Thanks for checking out our Immortals review. When word first came out about this film I, like a lot of us, kind of rolled my eyes. It came right on the heels of the revisited “Clash of the Titans” (which was just dreadful) and sounded almost like a bit of a copy cat project. Then came Comic Con this past summer and I had a chance to watch about 15 minutes of the film including a spectacular fight sequence between the gods of olympus and the titans… and suddenly my enormous skepticism turned into mild enthusiasm.

So… did Immortals end up being the waste it first looked like or a fun flick that Comic Con made it look like? It’s not a fantastic film, but I’d have to say it’s pretty damn fun.

THE BASIC IDEA: “A brave young stonemason assembles a fierce band of warriors to prevent an evil king from acquiring the artifact that will permit him to rule the world in this epic mythological fantasy from visionary filmmaker Tarsem Singh. King Hyperion (Mickey Rourke) is a brutal tyrant on a bloody mission to seek out the mythical Bow of Epirus. Should he succeed, even the gods of Olympus will be forced to bow before him. In his efforts to locate the invincible and elusive weapon, Hyperion leads his Heraklion army on a brutal rampage across Greece, razing every town in their path, and killing with impunity. When the Hyperions lay waste to his village and cut down his mother in cold blood, vengeful stonemason Theseus (Henry Cavill) emerges from the rubble determined to make the king pay for his crimes. Later, the Sybelline Oracle, Phaedra (Freida Pinto), experiences a vision of Theseus’ future that convinces her he will play a pivotal role in defeating King Hyperion. Armed with that supernatural knowledge, she agrees to help Theseus assemble a small army capable of defeating the tyrannical king and preventing him from enslaving the entire human race. Stephen Dorff, Kellan Lutz, and John Hurt co-star.”

Watch the video version of our IMMORTALS review here. Continue reading the written review below:

THE GOOD

Not having watched the TV show “The Tudors” I’ve been completely unfamiliar with the word of Henry Cavill (who as most of you know is the new Superman). I’ve been curious to see if he can carry a film and specifically shine in an action/adventure role (much like Superman will be). Although I won’t be putting his name on any Oscar ballots for his leading role in Immortals, I have to say I was impressed by his screen presence and intensity (probably 2 of the most important qualities in someone carrying an action film… and Superman). He’s not the best I’ve ever seen at hiding his considerable accent, but I found as the movie progressed I noticed it less and less… not sure if that means he was getting better at it or if I was just getting used to it. That being said, I found his performance to be solid and he owned the screen when he was on it.

The fight sequences are more than impressive. I’ve always said that a comedy can be forgiven a lot of flaws if it at least is funny and makes the audience laugh. The same sort of principle applies to action/adventure films. If the action is solid and the battles are grand (peppered with some good visual effects) then a lot of the flaws can be forgiven. One scene in particular stands out to me and that’s the aforementioned fight between the gods and the titans. It will probably end up as the single best fight scene of the year and had me saying “wow” out loud more than a few times.

I’m becoming a Luke Evans fan. He was seen a few weeks ago in the completely awful “The Three Musketeers” as the Musketeers Aramis and believe me when I tell you his performance was the only redeemable thing about that train wreck. Luke has a terrific screen presence and does a fantastic job playing the king of the gods… Zeus. Zeus also plays a key role in a major subplot of the film being the nature of the relationship between the gods and humanity… between Olympus and Earth. Zeus has a strict non-interference law forbidding to intercede in man’s affairs as a god stating at one point “we ask the mortals to believe in us, so we must do the same for them”. And so Zeus’ refusal to help humanity comes from his firm belief and faith in humanity. It’s fodder for interesting conversation when you come out of the movie if you’re looking for that sort of thing.

THE BAD

The film is directed by Tarsem Singh who already has a bit of a reputation of being a visual visionary… but lacking a bit when it comes to how he handles narrative. No less can be said about his work on Immortals. Yes, the action and visuals are all there, but as a director his first job to is drive the story, make it compelling and get us as the audience invested in the narrative. Unfortunately Singh falls short in delivering an engaging story despite having a rich concept with larger than life characters and an epic scale. With all that at his disposal it’s almost unforgivable to not tell the story in some sort of compelling way.

Despite the fact that Freida Pinto is one of the single most beautiful women on the face of the earth and that she gets naked in it (I’m a man, I had to notice) and despite the fact that I like Stephen Dorff a lot, it has to be said that all the “side” characters in the film were quite weak and poorly used. Once you moved outside of Theseus (Henry Cavill) and Zeus (Luke Evans) there was simply nothing interesting there. Often it just felt like the other character were just impotently there with no real value or function. Again, this could be pointed right back at Tarsem Singh’s failure to craft narrative.

Look, I’m sure I’ll take some flack for this but it has to be said: Mickey Rourke’s performance in Immortals is something he should be ashamed of. We all know how good of an actor Rourke can be and I’m a big fan of his… but at NO POINT in Immortals did I ever get the sense that Rourke cared about the film or gave the slightest bit of effort in his performance. This was the classic example of someone just mailing it in to cash a quick paycheck. These films need a strong antagonist, and King Hyperion could have been one… but Rourke, seemingly intentionally, tries to sabotage the film. As a Rourke fan I was embarrassed and he should be too.

OVERALL

Despite a poorly handled narrative, misused secondary characters and an inexcusably poor “effort” given by Rourke as the villain of the film, Immortals still somehow manages to entertain with a beautiful visual style, solid performances by Cavill and Evans and some absolutely terrific actions scenes to make up for it. Immortals is a deeply flawed film that I believe still has enough going for it to deliver a good time at the theatre. Overall I give Immortals a 6 out of 10.