Saturday 9 November 2013

Film Review - Thor: The Dark World


Hammer and Tongs

Film: Thor: The Dark World
Cast: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Tom Hiddleston
Directed by: Alan Taylor
Duration: 1 hr 52 mins
Rating: * * 1 / 2

Considering that its predecessor was not great shakes, the expectations from Thor: The Dark World were on the lower side. Directed by Alan Taylor who has done considerable work for television and is at the helm of the next Terminator movie, this is certainly a more entertaining outing than the previous one primarily because it doesn’t take itself too seriously. In fact, it may sound odd but the humor which is the saving grace in this action film. 

Unless you are a serious fan of the franchise, you’ll find plenty of mumbo-jumbo going on here. All action films need a strong villain but Malekith (Christopher Eccelston) has been relegated to the back seat. He had unsuccessfully attempted to fight Odin’s father (that would be Thors grandfather) to destroy the universe using the Aether. He wants to give it a shot again. With Loki (Tom Hiddleston) captive Thor (Hemsworth) has to take on the bad guys but due to lack of resources, he forced to take his brothers help. 

Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) the scientist and Thor’s love interest also gets teleported to Asgard and the fight keeps shifting from outer space to Earth and the finale happens in London. 

All the science, physics and talk about the alignment of the Nine Realms appears complete baloney; there is no conviction in that. In fact it reminds you of those Hindi movies where the priest waits for particular planets to line up so that he can do his pooja and ward off evil. Except that there are plenty of special effects that Hollywood has its disposal. 

Thankfully, there is the odd tongue in cheek joke every now and then to prevent the proceedings from getting to giddy. Kat Dennings plays Darcy, Jane’s friend and her character provides considerable comic relief. One of the Avengers is also seen a cameo and as he did in Thor, Loki steals the show again. The success of the next Thor film (although Avengers is due next) will depend on the screen time given to Loki. Natalie Portman’s character is again a weak one, she has precious little to do. Thor mostly indulges in action scenes summoning his hammer from time to time there is also a funny scene where he hangs it like a coat. 

Thor: The Dark World is not such a bad outing, you wish there was more though, not in terms of time but content.

(Published in The Navhind Times on 10th Nov 2013)
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