Thor (2011)

Thor Review
Review # 150

3/5 stars

Director – Kenneth Branagh

Cast – Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Anthony Hopkins, Tom Hiddleston, Stellan Skarsgard

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– followed by The Avengers

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Thor continues Marvel’s journey to the intensely awaited The Avengers. Directed by Kenneth Branaugh (of all people), the movie follows the titular arrogant supernatural being/god as he finds himself banished on Earth after a brash attack on a similarly supernatural group of beings called Jötunn (or “Frost Giants”). To regain his superhuman abilities and the respect of his father, Odin, Thor must find humility and lose his arrogance. Or something like that.

Anthony Hopkins appears as Odin, Colm Feore plays the Frost Giant King, and Stellan Skarsgard mentors Natalie Portman’s young and ambitious scientist. I get the feeling that a cast like this would not have been possible without Kenneth Branaugh’s involvement as director. And seriously, how the hell did they get Mr. Shakespeare to do a superhero movie? In interviews Hopkins and Branaugh constantly mention the “Shakespearean themes” in the story. Well, there is a squabbling royal family, I guess that counts.

Released just months before Captain America, there was a lot riding on the success of the two films. Imagine if they both tanked and hadn’t found an audience, especially as The Avengers had already been started. Hundreds of millions of dollars would have been lost. But it wasn’t that likely, was it. The question remains though, could they find a way to make the films work?

They did, for the most part. Thor finds himself mingling with already introduced characters such as Agent Coulson, numerous references are made to Iron Man and other future Avengers, and the tone (on Earth anyway) is kept as realistic as we have come to expect. There may not be a huge amount of chemistry between Hemsworth and Portman, and the script gives them even less to work with, but it does get by, and in a fairly pleasant fashion.

Thor is best looked at as a part of a whole, that whole being the Avengers franchise. It serves to introduce both the character of Thor and his villainous brother Loki, and also the concept of supernatural beings as superheroes. Up to this point in the Marvel-verse superheroes are the result of serums (The Incredible Hulk and then Captain America), or super-suits (Iron Man), so to introduce gods into the equation seems a little off. All in all the movie meshes itself in well to the established continuity, and that is really all it wants to do. A more unique story would have been welcome, but what we have here is done well.

OVERALL

Thor is fairly unremarkable, though the special effects and most of the visual design is great. The script holds back the movie, which, while solid and workmanlike, likes to dips its toes in the pool of cliché once or twice too often. It is best seen as a build up to The Avengers, and as such it does what it is expected to.

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TRAILER

“Thor” on other websites:

IMDB —– Rotten Tomatoes —– Wikipedia

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Taste the Blood of Dracula (1970)

Taste the Blood of Dracula Review
Review # 149

3.5/5 stars

Director – Peter Sasdy

Cast – Christopher Lee, Peter Sallis, Geoffrey Keen, Gwen Watford, Linda Hayden, Anthony Corlan, Isla Blair, John Carson, Martin Jarvis, Ralph Bates, Roy Kinnear

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– follows Dracula Has Risen From the Grave

– followed by Scars of Dracula

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We all know Dracula, the evil vampire and seducer of lore. The most recent movie adaptation of any note was Coppola’s 1992 Bram Stoker’s Dracula starring Gary Oldman. That is a movie that, while being hailed for its old-time charm and practical effects wizardry, I have yet been able to sit through once. But before Oldman and his famous (infamous?) hairstylings, the character was synonymous with Christopher Lee and his portrayal in the Hammer Productions films.

Christopher Lee is perhaps most famous to modern audiences as the villains Sauroman and Count Dooku, from the Lord of the Rings films and Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones respectively. He also makes numerous cameos in Tim Burton movies. But back in the day Hammer films were his training ground, with appearances in The Hound of the Baskervilles and many other non-Dracula roles. His Dracula is suave and commanding, but doesn’t say much, except for counting down the number of victims he has killed. He doesn’t even appear (save one brief scene at the beginning) until 50 or 55 minutes into the movie.

The movie is told from the point of view of three men, friends who like going out on a Sunday night and living a little wild. (In a nice surprise one of these men is played by Peter Sallis, eventual voice of Wallace from Wallace and Gromit, and long time cast member of the BBC TV series The Last of the Summer Wine.) Once brothels start seeming a little tame, they talk to someone rumoured to have been once caught in the act of worshiping in a Black Mass. He is a rich and arrogant young man, and takes them to a remote castle. There he drinks the re-constituted blood of Dracula (after the three men chicken out), and after they flee we see him morph into a familiar fanged form. Dracula vows to hunt the men down. As you do.

The movie is slow to build up, and uneven pacing is its biggest problem. It is a beautiful looking movie, though, and clearly had a decent budget (for movies it its type.) I was intrigued by its way of keeping Dracula off-screen til the half way point. We saw the story through the eyes of three middle-aged gentlemen who realize they are in over their heads, and it was enough of a new take on the vampire genre to interest me. I must admit that other than that the story is fairly routine. The special effects aren’t great (what little there are), with the occasional visible wire or dodgy compositing, but we have to expect that from these productions.

OVERALL

Taste the Blood of Dracula is a solid entry into the Hammer Dracula series, as those movies go. Christopher Lee is back in fine form, but doesn’t have a lot to do, really. I would recommend this to fans of Hammer films, or Dracula films. There isn’t much in it for anyone else, but it does certainly have a quaint charm to it.

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TRAILER 

“Taste the Blood of Dracula” on other websites:

IMDB —– Rotten Tomatoes —– Wikipedia

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