By Brett Blake When the final word on the Marvel Cinematic Universe is written, I expect THOR: THE DARK WORLD will go down as one of the more controversial entries in the series. It’s a sequel that fully embraces the cosmic weirdness of its comic-book-panel origins, and it nicely expands on the groundwork laid down by the previous film… but it’s not perfect... and it’s not as solid, top-to-bottom, as its predecessor, either. But here’s the good news: it’s still a massively entertaining movie, full of incident, humor, and spectacle, and it perfectly sets the stage for the movies we’ll be seeing from Marvel over the next several years. After an expositional prologue establishing this story’s antagonists, the Dark Elves, THOR: THE DARK WORLD picks up almost immediately following the events of last year’s THE AVENGERS; Thor (Chris Hemsworth) is hopping across Asgard suppressing uprisings, while Loki (Tom Hiddleston) has been imprisoned for his crimes. Through some elaborate plot machinations, Thor finds himself reconnected with Jane Foster (Natalie Portman), and must contend with attacks on both Asgard and Earth, in the process forging an uneasy alliance with Loki to defeat the Dark Elves and their leader, Malekith (Christopher Eccleston). With that brief synopsis out of the way, allow me to begin with the positives. First and foremost, Hemsworth and Hiddleston up their respective games and deliver new angles and dimensions with their characters. Hemsworth’s easy charm fits Thor wonderfully, and the storyline allows the character to grow. That’s doubly true for Hiddleston’s Loki, and one of the movie’s biggest successes is how it handles him. I’ll tread lightly for fear of spoilers, but I will say that the way the script chooses to use Loki feels like a natural progression from where the character’s been over the course of both THOR and THE AVENGERS, and it puts him into some quite interesting positions that should warrant further exploration in the future. The rest of the cast members all do very solid work; Portman completely sells her character’s chemistry with Thor, and Anthony Hopkins gets to bring the gravitas as Thor’s father, Odin. Stellan Skarsgard and Kat Dennings get to handle the bulk of the movie’s comedic relief, while Jaimie Alexander and Idris Elba get some nice, action-y moments to shine. The other factor worthy of discussion is how just plain “out there” the film goes. It’s almost joyfully fantastical from the very beginning, and it never lets up. This is a movie that has elves flying bizarre spacecraft, giant monsters, and a weird red substance capable of destroying the entire universe. Far and away, I’d call this the most blatantly comic book-y movie Marvel has yet produced; there are literally dozens of moments that feel like they’ve been ripped from the pages of any given issue of “Thor,” and I mean that in a very good way. Much of the imagery - colorful and grand in scope - is absolutely spectacular. Similarly, Asgard itself is rendered in far more detail than when last we saw it; this time around, it actually feels like a lived-in, fleshed-out place. That’s no slight against the previous THOR film, as the more contained Asgard we saw there fit the needs of that story. Along that same vein, the action in the film is exciting and thrilling, and feels distinctive when compared to what we saw in the first film. Here, we’ve got (several) aerial dogfights, sequences of close-quarters combat, and the constant threat of massive destruction being visited upon Asgard and London. The climactic action setpiece, while relatively small in scope when compared to, say, the final battle in THE AVENGERS, is an incredibly inventive sequence involving teleportation and assorted gravitational anomalies; it’s great fun. I also want to quickly touch upon the musical score by Brian Tyler. He conjures up an absolutely massive, powerful sound for the music that appropriately accompanies the picture, and he also crafts a strong main theme to anchor the score. Given that he scored IRON MAN 3 earlier this year, I’d like to think that he’s slowly becoming Marvel’s go-to guy as they move forward. All that’s good, right? So where does the movie stumble a bit? Two key areas: the villain and the pacing. Let me take the latter first. At a mere 112 minutes (and that’s including the end credits), this is the shortest Marvel film to date, and while that would be fine if that was the intention going in, it really feels like we’re getting a somewhat chopped-up version of the movie that was originally shot. The opening third of the film has a herky-jerky quality that just seems off; having a fast or breathless pace is one thing, but there are quite a few moments here that feel rushed, like whole scenes might be missing. It’s not enough to impact the narrative, but I found it to be quite noticeable. There’s not much “connective tissue,” if that makes any sense. The second area of concern is much more detrimental to the film. Put simply, our villain, Malekith, and his band of Dark Elves are not compelling in the slightest, and the screenplay seems to almost go out of its way to not supply them with any meaningful motivation. They want to “plunge the universe into darkness.” Why, you might ask? Well, just because, apparently. Now, don’t get me wrong, none of this is the fault of Eccleston, who plays Malekith just fine (I think he’s rather good at projecting the character’s single-minded determination to accomplish his - admittedly vague - goal, and there’s a subdued quality to his evil that’s interesting), but we never get a full sense of what this race of beings truly desires. We’re meant to be afraid of the elves simply because they’re at odds with our heroes, not because we understand their motivations, or the consequences of them getting what they want. In a lesser film, this flaw could have been enough to sink the whole enterprise; luckily, everything else about THOR: THE DARK WORLD is strong enough to overcome it. What it comes down to is this: if you’re willing to look beyond the unimpressive villains, and can embrace the sense of fun that the movie offers, you’ll have a blast. Those looking for something more grounded, however, should consider this entire review a warning - the movie’s probably not for you. For the rest of us, however, THOR: THE DARK WORLD is a ton of fun. Side note: Do see the film in 3D if you can. Not because there’s anything groundbreaking in the movie itself in terms of its 3D usage (there isn’t), but because you’ll get to see a pretty cool, complete scene from next spring’s CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER that’s only attached to the 3D prints of the movie.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Archives
January 2023
Categories
All
|