Logan (James Mangold, 2017)

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Luke M
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#1 Post by Luke M » Sat Feb 18, 2017 6:02 pm

Logan is getting overwhelmingly positive reviews.

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Feiereisel
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#2 Post by Feiereisel » Sun Mar 05, 2017 2:14 pm

Logan is the most lucid and focused X-Men film a long, long time, and among the best of the "mature" superhero fare like the few R-rated films and director's cuts, serious works like The Dark Knight, and Marvel's broodier Netflix output. The film is uncluttered and refreshingly substantive.

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captveg
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#3 Post by captveg » Sun Mar 05, 2017 6:47 pm

This is Jackman's finest work as the role he'll be most remembered for, and I really enjoyed the pseudo-western vibes of the film, with a dash of the post-Apocalyptic thrown in (no pun intended). A lot of it seemed more telegraphed than I anticipated, however, and the first act seems to try a bit too hard to remind the audience this is rated R in a way that sits outside the story. Ultimately it's all how one can relate to the characters and the ideas of a film, and this one finally delivers a Wolverine and setting that allows for this potential to be realized. Fox should continue these tales from the corners of their X-Men universe now that they've seemingly mined the main series beyond what it can likely sustain. This is another really good step in that direction.

flyonthewall2983
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#4 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Sun Mar 05, 2017 6:56 pm

Is this recommendable to someone who hasn't seen any of the other movies?

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captveg
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#5 Post by captveg » Sun Mar 05, 2017 6:58 pm

I think as long as you have a general idea of who Wolverine and Professor X are as characters (and of the basic concept of the X-Men) you'll be fine.

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Re: Comic Books on Film

#6 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Sun Mar 05, 2017 7:10 pm

That I do. I did see The Last Stand on HBO once years ago, and was impressed with Jackman's performance. I know that it was derided at the time, but I enjoyed it for what it was.

Regardless of how much of a runaway hit something like Deadpool was, I am not surprised at this push towards R-rated comic book movies now. Maybe only surprised that it's happening now, maybe as opposed to earlier on. I felt like the Nolan Batman movies pushed the sub-genre as a whole towards a new dramatic sophistication that made going into more exclusively adult areas possible.

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dx23
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#7 Post by dx23 » Sun Mar 05, 2017 10:02 pm

flyonthewall2983 wrote:I am not surprised at this push towards R-rated comic book movies now.
The only reason these two films got be to R-Rated was because the main stars decided to take paycuts. I would be surprised that other than Deadpool, we would see a Marvel or DC film with their superheroes that is R rated since it would most likely keep kids away from seeing it.

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matrixschmatrix
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#8 Post by matrixschmatrix » Sun Mar 05, 2017 10:05 pm

Given that Deadpool was a higher grosser than the much more hyped and expensive Doctor Strange last year, and Logan looks like it will clean up as well, I wouldn't be at all surprised if we see this more- the MCU probably won't go there, but I'd be shocked if DC doesn't, and the X-Men line is only getting more and more reinforcement that they should.

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Re: Comic Books on Film

#9 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Mon Mar 06, 2017 11:21 am

Anything like the MCU, which is a huge priority for Disney, likely never would. That said, the Marvel shows on Netflix (if Daredevil has been any indication) push on the TV-MA rating, without going as over the edge as Deadpool and I presume Logan has. The violence gets rather brutal, but the language is straight out of a PG-13 movie, and there hasn't been any nudity/sex of any volume.

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dx23
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#10 Post by dx23 » Mon Mar 06, 2017 11:50 am

That's why I mentioned film on my post above. Marvel is going with the equivalent of an R rating with their Netflix show, and that's why Kevin Feige still a little reluctant to have them connect to closely to the films and other TV shows like SHIELD, the upcoming Cloak and Dagger or Runaways. I don't think that FOX will move on doing more R-rated X-men related movies other than Deadpool and the X-Force spinoff as they still want the X-Men films to be PG-13. I wonder how they'll tackle an X-23 film because that one can be an R-rated one like Leon, The Professional.

DC/WB will certainly be PG-13 for a while, especially during the Geoff Johns/Rebirth era. The only property I see them going with an R rating would be Justice League Dark (Swamp Thing, Constantine, Zatanna, Black Orchid, and other magic characters), which incorporates a lot of characters who became synonymous with the Vertigo imprint.

Edit: DC will most likely go for R rating for Lobo, which could be their answer for Deadpool.

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jbeall
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#11 Post by jbeall » Wed Mar 08, 2017 8:02 pm

Logan easily makes up for the failings of the previous standalone Wolverine films, both of which were mediocre at best. I definitely have a preference for comics-inspired films that transcend their genre boundaries (e.g. Captain America: Winter Soldier), and this one definitely has noir, post-apocalyptic, and (explicitly) western influences. If the opening scene was heavy-handed (pun intended) in signaling this installment's darker, more violent, and--given the source material--arguably more realistic turn, the rest of the film follows through on the thematic promise of this stylistic difference. A good antidote to superhero movie fatigue.

And yeah, as long as you know the basic history and powers of Wolverine and Professor X, the plot is easy enough to follow. The fascinating twist is that
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the very source of their awesomeness may now be deadly, either to themselves or others. Xavier's issue is a key plot point, while it also seems that Logan's adamantium skeleton is slowly killing him.

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captveg
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#12 Post by captveg » Wed Mar 08, 2017 8:19 pm

Your final point is one of the smarter aspects of the film for sure.

While Origins is a truly bad movie, I like The Wolverine. It has a mediocre ending, but it's an enjoyable enough entry for the character, even if it is a fairly standard action film in the end.

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Logan (James Mangold, 2017)

#13 Post by flyonthewall2983 » Wed Jan 10, 2018 10:29 am

Having only seen the 3rd X-Men directed by Brett Ratner and having a general idea of who the main characters are from trailers and bits and pieces from the other movies, I was surprised to find Logan something enjoyable just on it's own as a hybrid of hard-R action/drama and the more fantastical elements of that world. Things that were alluded to that I have no reference to didn't weigh it down much for me* and I found the idea of the comic books themselves as a plot device very clever.

[*]
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Just before he's killed off am I to believe that Richard E. Grant character is Magento's son? Or is it someone else?

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Big Ben
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#14 Post by Big Ben » Wed Jan 10, 2018 12:29 pm

In regards to flyonthewall's question about Logan:
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No he's the man who created a sort of eugenics thing that's put into corn syrup which prevents the mutant gene from activating on the genome essentially ensuring no new mutants are born. One of the concepts in the film is that mutants are to be created by private companies and monetized as seen with the Logan clone and all the young children. He's not a mutant bad guy just a corporate one.

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colinr0380
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#15 Post by colinr0380 » Wed Jan 10, 2018 1:16 pm

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Sounds very like Scanners!

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diamonds
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#16 Post by diamonds » Mon Feb 12, 2018 12:06 pm

Director James Mangold said his goal with Logan was to "make an Ozu film with mutants." ...Really? I have not seen the film, but if this is at all evident in the finished product I'd sure love to.

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tenia
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#17 Post by tenia » Mon Feb 12, 2018 12:16 pm

It's not. At all. Probably not even one second.
This only element that could be compared to an Ozu movie is the family bit, Logan being a father for X-23, and Ozu being often movies about families and father-daughter bond, but that's about it, and there's absolutely nothing in Logan that would make this bond feeling it's treated like an Ozu movie.
It feels more and more like Mangold, and Marvel with him, tries to amp up post-release the movie's legacy by making it look more arty and auteurist that it is, riffing on how some felt Logan was soooo different from other movies, but it never really feels this way. It's more graphic (yay, bloodshed !) and with more cursing (yay, cursing everywhere for no reason except saying curseword in a Marvel movie !), but that's about it.

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matrixschmatrix
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#18 Post by matrixschmatrix » Mon Feb 12, 2018 12:27 pm

I don't agree with that- Logan really was an exceptional and different movie in a crowded superhero field, though the Ozu claim seems odd. It felt and played very much like one of the American tales on revisionist Westerns in the 70s, particularly The Outlaw Josey Wales (or even Unforgiven, later on)- the closing of the West, the dying of the frontier, the end of an era of freedom, only here what has taken its place is not an ambivalent civilization but an outright nightmare, and it seems to be America or the entire world that's falling apart.

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Roger Ryan
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#19 Post by Roger Ryan » Mon Feb 12, 2018 12:57 pm

The Mangold quote is certainly hyperbole, but I believe it's important to recognize this quote is from a mainstream filmmaker who successfully convinced Marvel to allow Logan to be made as an "adult-themed" comic book film. As Mangold notes in his commentary track, the "R" (or "Adult") designation not only gave the film an opportunity to show more grisly violence (which Mangold admits is something that Wolverine fans would get excited about), but kept the studio from worrying about the length of some of the dialogue scenes or the need for Logan to have a pet dog or some such contrivance. Logan is certainly designed to be mainstream entertainment, but in the form of a classic Western (as "matrixschmatrix" notes above and which Mangold insists was the form he was going for). Compared only to the other Marvel offerings of the past decade, Logan is a relatively low-key, thoughtful action film where the stakes are much lower than usual (no cities being blown apart or alien invasions thwarted), but are more keenly-felt.

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tenia
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#20 Post by tenia » Mon Feb 12, 2018 1:20 pm

The bad guy is awful, all the secondary characters are underwritten and superficial, the whole vaguely melancholic setting feels wasted, the relationship between Logan and X-23 never is deepened in any way (it's especially hard to care for X-23's character, one of the most annoying character I've seen for a long time), the pace is tepid (the movie is at least 30 min too long), and the whole tone seemed inconsistant (especially the end encounter with the main baddie).

The result is a movie that probably is better than most current Supers movies (and superior to the other 2 Wolvie movies) (but that definitely wasn't hard to achieve), but never really works and feel extremely pretentious. It probably hoped to do vastly different things, blending together mainstream Super hero movies elements with a more low-key gritty aspect, but actually is just your typical super hero movie, but with an added superficial subtext (Getting old is tough, and at the end, you die) and a R-rating that allows nothing else than bloodsheds and swear words everywhere. Saved for its prologue, it never feels very gritty.

If I had to sum up the movie, it'd probably be somewhere like a bloated pretentious disappointment that probably was a good idea originally, but sadly ends up failing flat mostly due to its superficial writing.

The movie might be R-rated, but it didn't feel any more adult than many other PG-13 Super hero movies (GoG 2 felt vastly superior in this regard).
Roger Ryan wrote:(no cities being blown apart or alien invasions thwarted)
This, however, was very refreshing indeed.
Last edited by tenia on Mon Feb 12, 2018 1:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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jindianajonz
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#21 Post by jindianajonz » Mon Feb 12, 2018 1:32 pm

diamonds wrote:Director James Mangold said his goal with Logan was to "make an Ozu film with mutants." ...Really? I have not seen the film, but if this is at all evident in the finished product I'd sure love to.
He said similar things about The Wolverine, and that movie was even further from its supposed influences.

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Ribs
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#22 Post by Ribs » Mon Feb 12, 2018 2:38 pm

I think he gives himself too much credit, generally - Deadpool was a project that was long DOA that only got greenlit because of Kingsman's surprise success for Fox as an ultra-violent February release made on a relatively modest budget, and its success enabled Mangold to make Logan a "harder" film than what was being planned. It was basically fortuitous timing that he got to do the movie he did.

As somebody who really enjoyed the X-men films as a whole, particularly the delightfully lax continuity where not one film seems to make any sense when considering its supposed to take place around the other films, I found Logan just to be taking it a little too far and a disservice to the character as Jackman had played him for 15+ years to make him suddenly brutally violent in a film with swearing and lots of blood.

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Roger Ryan
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#23 Post by Roger Ryan » Mon Feb 12, 2018 3:16 pm

Ribs wrote:...I found Logan just to be taking it a little too far and a disservice to the character as Jackman had played him for 15+ years to make him suddenly brutally violent in a film with swearing and lots of blood...
To be fair, Wolverine has viciously killed people with his claws in nearly every film he has appeared in (just not as gorily as in Logan) and his language has been the saltiest of any X-men character (discounting Deadpool) on film (note his F-bomb line in his gag cameo in X-Men: First Class).

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Ribs
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#24 Post by Ribs » Mon Feb 12, 2018 3:24 pm

Yeah, I know, but I just thought Logan pushed it just a bit further to make it a really odd note to send off the character/actor. I get it, just wasn’t for me and the things I liked about the Bryan Singer X-Men universe.

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Big Ben
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Re: Comic Books on Film

#25 Post by Big Ben » Mon Feb 12, 2018 3:44 pm

Have you read the Wolverine comics Ribs? In one of the ones that loosely inspired the film he's eaten by The Hulk, regenerates and then claws his way out of him and kills him by tearing him apart from the inside. There is absolutely basis for the violence and gore. Wolverine is essentially the mutant equivalent of a Berserker in the comics and there has most certainly been graphic violence in Wolverine comics for over thirty years. The earlier films are the ones not true to Wolverine. He was very clearly edited down to fit into the more profitable at the time PG-13 market. Logan felt a lot like a deconstruction of those earlier films which ranged from okay to terrible in my opinion.

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