A lot of thunder, but not much substance.

Rating: Null/10 (13 October 2011)

Perhaps I've been spoiled by Iron Man 1 & 2, as well as the Dark Knight series, but I've reached a point in my movie-watching experience to expect a superhero movie to do more than splash awesome special effects and fight scenes across the screen for 90 minutes. Thor is a character that is larger than life, but Branagh's attempts to squeeze in plot between big effects scenes leave the viewer unsatisfied. We get a good chemistry between Odin and Thor, but Thor's relationship with every other character in the movie is so trite or compressed that you simply don't care about them or the plot. You never buy into his close friendship with Volstagg and company, and his love affair with Jane Foster is cut so short that they should have been shaking hands at the end of the movie, not kissing and swearing to find each other again. Their chemistry is friendly at best, dull at worst.
Perhaps a bit ironically, this film suffers from some of the same issues as another film Portman starred in - Attack of the Clones. The dialog is stiff, and you can't get emotionally attached to any of the characters. You leave feeling like you got cheated, and feeling that a lot of potential was wasted.
If you love great VFX and epic fights, you're have a few treats, but don't expect to fill up on this one.