics. I didn't quite like the storyline though, with the Yakuzas and ninjas and the Viper.
For me, the best part of the movie was the easter egg segment, where Magneto and Prof Xavier appeared, and hinted of a huge storm brewing ahead of them, thus uniting both forces together to fight what was coming up.
Another movie adapted from a fairy tale, this movie got my attention when I noticed Nicholas Hoult as the male lead. I remember him as the young Beast from "X-Men - First Class". In addition, he is starring in another upcoming movie on zombies "Warm Bodies".
Nicholas isn't exactly the handsome male lead type but he is definitely likable with a great smile and have beautiful eyes as blue as the sea. It is always interesting to see how Hollywood interprets their materials, especially simple fairy tales like this. Fe-fy-fo-fam, I smelt a good storyline here and remember the story of Jack and the Beanstalk which would serve as the spine of this movie.
The other cast include one of my favourite actors Ewan McGreggor and Eleanor Tomlinson. I will not give the storyline away but I must admit just when I thought the movie had come to an end, the story unfolded further. It was like eating a cake just to find that there was another underlying layer. To me, this almost seemed like two stories rolled into one.
Having said that, I am looking forward to watch "Warm Bodies".
So is "Prometheus" the prequel to the 1979 movie "Alien" by the same Director Ridley Scott? I think so.
Starring Noomi Rapace, the original actress in the movie "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo", Michael Fassbender of "X-Men First Class" fame, Guy Pearce, Logan Marshall-Green and Charlize Theron, who was most recently seen in "Snow White and the Huntsman", it was a controversial movie that explored the origin of man and appeared to bridge the missing links to the alien movie. I feel a movie is just a movie and should not be taken too seriously since it is usually made more for entertainment than anything else.
At the start, it probably showed how mankind was created from the DNA of a humanoid alien. Fast forward to a futuristic 2089 when archaeological digs at various continents unearthed similar star maps pointing to a series of planets. Four years later in 2093, a team of 17 members on board a spaceship were gathered together to explore a distant planet which points to the origin of everything. The expedition was fraught with lots of unknown e.g. row of gigantic structures in a clearing, cylinders with a black oozing substance, decapitated alien corpse, as two crew members succumbed to violent deaths inflicted on them by the alien beings. They referred to the aliens as engineers because of their supposed creation of mankind.
The movie was kind of slow at first as the team was formed and picked up pace about one hour into it. Noomi was the lead protagonist Dr Elizabeth Shaw and her foetal abortion by caesarian was actually quite gross. Michael as the android was cold, calculated and brilliantly mechanical in his movements. I was disappointed with the role that Charlize played because it was sadly insignificant. She is so talented and her acting ability was all wasted here.
Subsequently, a surviving alien was revived by the team and it turned on them, killing most of the members. The remaining survivors discovered that the aliens were bent on destroying their creation and despatched their spaceship to go to Earth to decimate the human race. To prevent the impending war, some of them sacrificed their lives to prevent the alien spaceship from taking off into the sky.
Of course in the end, the brutal engineer was killed but In the process, a new alien form, similar to the one in the "alien" movies was created. The only survivor, on board the Prometheus, Dr Elizabeth Shaw recorded a message log as she escaped from the planet in one of the alien's spaceship. In fact, this message sounded familiar as if I have heard it before in one of the alien movies. That is probably the connection between this latest movie and the earlier ones.
This was where everything started. This so-called prequel to the X-Men movies chronicles a time when Magneto and Professor Xavier were known as Erik and Charles respectively. It traced back to when they first met as younger men and fought alongside each other before parting ways as enemies.
It explains how the two once close as brothers friends diverged on separate paths and why Professor Xavier was wheel-chair bound and much more. Starring a stellar cast of James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Kevin Bacon, Rose Byrne with a hilarious less than 1-min cameo by Hugh Jackman, I enjoyed the movie because this is the origin of it all and it helps to explain the relationships between Magneto, Professor Xavier, Mystique, Beast etc.
There will be no spoiler alerts here but a link on the movie is attached below:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-Men:_First_Class
The 2 posters of Magneto and Professor Xavier are also very interesting because the reflections in the water show who they eventually become.
