X-Men marked the Hollywood debut for Jackman, a last-second choice for Wolverine, cast three weeks into filming. Singer signed to direct in 1996, with further rewrites by Ed Solomon, Singer, Tom DeSanto, Christopher McQuarrie, and Hayter, in which Beast and Nightcrawler were deleted over budget concerns from Fox. The film rights were bought by 20th Century Fox in 1994, and various scripts and film treatments were commissioned from Andrew Kevin Walker, John Logan, Joss Whedon, and Michael Chabon.
It focuses on mutants Wolverine and Rogue as they are brought into a conflict between two groups that have radically different approaches to bringing about the acceptance of mutant-kind: Professor Xavier's X-Men, and the Brotherhood of Mutants, led by Magneto.ĭevelopment of X-Men began as far back as 1984 with Orion Pictures, with James Cameron and Kathryn Bigelow in discussions at one point. The film depicts a world where an unknown proportion of people are mutants, whose possession of superhuman powers makes them distrusted by normal humans. The film is based on the Marvel Comics superhero team of the same name and features an ensemble cast consisting of Patrick Stewart, Hugh Jackman, Ian McKellen, Halle Berry, Famke Janssen, James Marsden, Bruce Davison, Rebecca Romijn-Stamos, Ray Park, Tyler Mane, and Anna Paquin. X-Men is a 2000 American superhero film directed by Bryan Singer and written by David Hayter from a story by Singer and Tom DeSanto.