X-Men: First Class

Movie Details:

Cast & Characters:

• James McAvoy as Charles Xavier (30 Years)
• Laurence Belcher as Charles Xavier (12 Years)
• Michael Fassbender as Erik Lensherr
• Bill Milner as Young Erik
• Kevin Bacon as Sebastian Shaw
• Rose Byrne as Moira MacTaggert
• Jennifer Lawrence as Raven / Mystique
• Beth Goddard as Mrs. Xavier
• Morgan Lily as Young Raven (10 Years)
• Oliver Platt as Man in Black Suit
• Álex González as Janos Quested / Riptide
• Jason Flemyng as Azazel
• Zoë Kravitz as Angel Salvadore
• January Jones as Emma Frost
• Nicholas Hoult as Hank / Beast
• Caleb Landry Jones as Cassidy / Banshee
• Edi Gathegi as Darwin / Armando Muñoz
• Corey Johnson as Chief Warden
• Lucas Till as Alex Summers / Havok
• Demetri Goritsas as Levene
• Glenn Morshower as Colonel Hendry
• Don Creech as William Stryker
• Matt Craven as CIA Director McCone
• James Remar as US General
• Ludger Pistor as 1st German / Pig Farmer
• Wilfried Hochholdinger as 2nd German / Tailor
• Greg Kolpakchi as Russian Soldier No. 1
• Andrei Zayats as Russian Soldier No. 2
• Rade Serbedzija as Russian General
• Ray Wise as Secretary of State
• Michael Medeiros as Political Officer
• Olek Krupa as Soviet Captain
• Yuri Naumkin as Soviet Fire Control
• Gene Farber as Soviet Radioman
• David Agranov as Soviet NCO
• Katrine De Candole as Swiss Receptionist
• James Faulkner as Swiss Bank Manager

Storyline:

Before Charles Xavier and Erik Lensherr took the names Professor X and Magneto, they were two young men discovering their powers for the first time. Before they were archenemies, they were closest of friends, working together, with other Mutants (some familiar, some new), to stop the greatest threat the world has ever known. In the process, a rift between them opened, which began the eternal war between Magneto’s Brotherhood and Professor X’s X-MEN.—Twentieth Century Fox

About Movie:

X-Men: First Class (stylized on-screen as X: First Class) is a superhero film based on the X-Men characters appearing in Marvel Comics. It is the fourth mainline installment in the X-Men film series and the fifth installment overall. It was directed by Matthew Vaughn and produced by Bryan Singer, and stars James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Rose Byrne, Jennifer Lawrence, January Jones, Oliver Platt, and Kevin Bacon.

At the time of its release, it was intended to be a franchise reboot and contradicted the events of previous films; however, the follow-up film X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) retconned First Class into a prequel to X-Men (2000). First Class is set primarily in 1962 during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and focuses on the relationship between Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr / Magneto, and the origin of their groups—the X-Men and the Brotherhood of Mutants, respectively, as they deal with the Hellfire Club led by Sebastian Shaw, a mutant supremacist bent on enacting nuclear war.

Producer Lauren Shuler Donner first thought of a prequel based on the young X-Men during the production of X2; producer Simon Kinberg later suggested to 20th Century Fox an adaptation of the comic series X-Men: First Class, although the film does not follow the comic closely. Singer, who had directed both X-Men and X2, became involved with the project in 2009, but he could only produce and co-write First Class due to his work on other projects.

Vaughn became the director and also wrote the final script with his writing partner Jane Goldman. Principal photography began in August 2010 and concluded in December, with additional filming completed in April 2011. Locations included Oxford, the Mojave Desert and Georgia, with soundstage work done in both Pinewood Studios and the 20th Century Fox stages in Los Angeles. The depiction of the 1960s drew inspiration from the James Bond films of the period.

First Class premiered in Ziegfeld Theatre on May 25, 2011, and was released in the United States on June 3, 2011. It was a box office success, becoming the seventh highest-grossing in the film series, and received positive reviews from critics and audiences, who praised its acting, screenplay, direction, action sequences, visual effects, and musical score.

The film’s success re-popularized the X-Men film franchise with various installments following, including a number of sequels focusing on younger iterations of the X-Men characters, with X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014), X-Men: Apocalypse (2016), and Dark Phoenix (2019).

Budget & Box Office Collection: