Rating in Stars: *** (out of ****)
Cast: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Tom Hiddleston, Rene Russo, Anthony Hopkins
Director: Kenneth Branagh
MPAA Rating: PG-13 (for sequences of intense sci-fi action and violence)
Running Time: 1:54
Release Date: 05/06/11
The screenplay for Thor alternates between two narratives dissimilar in tone but that converge into something quite enjoyable. This isn’t an origin story, per se, in that our hero is introduced, gains powers, and faces a foe. Screenwriters Ashley Edward Miller, Zack Stentz, and Don Payne establish the world from which our hero hails as one that has long existed and been inhabited by many people. It’s clever, actually, the way they establish that our hero has what we humans might consider super-human powers but aren’t unique on his world, then remove the hero’s powers and banish him to Earth, where he is still considered a fish out of water.
He is also played with rugged, handsome charm by Chris Hemsworth in a performance not of a character who comes out of a professional production of a William Shakespeare play but of one who lives the caricature. He speaks with a tenor and inflection of an actor playing to the room on purpose. It’s a solid performance because it still manages not to cross over into that caricature. Everyone here speaks in such a manner, from his father Odin (Anthony Hopkins, who adds more than a bit of credence to a role only he could play) to his fellow soldiers to his brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston).
Thor and Loki may be brothers, but each has been courted for the throne when Odin decides to pass on the duties. Just before the Allfather crowns a prideful Thor, however, a breach of their battlements occurs. The Frost Giants, an ancient race with whom Odin once did battle before reaching a truce, seemingly break their promise never to intervene in Asgard again. The traitor in their midst is none other than Loki, who obviously wants the throne to himself. Further, he wants to revenge himself upon Odin when he discovers his true parentage. He manipulates the situation to force Thor into action against the Frost Giants on their homeland of Jotunheim (a well-mounted action scene, despite the darkness of the setting, which uses a form of combat that mixes well with a kind of physical humor), which drives Odin to remove his powers and banish him (and his hammer, called Mjolnir) from Asgard.
Thor arrives on Earth in the middle of a sandstorm, discovered and taken in by Jane Foster (Natalie Portman), an astrophysicist whose team of fellows includes Darcy (Kat Dennings, clearly having a ball and whose mangling of the title of Thor’s hammer is particularly amusing) and Dr. Erik Selvig (Stellan Skarsgård). Jane’s work is confiscated by S.H.I.E.L.D., the government entity whose job is secretive and whose suspicion regarding Thor’s place of origin is strong. The segments on Earth are amusing enough but pale compared to those on Asgard (or, indeed, within the Bifrost, a gateway to the Einstein-Rosen Bridge that connects to Earth and other realms and is guarded by Idris Elba’s commandingly still Heimdall). This is most evident in one of the two climactic action setpieces, the one on Earth ultimately adding up to little more than a showdown between Thor and a giant, metallic beast controlled by Loki.
It leads directly into the showdown between the two brothers that holds a lot more in the stakes department as all of the tension between them comes to a head (Hiddleston’s every line is like a slickly oiled thing) and Thor must make a rash decision. It also helps that the richly detailed Einstein-Rosen Bridge is the backdrop of the sequence, because the film’s strength of juxtaposing such melodrama against effects work is also highlighted in the sequence. Director Kenneth Branagh’s liberal use of Dutch angles and his capturing of the gold-plated mansions that populate Asgard are compelling elements to create this world. It isn’t much, but it separates Thor from the films that proceeded it in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It isn’t unique, per se, but it is something.
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