"The Wolverine" reinvents the character's mystique.
Logan lives a solitary, troubled, and completely isolated life in the Yukon forests. He identifies more with a bear, a forest dweller, than with the humans, usually hunters, who approach the area; it is precisely an action by the hunters that triggers a fit of rage in which Logan rediscovers his exceptional powers and gets into a big mess, from which he is rescued by a mysterious newcomer, Yukio.
SAO PAULO, July 25 (Reuters) The best thing about "The Wolverine" is that director James Mangold and screenwriters Scott Frank and Mark Bomback managed to give the character Logan (Hugh Jackman) much more than just the usual metal claws.
Mangold, Frank, and Bomback went further by rescuing the character's story and giving it nuances, complexity, and heart, in addition to the usual action sequences, which certainly do not disappoint. The film premieres in conventional and 3D versions, dubbed and subtitled.
Logan lives a solitary, troubled, and completely isolated life in the Yukon forests. He identifies more with a bear, a forest dweller, than with the humans, usually hunters, who approach the area.
It is precisely an action by the hunters that triggers a fit of rage in which Logan rediscovers his exceptional powers and gets into a big mess, from which he is rescued by a mysterious newcomer, Yukio (Rila Fukushima).
The frail, red-haired Japanese girl is an expert in fighting and wielding a samurai sword. Even better, she has a car and gets Logan out of trouble. In fact, she came all this way to take him to Japan, where old Yashida (Hal Yamanouchi) hopes Logan will return to see him before his imminent death.
Decades ago, in 1945, Logan saved Yashida, then a young soldier, from the atomic bomb explosion in Nagasaki. Now, Yashida, who, like a normal person, has aged, is dying and wants to see the immortal mutant, his savior, again.
Yashida has a secret agenda behind this farewell request. In fact, he wants Logan to transfer his immortality to him, knowing how much of a burden it has sometimes been for Logan -- who lives haunted by visions of his beloved Jean (Famke Janssen), now a ghost that appears to him in his dreams.
Beyond Logan's quest for immortality, the transfer of power within the Yashida empire, a technological powerhouse, is at stake. The old patriarch has chosen his granddaughter, Mariko (Tao Okamoto), as his heir, sparking a war within the clan, as her father, Shingen (Hiroyuki Sanada), had hoped to be chosen.
To protect Mariko, Logan emerges from his depression, confronting a veritable army of Yakuza (Japanese gangsters) at Yashida's funeral. From then on, he'll have no shortage of action – like a sensational showdown against several thugs on the roof of a bullet train, where his timely claws will come in handy.
But something happened to Logan's health. He no longer recovers from his injuries as quickly and even feels tired. Behind this is a mysterious doctor who was treating Yashida (Svetlana Khodchenkova) and who, in her spare time, assumes the identity of Viper – that is, a viper, complete with a long, venomous tongue behind a sculpted body and beautiful green eyes.
All these dangers, plus his involvement with Mariko, provide Logan with the opportunity to show what he's made of -- and that he's much more than the adamantium of his claws. The script offers the versatile Australian actor the chance to develop nuances of the character that make him more complex and more human, eventually also more fragile.
And here, running the real risk of dying, which makes everything more electrifying for the character's loyal audience - who, incidentally, will be on board for the new X-Men adventure, "X-Men: Days of Future Past", again directed by Bryan Singer, with a premiere scheduled for next year.
(By Neusa Barbosa, from Cineweb)
* The opinions expressed are the responsibility of Cineweb.