I found CharacterFX very easy to get into - but for cut scenes it's probably a bit rough and ready and useless really.
If you want to make character models for FPSC, learning Anim8or and CharacterFX is probably a nice and easy way into it.
If you want to make cut scenese for FPSC then you need to first consider how you'll get the media, animate it, orchestrate a scene, then get that scene into FPSC. If you can get ok results with the Movies (how I have no idea!), then continue to use that unless this is something you have to do. There's a good couple of years in learning how to make Machima properly, and it's not worth it for a FPSC game.
Personally, I'd avoid movies and go for pre-calculated movement and animation paths with dialogue, like a little module added to the FPSC game engine to allow cutscenes to be played back - that would be great, because it could be seamless. It depends on how much you want it and how much time your prepared to spend learning or coding.
Aegrescit medendo
