The film is supposed to take place in the UK in the '60s, but except for the occasional nod to mod decor and the distracting use of the word "groovy" by Professor Xavier, it doesn't look any more like '60s academia than the other X-Men films, or Hellboy, or anything else with a generic chrome-and-primary color palette. The special effects are only passable, and at times, it's too obvious that the vehicles and the super-powers are modeled and generated on a computer screen. Fight scenes depended entirely on these flashes and particles and lens flares, and weren't terribly impressive as a result. A strong aesthetic eye could have pulled the film out of "generic" and into "visually unique" territory, and this would have made it feel considerably more serious. Alas, once again, there was no such commitment.
In the end, this is the first draft of a technically stronger and thematically more powerful film. There's a deep reservoir of thematic material here, from the Nazi and oppression themes to the intensely ambivalent relationship between Charles Xavier and Magneto. However, the film passes like a stone skipping over the surface of these ideas, moving too quickly and too lightly to make good on the promise.
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