THOR

Year: 2011
Director: Kenneth Branagh
Screenwriters: Ashley Miller, Zack Stentz and Don Payne

Main Cast:

Chris Hemsworth – Thor
Natalie Portman – Jane Foster
Tom Hiddlestone – Loki
Anthony Hopkins – Odin
Stellan Skarsgard – Erik Selvig
Kat Dennings – Darcy Lewis
Clark Gregg – Agent Coulson
Idris Elba – Heimdall
Colm Feore – King Laufey
Ray Stevenson – Volstagg
Tadanobu Asano – Hogun
Josh Dallas – Fandral
Jamie Alexander – Sif
Rene Russo - Frigga

This film suffers from the same condition most blockbusters do. It is made for an audience as wide as possible. It tries to please adults, teenagers and children, which is a very hard task. There is no other way, it’s a business. Since it must have cost a lot of money, it has got to make at least more than it cost in return. The more people pay for a ticket, the richer the studios get. Very few movies of this magnitude succeeded in being great and highly profitable at the same time. “Thor” is not one of them. “The Rise of the Planet of the Apes” is. Go and check it out at the cinema right now.

What does “The Rise” have that “Thor” doesn’t? An excellent script and good editing. The “Thor” writers even tried to do something cool and, at the same time, faithful to the comics, but ended up having to make various concessions in order to make it appropriate for children. It’s not as bad “Green Lantern”, as it explores much of the magical world of northern mythology, as opposed to the very little screen time that is given to the Green Lantern adventures in space. Asgard and Jotunheim are well depicted. Bifrost, the Rainbow Bridge got particularly very good and it does deserve merit. It must have been pretty difficult to make something so intrinsically kitch into a modern and interesting construct. The CGI imagery is quite beautiful to watch. However, when the visual effects are a film main attraction instead of a plus to the great story that is being unfolded, we’ve got a serious problem.

When the plot takes us to Earth, the film shows its worst weaknesses. Apart from the humor, which is surprisingly effective, there is a feeling of “we were expecting more”. The love interest is only interesting because she is Natalie Portman. Sadly, she doesn’t have much to work with. She and Thor don't share share many moments together. It’s hard to understand the reasons why she fell in love with the god of thunder other than that he is such a hunk. They fall in love in a hurry. Another thing was Thor’s four fighting friends, whose only motivation is to follow him wherever he goes, either to fight along his side in Jotunheim or to rescue him from Earth back to Asgard. They are no more than mere sketches of characters. There is not much time to develop them. And that’s why many super hero movies fail: the excess of characters. It should be a rule of thumb – if there is no time to give a character minimum background and substance, it should not be in the film at all. By the way, whey the four of them reach our planet to find the banished hero, they seem to have come out of a comedy like “Weekend at Bernie’s”. In Portuguese, I nicknamed them “Os Vikings do barulho”. What about Rene Russo’s character, Queen Frigga? Honestly, I think she says two sentences in the entire movie. Why waste such a good actress on such a minor role? I only found out that her name was Frigga when I looked it up at imdb.

Loki is a bit better developed. He is indeed a liar and deceiver like he is supposed to. Loki’s machinations and political maneuvers in order to achieve Thor’s position of power in Asgard resemble Shakespeare’s villainous characters. But, there is another side to him that makes him a bit of a pussy. It is discovered near the end that, more than becoming the King in Thor’s place, he wants to be loved and favored by their father, Odin (Hopkins). Oh, poor thing… Deep down, everything Loki does, he does it because he wants attention from his father. How traumatic it must have been for him to grow up with such a brother to look up to. Come on! What a wuss… That dude doesn’t scare anybody.

The editing was also pretty poor. One scene, in particular, definitely shouldn’t have been cut. Thor is on Earth and has just been rescued by Professor Erik Selvig. He was being held captive by SHIELD because he was caught trying to recover Mjolnir. Selvig and Thor decide to go to a bar then and have a few drinks. Selvig tells him not to hurt Jane Foster’s feelings with fantasies of being a god from another dimension and all. Thor says ok, he means her no harm. That’s it, the scene is cut right to the point Thor is putting him to bed in Jane’s home. Where is all the drinking, the toasting, the laughing out loud, the fighting? Isn’t this film about a barbarian god? Thor doesn’t get drunk. It seems that not being able to get drunk is one of his super powers. That’s disappointing. They must have cut the scene because of the kids. They couldn’t show their super hero drinking. I have to say it’s just fucking ridiculous.

Another thing about the editing. Actually, it’s more concerned to the screenplay. I didn’t really get the fact that the climax is at the beginning of the movie, not at the end. Why was the best action scene placed in the first twenty minutes? The momentum is lost, the rest of the movie goes downhill, of course. If you say that the battles between Thor and the Destroyer and the one between Thor and Loki are more exciting, do me a favor and seek psychiatric help, because you’re crazy. These two scenes are far from measuring up to the early battle scene against the Frost Giants. For me, this is a grave mistake.

Another huge mistake was casting Kat Dennings and not show her biggest attributes, if you know what I mean.

Grade: FR

Link at imdb.