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X2

X2 - X-Men United on DVD

The president of the United States has been attacked in a most frightening manner, and obviously by a mutant. This puts more pressure on the government to take care of “the mutant problem” one way or another once and for all.

Does this mean war? If so, on whom would you want to bet? The mutants, with their strange powers, or the US military with its huge numbers and high technology?

X2 - X-Men United picks up pretty well where the first movie leaves off. Magneto (Ian McKellen) is in his special prison, which makes it unlikely that he could have spearheaded the attack on the president - or so it would seem.

So who could have done it?

Well it isn’t just mutants who can manipulate stuff, it turns out, because there’s a rather nasty piece of humanity (Brian Cox) at work manipulating mutants for his own nefarious ends. He’s also a blast from Wolverine’s (Hugh Jackman) past, and could have the answers to that X-Man’s questions about who he is and from whence he came.

This may be a comic book turned into a movie, but it doesn’t feel like a comic book. Rather, it’s more like a grand science fiction adventure, populated by textured characters that have depth, with their own foibles and strengths. Credit the writers and director Bryan Singer with going the extra mile and giving us a ripping yarn instead of just throwing special effects at us.

Of course, they do throw special effects at us and they’re very good, but they serve the story rather than the other way around.

We get to see personal growth in our X-Men, too, from a budding romance for Rogue (Anna Paquin), the resolution of the romanctic triangle involving Cyclops (James Marsden), Wolverine, and Jean Grey (Famke Janssen). And much more.

Then there’s Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart), the “good X-Men’s” mentor who, while not a new character, almost ends up being their undoing.

There are new X-Men, too, chief of whom is Nightcrawler (Allan Cumming), a deeply religious man (and who’d have thunk that a Hollywood movie would treat his religion with such respect?) who can teleport himself and other people/things.

Last movie’s adversaries, the good and the bad mutants, are forced to put their differences aside to work for the greater good - but reluctantly. Will their union lead to a happy marriage for all time?

There are also some gorgeous locations (the Alkali Lake sequences in particular) that make the heart of this reviewer race with joy because they were shot in Kananaskis country, Alberta, about an hour from where this review is written. Ah, the beautiful Canadian Rockies!

Yep, there’s a lot of stuff happening in X2, and it makes for a terrific ride in the home theater.

20th Century Fox has also released another fine DVD with X2, though we must caution readers that they’ve inflicted separate anamorphic widescreen and Pan&Scan versions onto the market - so beware! We’d recommend that anyone who wants to buy the disc get the widescreen version, because as sure as God made little green apples your next TV is bound to be a widescreen one and if you buy the Pan&Scan version you won’t be happy when you make the transition.

So if you can’t stand black bars, and don’t mind losing half the picture when you slice the sides off the it, rent the Pan&Scan version - but save your hard-earned purchasing dollars for the real McCoy.

Other than that, we’re really impressed with this disc. It isn’t a THX-certified transfer, but you’d never know that from the quality of this release: audio and video are both superb, and this DVD makes a great test of your home theater.

The video quality of the anamorphic widescreen version we tested mades us wonder why all DVD’s aren’t this good. The image is razor sharp, colors are deep and rich, and the whole shebang is a visual delight.

Likewise the audio, which gives you surround choices of Dolby Digital or dts 5.1 surround, is excellent. Highs are clean and not shrill, there’s plenty of deep, rumbling bass, dialogue is clean, and all the channels are used very well.

For what more can a DVD fan ask?

Well, how about a bunch of extras?

X2 is a two disc set, so one would assume they’ve piled on the supplementary material. And you’d be right.

You get commentary tracks on disc one: one by Bryan Singer and Tom Sigel and another by Lauren Schuler Donner, Ralph Winter, Michael Dougherty, Dan Harris, and David Hayter.

The extra meat is spread over to the second disc and gives you such stuff as the obligatory theatrical trailers, a documentary – "The Second Uncanny Issue of X-Men" – Making of X2, and a total of 11 featurettes: "The Secret Origin of X-Men," "Nightcrawler Reborn," "Evolution in the Details - Designing X2," "United Colors of X," "Wolverine Deathstrike Fight Rehearsal," "Introducing the INCREDIBLE NIGHTCRAWLER!," "Nightcrawler Stunt Rehearsal," "Nightcrawler Time-lapse", "FX2 - Visual Effects," "Requiem for Mutants - The Score of X2," and "X2 Global Webcast Highlights."

If that isnt enough to satisfy you there are enough deleted scenes to choke a horse, as well as galleries of still images.

In all, a wonderful DVD.

X2- X-Men United, from 20th Century Fox Home Video
134 min. anamorphic widescreen (2.40:1, 16x9 TV compatible)/Pan&Scan (SOLD SEPARATELY), Dolby Digital and dts 5.1 surround
Starring Patrick Stewart, Hugh Jackman, Ian McKellen, Halle Berry, Famke Janssen, James Marsden, Rebecca Romijn-Stamos, Anna Paquin
Produced by Lauren Shuler Donner and Ralph Winter
Written by Michael Dougherty & Dan Harris and David Hayter, directed by Bryan Singer

 

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