I actually got to see another movie in an actual movie
theater, and this time I didn’t have to go to the bathroom three times during
it! (Sorry Iron Man 3).
Wolverine is not the movie I wanted to see Saturday night. I had my heart set on Pacific Rim, but
really there was no way I was going to make it the late show
(Sorry Charlie Hunnam’s shirtless body, but I have an internal curfew. I
probably would’ve fallen asleep anyway) so we chose The Wolverine as a sort of
compromise. And for the most part, I enjoyed myself.
It was a roller coaster ride, which is what I want in my
action movies. I could argue that the that the ending was telegraphed from the
very beginning, which it was, and it was a pretty predictable ending at that, but
the journey getting there was fun, mostly because of the characters and the
performances that got delivered.
Because most of the cast was pretty awesome. Yes, we could
talk about Hugh Jackman, but we know what we’re going to get from him in terms
of performance. That’s why I bought my ticket. But it was the side performances
that really shined. I mean, every time I see Will Yun Lee in anything, I
continue to enjoy him even more, especially when he’s an unbelievable bastard.
Come on, he outclassed most everybody in Red Dawn (which yes, with Josh Peck in
the cast, wasn’t hard to do), and *spoiler alert* he delivered in what I knew was going to be a
pretty one-note role in this movie too. He was sometimes the most interesting
part in this, especially when it became clear what fate had in store for him.
But even better than him were some of the female
performances in this. Mariko started out a thankless role. Yes please, try to
kill yourself in your second scene in the movie and then run away to your
family home that most people will assume you’ve gone in your fourth scene. That’s
how you win friends and influence people, really. But then somehow she grew on
me. She didn’t shrink away from conflict the way I thought she might. On the
whole, I really enjoyed her.
The absolute stand out for me was Rila Fukushima as Yukio.
She was simultaneously vulnerable yet fierce in ways I didn’t think were
possible. She was teasing out all this emotion and hinting at all these depths
within the character one moment and then having one of the most badass Samauri
sword battles in closed quarters I’d ever seen the next. That takes talent. And
I hope Hollywood takes notice and puts her in more things, or somebody has the
god damned audacity to make Yukio the movie, because based on her performance
alone, I’d plunk down hard earned money to see that.
But for all the performances that I did enjoy there were just as
many that annoyed me to no end. I love Famke Janssen and have sense Love and
Sex for crying out loud and I also loved her as Jean Grey, but her reprisal of
the role was thoroughly unnecessary. It added nothing to the story itself and
came off as very hackneyed and cloying. If you’re going to have Famke Janssen
in a movie, make her useful, instead of just a passing fancy in The Wolverine’s
head, fercryingoutloud.
The worst offender though was the role of Viper. I wrote on
twitter the other day that Uma Thurman called and she wanted her performance
and wardrobe as Poison Ivy back. And I stick by that. Viper was just a thin
impersonation of Poison Ivy and one that wasn’t very enjoyable at that. *Spoiler Alert again* Thank
god Yukio cut her head off, I was getting tired of her and if she showed up in
another movie I was going to have to give up on the whole X-Men franchise
altogether.
But on the whole it really did work, despite my bitching. It
was well-paced, the action was fun, there were ninjas, and swords, and yakuza,
three things I enjoy immensely in my movies. So, what I’m trying to say is, you
could do worse. B
