Thor = a poor film, which became an agonising chore to watch and ends being a complete bore.

Rating: 2/10 (27 April 2011)

WARNING: VOAF (Very Overrated Audience Film) has struck cinema in the form of Thor with a over-bloated 7.9 IMDb rating in what has been described as an "epic" superhero film. The only epic thing about Thor is what a bore it was and where I felt myself drifting towards sleep halfway through. Seriously looking on here I shook my head with disbelief at the statistical ratings of nearly 40 per cent of ten out of ten and written reviews of a no less given rating of four (apart from one reviewer). The thing is I have to be honest with how I felt about this movie. I won't go into the plot really because other people on here have already given a synopsis and I can't be asked to waste my time writing one. Sufficed to say the story is very simplistic with no real twists and has all the usual clichés of the "bad brother" and the "damsel in distress" falling for the "hero." But hey this is not really much of a criticism as there are plenty of films out there that follow the same formula, but at least they were enjoyable like Spiderman or the Batman films, the old or new ones.
What I will say that I did enjoy with this film, which stopped me giving this a turkey and ultimately becoming as worse as the truly dreadful I Am Number Four is the special effects, which I have to say were quite impressive. Some of the scenery was breathtaking, the 3D in certain scenes was well implemented and Anthony Hopkins gave a great performance. However these small positives are drowned into oblivion by the scale of terrible things about Thor.
First off the rest of the performances are terrible across the board. Chris Hemsworth as Thor was ridiculously bad and just sounded like he wanted to be elsewhere. He might look the part in costume but he cannot act and didn't convince me for a second as the hero. This wasn't helped by the script, which made his character stupid (at first) but then he supposedly redeems himself. But for me he was just annoying as you don't come to care about him or any of the other characters. Tom Hiddleston as Thor's brother Loki carried no weight as the villain as he just sounded so dull and my Natalie Portman! She seems to have lost her brain since her extraordinary performance in Black Swan. She gives the most cringe-worthy and wooden performance out of the whole cast. She laughs like a hyena and smiles like a retarded idiot and I just wanted to slap her as she goes all luvy dubby eyed over Thor (what does she see in him!? There is no romantic chemistry between her and him whatsoever). All the other cast are just as bad in under-performing and again wishing like they were somewhere else and who could blame them with such a bad script.
It carried no emotional weight or substance and was just dry and repetitive. All the characters are essentially cardboard cut outs with no depth (though some of the reviewers say there is!) so I didn't care about them. When Thor in one scene is supposedly killed, I kept wishing it would come true but it dosen't. There is very little action and even when there is the Michael Bay trait appears with you hardly being able to see what is happening because the camera is so close up with lack of continuity editing. Furthermore the 3D itself though impressively implemented in a few scenes was mostly bad. I could actually at certain points take off my 3D glasses and see where it was in 2D as there was no distorted image. It's as though Kenneth Branagh the director decided after a while he couldn't be asked to properly implement the entire film in 3D and thought "well the audience won't notice." Well he hasn't fooled me. If he thinks audiences are that gullible in that respect when it comes to poor 3D he's wrong. What makes me laugh though is that he in an interview said he added the comedy moments to make sure audiences didn't take the film seriously, but the comedy wasn't funny and the whole film literally had the tone of trying to be serious, which I think is part of it's big downfall for me. The scene where you think Thor dies and there is sad music is just for me sickeningly insincere. (A similar scene to one in I Am Number Four).
When it comes down to it is that Thor is just another Hollywood glossy movie that pitches itself as delivering everything (but for most audience viewers it has) but really delivers nothing. Hollywood has duped us all and they should be ashamed of themselves. If you want to waste £7.80 or more if you see it in the evening or weekend on this travesty of a film, don't say I didn't warn you. You watch it as your own peril. The only saving grace surely for how awful this film is will be bought to light by the film critics when reviewed this Friday, which will hopefully help counterbalance the very overrated opinions of Thor from audience reviewers on here.