Simon Kinberg
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Connections, in both directions
“The 355” – the title refers to a female spy during the American Revolution – could have been a fun spin on the “Fox Force Five” concept from “Pulp Fiction.”
The 355 is slightly less ridiculous, starting with implausibility and getting less credible as it goes, contriving reasons to throw our “Fox Force Five” together (see Pulp Fiction for details) any way it can.
It’s essentially a reimagined Fox Force Five, the TV pilot about a “foxy” team of female secret agents that Mia Wallace describes starring in in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction.
Ya se burló Deadpool de este tema: las líneas de tiempo de las películas de X-Men apenas tienen sentido.
Based on arguably the best X-Men arch in its long tenure in comics (which itself was adapted from the incredible Fox cartoon series), Dark Phoenix marks the directorial debut of Simon Kinberg, who previously made a career out of producing a slew of action blockbusters, including all of Fox’s recent X-Men titles and the Deadpool series.
X-Men: Dark Phoenix is the final chapter to a 20-year franchise which has lost its way as of late, unless we’re talking about spinoffs like Logan or Deadpool which worked really well.
It’s a disservice to a great cast and X-fans everywhere to undermine all that has come before only to be upstaged by two farcical Deadpool movies that provide a far better representation.
So before Logan and Deadpool wowed us with their uniquely specific sensibilities, the gang got together for Apocalypse.
Whilst the 1980’s and 1990’s gave us Superman and Batman films, and, though a Marvel brand, the Blade films were seen more as Wesley Snipes features rather than a comic-book outing, it was 2000’s X-Men that would unknowingly launch the phenomenon that’s become something of a staple in today’s cinema climate.
It wasn’t the first superhero movie or even the first film based on a Marvel comic (“Blade” debuted two years earlier), but it seemed to rise out of the shadowy depths of the campy DC movies and the overlooked ghettos of the action-horror genre.
It was my favorite comic book as a kid, and the 2000 X-Men , the movie that primarily jump-started this entire cycle of superhero cinema (although Blade , which preceded it, also deserves a salute), was like a godsend to those who had long dreamed of seeing Wolverine, Cyclops et al on the silver screen.
The 1-2-3 punch of that movie, Blade in 1999, and Spider-Man in 2002 helped usher in the era we live in today.
Si bien es cierto que películas como “Blade” ya habían tenido cierto éxito en la década de los 90, fue la primera entrega de “X-Men” la que inauguró la época dorada del cine de superhéroes.
In addition, the enjoyable stunt work and action scenes have a roughness reminiscent of the Jason Bourne series and the film’s theme of multiculturalism emphasises the global threat flowing through the narrative – with the main cast being so great, it is just a shame that The 355 ‘s poorly conceived character and plot development seems to overwhelm everything.
Saying it’s “from the studio that brought you Jason Bourne” is one thing, but I was hoping it didn’t literally mean something equivalent to Jason Bourne , let alone The Bourne Legacy .
Every portion of Simon Kinberg’s turgid, clumsy spy flick The 355 sounds good on paper: Five of Hollywood’s most acclaimed actresses come together to portray global intelligence officers fleeing from their respective governments, in a film melding Oceans 8 and the Jason Bourne, James Bond, and Mission: Impossible franchises with the recent trend toward aggressively female-fronted action films.
There have been subtler, cleverer and just plain better efforts at bringing women to the forefront of so-called male genres (from “Widows” to “Spy”), but it’s hard not to go into something like “ The 355 ,” which has been written about as a female “Jason Bourne” meets “Mission: Impossible” for over four years, a little wary.
In trying to be its own “girl power” Jason Bourne , its screenplay sticks to a by-the-number formula.
Chastain’s concept, eventually penned by “Catwoman” and “Harriet the Spy” screenwriter Theresa Rebeck, was cooked up on the heels of plenty of other successful, interesting female-centric action outings, from “Atomic Blonde” and “Lucy” to “Wonder Woman” and “Mad Max: Fury Road.”
As is, I suppose, watching them take nearly equal amounts of punishment in response (see Charlize Theron in "Atomic Blonde" for the apex of this aspect), just to prove, resolutely, that they can take it every bit as well as dish it out.
It doesn’t carry the same weight on its shoulders as Wonder Woman , Atomic Blonde , or Ocean’s 8 .
It’s a wild thing to miss the competence of something like Atomic Blonde , which at least had a John Wick co-director behind the camera instead of the dude who brought us Dark Phoenix .
Stars Jessica Chastain, Lupita Nyong’o or Diane Kruger easily could have easily cranked out an Atomic Blonde style solo film, but the premise of a United Nations collaboration is far more intriguing.
While an-all female-fronted group action flick is a fine idea, in the wake of movies like Atomic Blonde , Wonder Woman and even the divisive Birds of Prey , The 355 feels old-fashioned and generic, like a TV pilot released on the big screen.
And the concept of unknown enemies wreaking havoc from behind the scenes is just as common in spy films, with movies like Skyfall and Enemy of the State addressing it in much more intriguing ways.
The 355 is watchable at best but, in keeping with the Bond analogy, this is more like a gender-flipped version of Octopussy than Skyfall.
Only death will work as Logan (2017) indicated.
Like with 2017’s Logan , the film seems to be a conscious attempt to break free of the bigger-is-better strategy that informed recent X-Men adventures such as Days Of Future Past and Apocalypse .
Nor will anyone hoping for a definitive adaptation of "The Dark Phoenix Saga" or a return to the spectacular quality of Day of Future Past or Logan find what they're looking for.
The film is much more in the league of Logan , 2017’s revisionist take on Wolverine, then the standard time-travel fare that’s marked a lot of the X-Men movies.
Jump ahead now to 1992 -- and yes, this franchise is forever set in the near past now, only adding the interminable confusion of what actually happened when and first (our only constant for the first plethora of films was Hugh Jackman's Wolverine, but with Logan , now his character is spun out as well) -- where the stable of X-Men includes a grown-up Jean (Sophie Turner); her boyfriend Cyclops (Tye Sheridan); the element-controlling Storm (Alexandra Shipp); the brilliant, bouncy Beast (Nicholas Hoult); and the teleporting blue demon Nightcrawler (Kodi Smit-McPhee), all led by the shape-shifting Raven (Jennifer Lawrence).
Add a one-off flash-forward to give Hugh Jackman his swan song with Logan and nobody would have faulted the studio for walking away with a satisfactory conclusion.
After Brett Ratner's pitiful conclusion to the original trilogy, X-Men: The Last Stand , the series began to play with its timelines in exactly the same way reboots of the comics do--jumping ahead decades, sending series favourite Wolverine back in time to stop a mutant genocide--and consequently delivered a few gems along the way in X-Men: Days of Future Past , The Wolverine , and Logan .
The ship was righted thanks to the timeline-altering reboot that began with “First Class” in 2011, a good Wolverine movie (“The Wolverine”) and a capital-G Great one (“Logan”) and the introduction of Deadpool.
It’s telling that “Dark Phoenix” doesn’t have the “X-Men” name in the title, following the pattern of the “Deadpool” movies, “The Wolverine” and “Logan,” and the much-delayed “The New Mutants.”
It's the latest and supposedly last installment -- at least of this most recent iteration -- of the X-Men series that's had its ups and downs in terms of quality since kicking off with 2000's "X-Men" and running through 2016's "X-Men: Apocalypse," with some spin-off ("Deadpool") and single character pics ("The Wolverine" and "Logan") along the way.
Cue the propulsive music score by Tom Kolkenborg, aka “Junkie XL,” as we watch chases, shootouts, stick-fighting, and explosions just like a “John Wick” or “Jack Reacher.”
It doesn’t work for a moment, not least of all because the script burdens Julian Dennison, so charming and effervescent in Hunt for the Wilderpeople , with a thankless and unlikable supporting role.
Regrettably, director Simon Kinberg doesn’t prove to be much of a dab hand at staging compelling action scenes here, even though he’s written a bunch ( XXX: State of the Union ; Mr & Mrs Smith ; Sherlock Holmes ; X-Men: Last Stand/Apocalypse/Days of Future Past ) and did a good job with his under-appreciated 2019 directorial debut Dark Phoenix , which was pretty nifty.
Then again, such things probably should have been expected from writers whose past experiences with spy narratives include xXx: State Of The Union , McG’s This Means War, and Harriet The Spy .
Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) (2020)
Directed by Cathy Yan
influenced The 355 (2022)
Themes
Ghostbusters (2016), Charlie’s Angels (2019) and Birds of Prey (2020) all mixed quips, actions, and feminist empowerment in varying degrees.