Sorry for the couple-day delay in getting this review out there. Hopefully there are still some people out there who haven’t seen this movie and want to read a review of it. My mini-review is below, and a full review (with spoilers) is after the jump.

The X Files: I Want To Believe: 4 stars/ 5.
Pros: Scully’s character has some really excellent moments; cool “monster of the week” idea; creepy white-haired dude from the previews is just as creepy as you want him to be, some genuinely good ideas regarding the “I want to believe” tagline, and what that might actually mean.
Cons: Weird pacing; lack of teamwork; scattered focus.
My Take: If you go see this movie, leave any specific expectations you may have for the film at the door. Watch it for ideas, not for blockbuster explosions or preconceived ideas of how you think the characters should behave. While it seems like the filmmakers couldn’t exactly settle on what they wanted the film to focus on, there are many truly excellent moments that make this movie worthwhile, and will leave you thinking about it after you leave.

This movie has been getting a lot of bad reviews, so I’d like to first start off with the really great things about it first:

The general premise is awesome. The title “I want to believe” is not about aliens this time, but about faith, the ethics of prolonging life, psychic connections, love and compassion, and guilt and redemption.
The main thread in this film is the search for a missing FBI agent, and a subsequent missing woman whose abduction (by humans) fits the same profile. A creepy white-haired man comes forward and says he is getting visions related to the case. The FBI is flummoxed, and calls Scully, asking her to convince Mulder to come back to the FBI to consult on the case. They say in exchange for his unique experience in dealing with psychics, they will drop all charges against him and consider the past forgotten. While that excuse is lame (they will really drop a death-sentence in exchange for a little experience in talking to a harmless psychic?), it brings Mulder and Scully back to the FBI and in the middle of what turns out to be a very interesting case. It turns out that the white-haired man is a former priest who molested altar boys and is living in self-imposed exile. His visions lead the FBI to finally uncover a Frankenstein doctor who is grafting the head of a man (who had been molested by the ex-priest) onto different bodies in order to prolong his life. While this is no government-sanctioned alien plot, it is pretty darn cool! Religious and faith-based themes are merged with science and psychic visions, giving us a very dark and interesting storyline.

Scully is awesome. This movie really let the character of Dana Scully shine. We find that she has gone back to medical practice, and is caring for a young boy with a fatal disease. She decides to undertake a very long and painful series of stem-cell procedures for the boy- surgeries that she does not even know will save his life. The priests who run the hospital are against her decision, and the parents waver back and forth. She feels a strong connection with the boy, and admits it is in part because of regrets about giving up her own son, William. Throughout the film, Scully struggles between the views of the church-run hospital and her own beliefs- questioning her belief in God, and trying to find her own definition of compassion and ethics. This runs in tandem with her interactions with the child-molesting priest, who finally comes to believe that his psychic visions are from God- a way for him to redeem himself from his past actions. Finally, it also ties into the Frankenstein surgeries that she and Mulder uncover- leaving us with the question- who determines who should live and who should die, and under what circumstances is it alright to extend a life that is destined to die (or to take away a life that is not)? Also, does God exist, and does he give signs to help people make these decisions, or are we alone? Scully’s struggles with these questions gives great depth to her character, and also gives her the fire and passion to play the sometimes aggressive, kick-ass, get-stuff-done woman that fans have fallen in love with.

I think between the depth of the plot and the depth of Scully’s character, the movie is well worth watching. There are, however, some not so great aspects which I should mention:

There is no teamwork, and Mulder is kind of lame. Mulder and Scully are in a relationship, but there’s no teamwork. It seems as though things have been strained for a while (Mulder is a crazy, bearded mess at the beginning of the film), but it’s not until Mulder is back on a case and “exploring the darkness” that Scully truly questions their relationship. Because of this, they work the case as individuals, and struggle with their demons and beliefs on their own. Scully truly shines, but Mulder’s struggles are explained away with the old “Always trying to save your sister” line that has become a joke among fans. It seems as though he learns nothing of himself, and they learn nothing about each other or their relationship either, really. In the show, Mulder and Scully are a perfect team- they complete aspects of each other that are lacking, they finish each other’s sentences, they work well together, they understand each other. They clearly love each other deeply, and it’s a love out of mutual respect. In the film, they seem to have lost all that was great about their relationship. They are divided, confused, stuck in a rut of singular goals. Their “home” is not enough to keep their relationship strong, it seems as though they are leading separate lives and just happen to come back to the same house every night.
Now, these relationship problems are ones that many, many people also face. It could have been an opportunity for some really great growth of both the characters. They could have worked through it, learned something of themselves, maybe taught the viewers something as well. There is certainly room to explore these human elements in the film. However, with all the screen time dedicated to the issue, the film never truly resolved anything. They dithered for a minute about whether to run away from “the darkness” or give up to the fact that it will always find them. Nothing was really decided, then they went off on a tropical vacation. A real opportunity was lost here, and ultimately it meant that a lot of time was wasted on something that no one cared about or wanted to see.

The pacing was off. As a video editor, I probably have a much more sensitive eye for this sort of thing than the normal casual viewer, but I think this issue was apparent to most everyone. Part of the issue was all the time spent on the relationship, which I outlined above. Part of it was also that Mulder and Scully were not working as a team, and that there were other FBI agents involved as well, so the film was constantly flipping through a series of characters and a series of separate plot elements. This resulted in a film that felt slow and disjointed. It never culminated in a big climax or neatly-packaged revelation. People are coming out of this movie feeling dissatisfied, and I think it’s because they were expecting a moment at some point, and it never really came. Now, I’m not arguing for a huge explosion, or a massive fight between Mulder and Scully, but I think some teamwork between the characters and some different editing could have given us a true “oh shit” moment (at the Frankenstein surgery site, for example, or when it’s definitively revealed that there is a connection between the Frankenstein subject and the priest).

So, in conclusion- go see the movie! Don’t expect any huge moments and don’t worry about the relationship fluff. Instead, focus on the myriad of ideas and debates that are brought up by the plot, and enjoy the dark and broody world of the X-Files once again.