As most of you know by know, David Goyer is hard at work trying to bring a Magneto (the bad guy from X-Men) spin-off movie to the big screen. He is currently scouting locations and trying to develop a budget that the studio will green light. Not sure how much they’ll be willing to fork over on a project like this.
Anyway, my friend Matt over at Obsessed With Film emailed me the following information about some possible plot details regarding the upcoming project that they’ve got up on their site. Some juicy stuff:
The movie is book-ended with two scenes in Poland at the 60th Anniversary of the Auschwitz Liberation. These events take place within the timeframe of the first three X-films and will reunite Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen. The opening takes a cue from Bryan Singer’s X-Men, where a young Erik Lehnsherr crumples the Auschwitz gates. Erik is subjected to horrendous experiments by a team of scientists led by vicious Nazi Dr. Kleinmein. We next meet Lehnsherr in Ukraine. It’s ten years later and he’s married to Magda, they have a young girl called Anya. Erik works in construction, his abilities are well developed, he’s able to plunge a nail straight through wood by just staring at it.
In the village pub Erik spots Kirken, an abusive prison guard from the concentration camp. Kirken ends up dead by Erik’s hand and the villagers burn down his house – Magda and Anya are killed in the blaze. In Paris, Erik seeks help from famed Nazi hunter Professor Wesenthein – he wants revenge, more specifically he’s looking for Kleinmein. Wesenthein tells Erik many Nazi’s are hiding out on South America, and that Kleinmein was trying to genetically manufacture a master race for Hitler. Erik moves on to Argentina to try and track down Nazi war criminals – he’s met by CIA agent Owen Graves and the pair fore an alliance. Graves tips off Erik on the whereabouts of known Nazis but also harbours his own agenda.
The action switches to Israel where Erik searches for a man well known for helping Holocaust survivors. He finds him playing soccer: Dr Charles Xavier
Now this sounds fan-frigging-tastic. It almost has a bit of a Hanibal feel to it (in a good way though). The character of Erik Magnus Lehnsherr (aka Magneto) is one of the deepest, most complex, rich and fascinating in literature (not just comics). He is misunderstood, conflicted, driven by a powerful force to do what he thinks is good, that often leads him to unspeakable evil. He is a scholar, an intellectual, a warrior… and someone you just plain don’t fuck with. An outline like this sounds like it would be more of a character film than a special effects film… and that’s just the sort of movie that “Magneto” needs to me in my opinion.
It does raise the question about who should play Eric. OWF raises a good point that the studio would pretty much NEED to put in a big name to draw in the mainstream audience. I usually prefer no-names for comic characters… but I agree that a name will probably be needed here.
james mcavoy as young erik.
I second Ralph Fiennes. Or Daniel Craig (though he might be a bit busy). Ewan McGregor?
I’m glad that the story they’re using (if this is true) is quite close to the history that comics writer Chris Claremont has written for Magneto’s early years specially the death of Magda and Anya in a fire. It appears in a story called “Fire In the Night” illustrated by John Bolton. It was a pretty heartbreaking story as Chris wrote. It remains one of my favorite comics stories. I highly recommend it.
For those interested, the story appears in Classic X-Men #12, or in the collection X-Men Vignettes. The latter also collects some well written back stories of the X-Men, which I like far better than most of it’s main stories.
For some reason Ralph Fiennes is popping up in my head. I think it would be kind of cool to see him going after the Nazis this time. Big name, but not too big. As Bishop said about Adrien Brody, I can kind of see him aging into McKellan.
Oh wow, the story sounds good, I really can’t wait to see it! You know, with the popularity of the X-Men movies, I don’t know if they would have to have a big name in the lead… especially if Wolverine does well (which I believe will be made first). Part of me thinks that just the fact that it is part of the X-Men universe would give it an initial draw, and if they market it well with good trailers, I really don’t think a big name would be needed.
First of all, I would not mind if there was an honorable mention to Pietro and Wanda, Erik’s long lost kids. (That’s Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch, in case folks forget) .
As to who could play A young Lensherr…I sorta secretly hold out for Jude Law, but maybe…
HUGH DANCY.
Think it over.
So far …..It sounds good, maybe even great. It does have a Hanibal feel too it that doesnt worry me much but just pricks a nerve. I think casting a big star as the lead is a BAD idea. I love the Magneto charater almost as much as I love DOOM however seeing DOOM being played by a one-minded actor that plays a plastic surgen that gets laid all the time really pisses me off. I hate to see Affleck or Dicaprio or some teen heart trobe play as the young master of magantism. Thats like casting a big name actor for Superman Returns. How about Nicholas Cage to play superman. Kinda reminds me of profession wrestling in a way that the big names get the better matches even thou they are older and played out while the younger and newer wrestlers get a back seat. Bring in some fresh blood for the role. Someone with talent and that knows a bit of the charater. If this is done right it will make for an intrestng franchise that could lead to a new X-men film franchise.
Sounds fucking badass! Goyer is the man.
What about someone like Adrian Brody? I know it may sound weird at first, but you know he’s got the chops. As well, you can almost see him age into Ian Mckellan can’t you? I don’t know if that is “name” enough.
I would almost be tempted to say Eric Bana, but do you suppose that might confuse the movie going public with his previous stint as Bruce Banner? Again, another actor with chops, but perhaps not “name” enough.
Or Ben Affleck.
I saw something on this earlier today, but it was submitted to a movie news site by a source unfamiliar to the guy who put it online, so I don’t know how much faith to put in it.
Vic
Does anyone else think Ian McKellen should play Mr. Freeze in a future bat flick, lol.
As long as Hayden Christensen isn’t picked for the role of Eric, I’m a happy camper. They should bring on Brad Pitt or Jason Ritter.
‘rich and fascinating in literature’ lets not get ahead of ourselfs the guy is deep for comics but so is wolverine if you think about it and so is the beast, the guy is almost an irony
Sounds great. Really looking forward to this.