Sci-Fi
description: The New Mutants is a movie starring Maisie Williams, Anya Taylor-Joy, and Charlie Heaton. Five young mutants, just discovering their abilities while held in a secret facility against their will, fight to escape their past sins and
Dave Cockrum
Release Year: 2020
runtime: 1hour 38M
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"The New Mutants" was a film that I was worried I would never see. After the absolutely stellar first trailer released in pre-COVID 2018, the movie got stuck in development hell for two years. With rumors of reshoots and re-edits plaguing the Internet, and especially with Disney acquired 21st Century Fox, most were convinced that "The New Mutants" would never see the light of day. Enter 2020: The New Mutants" was finally given its well-deserved theatrical release in August of this year, three years after filming wrapped in 2017. And after years of pushbacks and delays, the one question on everyone's mind is: Is the movie any good? In my opinion, the answer is a resounding yes.
I absolutely adored this movie. Granted, I do have an affinity for "Breakfast Club" style films, and as this movie has been described as "a haunted-house movie with a bunch of hormonal teenagers, what you expect is pretty much what you get. And for me, that was a good thing. There has never been a superhero movie quite like this before; in fact, I'd even hesitate to describe "The New Mutants" as a superhero film. Gone are the bombastic and high-stakes end of the world battles. Instead, the movie takes a refreshingly small-scale approach, taking place virtually in one entire location and foregoing all preconceived notions that the audience may expect while watching an X-Men film.
While there are stakes, the stakes are more personal, and thus, more emotionally resonant. Because the film intimately follows the five main characters, by the time the action starts you already feel connected with them and know why they're fighting and who they're fighting for. And the action itself is thrilling. While this isn't necessarily an action movie, when there is combat it is slick and well-filmed, and surprisingly, bloody. "The New Mutants" is pretty intense for a PG-13 film. Complete with people's faces getting ripped to shreds and terrifying imagery that depicts the PTSD of childhood abuse, this movie goes to great lengths to differentiate itself from other genre films.
Let's talk horror: While the movie has been marketed as a horror film, the horror elements are more implicit than they are explicit. And here, it worked. When the horror hits, it hits hard. There is disturbing imagery and disgusting elements that are teased, proving once again that some things are more frightening in imagination than they would have been if they were fully explained. I would of course have liked to see more horror sequences, but the ones we got were creepy enough to satisfy me, as a horror fan. But then again, a major element that helped these sequences work was the characters.
I loved every character in this film. While I do think this movie could have, and should have, been longer to deepen the characterization, what we do get of these characters leaves you wanting much more after the end credits roll, which is a good sign in my book. The cast does a phenomenal job with what they have. Anya Taylor-Joy, Charlie Heaton, and Maisie Williams stand out to me as the highlights of this movie; they were truly incredible and I was riveted every time they were on screen, which is thankfully, a lot of the time. Also, Maisie's romance that is built up with Blu Hunt's character is extremely sweet and does not at all feel like pandering or checking a diversity box. But like I said, this movie is so short that it really feels like a lot of character development scenes were left on the cutting room floor. I wanted much more of Charlie Heaton's character, who just oozed pain and personality throughout. Similarly, I wished that Maisie and Blu's romance was built up just a little bit more; I think this would've done wonders in helping the audience become even more emotionally invested.
Josh Boone did a fantastic job with his direction. The romance is filmed beautifully, the action clearly, the horror frighteningly, and just in general, this is a gorgeous movie to look at. You can tell he has a passion for this material, and that passion definitely carried over to the cast because, like I said, everyone was doing a fantastic job. Now, this movie isn't perfect. There are some cringy lines of dialogue, some wonky edits, and, while I understood what they were going for in the last act, I really wish it would have continued the small-scale story that the first two acts were building. Regardless, none of that took away my enjoyment of this movie as a whole. "The New Mutants" was such a fun time at the movies, and I can't wait to watch it again.
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