X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)

Director:

Gavin Hood

Writers (WGA):

David Benioff (screenplay) and
Skip Woods (screenplay)

Release Date:

1 May 2009 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Fantasy | Sci-Fi | Thriller

Plot:

After seeking to live a normal life, Logan sets out to avenge the death of his girlfriend by undergoing the mutant Weapon X program and becoming Wolverine.

Plot Keywords:

Mutant | Colonel | Revenge | Logger | Brother

Awards:

2 wins & 6 nominations

Cast

Hugh Jackman	...	Logan / Wolverine
Liev Schreiber	...	Victor Creed
Danny Huston	...	William Stryker
Will i Am	...	John Wraith (as Will.i.am)
Lynn Collins	...	Kayla Silverfox
Kevin Durand	...	Fred Dukes / Blob
Dominic Monaghan	...	Chris Bradley / Bolt
Taylor Kitsch	...	Remy LeBeau / Gambit
Daniel Henney	...	Agent Zero
Ryan Reynolds	...	Wade Wilson
Tim Pocock	...	Scott Summers
Julia Blake	...	Heather Hudson
Max Cullen	...	Travis Hudson
Troye Sivan	...	James Howlett
Michael-James Olsen	...	Young Victor

Also Known As:

Wolverine (USA) (working title)

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of action and violence, and some partial nudity.

Runtime:

107 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Colour:

Colour

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital

Certification:

UK:12A | South Korea:12 | Ireland:12A | Finland:K-13 | Singapore:PG | Netherlands:12 | Brazil:14 | Hong Kong:IIA | Switzerland:14 (canton of Vaud) | Switzerland:14 (canton of Geneva) | Philippines:PG-13 (MTRCB) | USA:PG-13 (certificate #44640) | Canada:13+ (Quebec) | Canada:14A (Alberta/British Columbia) | Norway:15 | Portugal:M/12 | Canada:PG (Manitoba/Ontario) | Sweden:15 | Australia:M | Germany:16 (uncut) (home video version) | Germany:16 (cut) (theatrical version) | Peru:14 | Argentina:16 | Mexico:B | Iceland:14 | France:U | Japan:G | Taiwan:R-12 | Denmark:11 | South Africa:13V | Austria:16 | New Zealand:M

Filming Locations:

Arcadia Station, Glenorchy, Otago, New Zealand

Company:

Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation

Trivia:

Brett Ratner, Len Wiseman, and Zack Snyder all expressed interest in directing the film before Gavin Hood was signed.

Goofs:

Plot holes: In the x-rays of Wolverine in X-Men (2000), you can clearly see springs that make his claws work, and his claws have 3 holes. In X2 (2003), William Stryker says he was the one who gave Wolverine his claws ("You are an animal - all I did was give you claws"), making it clear that his movie version had no natural claws but were the result of the weapon X experiments. However, in this movie they show a version of Wolverine that has bone claws (like in the comic book) making his claws part of his mutation rather than an implant.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Young Victor Creed: You're always sick.
Young James Logan: You were sick when you were my age.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Saturday Night Live: Ryan Reynolds/Lady Gaga (#35.2)" (2009)

Soundtrack:

New Orleans Boogie

Wolverine isn't Bad, but it's not as good as it could've been

I'll state my credentials up front: I'm a chick. I have read X-Men comics in my past, but it's been years. I don't remember every detail of every relationship and back story, so I'm not a huge X-men expert. I LOVED the original X-Men movie and X2.

I was so excited when I heard they were making a Wolverine movie. He and Gambit were my two favorite characters from the comics, and Wolverine was by far the best written and one of the best acted characters in the X-Men franchise. I thought, "This should be good!" I counted down the days until it came out. And I went to the theatre, and came out not disappointed, but not excited either. It was a middle-of-the-road movie, which seemed to not know what it wanted to be. But I would say go see it if you're an X-Men or Hugh Jackman fan.

The main crime committed in Wolverine is in the writing. I always say writers don't get enough credit on a good movie. But no amount of good acting (pretty much everyone in Wolverine does well with what they're given) and okay directing can cover up crappy writing like this. The script was all over the place. It didn't have any of the jaunty yet edgy feel of the first two X-Men movies. Wolverine's wisecracks and smart wit were all but forgotten. That would've maybe been okay if they had chosen to make Wolverine the dark, nearly evil character that he was supposed to have been before he lost his memory. But they didn't. He was neither good nor evil. This was ambivalent Wolverine. Kind of Emo Wolverine. Not above doing bad, but not really into it because it made him Feel Bad. No really interesting lines or plot points either way. The writers didn't seem to even know how to develop the relationship between Wolverine and Sabertooth. And was the love story put in by the studio just to satisfy us chicks who wouldn't go a see a comic-book movie without it? If so, the studio did us a great disservice, because if you wanted to make a story about Wolverine the lover (which, hey, I would go see), this movie wasn't that either.

And when I saw in the trailer that Gambit was in the movie, too, I was thrilled! Gambit in a movie, at last! But here he is, the underdeveloped and kind of confusing Gambit. Couldn't he at least have had his New Orleans accent? The cards were cool, but he was mostly underutilized and didn't feel like Gambit that much.

The movie does have some good moments in it where you actually say, "Yes!" I'm not putting spoilers, so I won't tell you what they are, but for me, they made the movie worth seeing. While I wouldn't put it anywhere on my worst-movie list, I wouldn't rank it with X-Men and X2 on my favorites list, either.