Immortals

Okay, so let me get this straight. There was a war in the heavens and the victors called themselves Gods and the defeated were called Titans. The Gods vanquished the Titans to some cage in the bottom of some mountain for all eternity and the only thing on the planet that could set the Titans free was the mystical and powerful Epirus bow that fell from the heavens during the war. If I got that right then that is the premise for the new movie Immortals by Tarsem Singh. Now if that name doesn't sound familiar or ring any bells then maybe that's because this truly expensive film is just Tarsem's third. His first was that off the wall and horrendously bad Jennifer Lopez vanity project entitled The Cell. I skipped his second offering, The Fall because of The Cell but Immortals for some reason intrigued me, so I went.

Was I entertained? Delighted? Pleasantly surprised? No. Was I impressed with the 3D? Yes. This movie is one to skip and I will explain why. First off the look of this stylized yet completely forgettable film is a blatant rip off of 300 (which might be because the producers of 300 backed this movie). It wouldn't surprise me one bit of some of the sets in this movie, wait what am I talking about, movies today don't have sets they have green screens. Well it wouldn't surprise me if some of the rejected visualizations for 300 made it into this movie, they look THAT similar. Secondly, the acting is just god awful. And that includes the two time Oscar nominated John Hurt. Mickey Rourke, while never really being classified as a good actor EVER (if you don't count his turn in The Wrestler) looks bored out of his mind as the evil King Hyperion who is searching for said mighty bow.

Rounding out the rest of the cast is Henry Cavill who plays Theseus, the man tasked to round up mankind and fight against Hyperion's hordes. Then there's the love interest because you KNEW there had to be a love interest, right? That's played by the ethereally beautiful Frida Pinto who is the oracle Phaedra. Now while Frida looks stunning for all the world to see and even though the cameras love her, she slept walked through this movie. She did a better acting job in Slumdog Millionaire and was borderline decent in Rise of the Planet of the Apes. There is a Stephen Dorf sighting by the way. I don't know who he bribed or slept with to get casted but there he was, on the screen without a HINT of an accent by the way. Lastly Luke Evans plays Zeus and I have to admit that he stole the movie in my eyes (not that it was all that hard to do really). When he was on screen, he was magnetic and blew everyone else into the background pretty much as someone portraying Zeus should in my opinion.

The fight scenes were impressive but come on, what did you expect from the producers of 300? Though I am growing tired of all the profile fight scenes. You know the ones, where the hero move steadily ahead through the throng of bad guys coming at him and he disposes of them one, maybe two, sometimes three at a time in slow motion. Yet all the while he (or she, see Watchmen) never slows down or takes a backward step and the camera shoots all this from the side view. Guys, try something new, okay?

The film is pretty to look at and the CG work (in 3D no less) is impressive. The score, supplied by Trevor Morris who is behind the music of The Tudors and Pillars of the Earth was decent. I can't say it's on the level of a John Williams or a Hans Zimmer, it's not even on the level of a Steve Jablonski but it's nice ear candy at times. It's not run right home and download it (unless you can for free) but it's not bad. What's bad is this movie and I recommend you skip it and wait for your neighborhood DVD bootleg guy to get it from instead of dropping almost $20 on a ticket to see it in the theaters. If you do see it though, don't say I didn't warn you :-)