Immortals

PLOT (spoiler alert!!!):

Hyperion (Mickey Rourke), King of Crete, declares war on humanity after the Gods fail to answer his prayers to save his family from illness, and starts searching for the Epirus Bow, a powerful weapon created by the God of War Ares (Daniel Sharman), which he intends to use to release the Titans from Mount Tartarus and destroy the human race.

Hyperion attacks several holy places in search of the Epirus Bow, and after kidnapping a virgin oracle priestess called Phaedra (Freida Pinto) to help him, advances towards a nearby village, where the young Theseus (Henry Cavill) lives with his mother. Theseus’ mother conceived him after being raped, and he is thus considered a bastard and prevented from evacuating the village with its other inhabitants by the soldier Lysander (Joseph Morgan). Theseus defeats him in combat, which he was taught by an old man (John Hurt), and Lysander is discharged by his commanding officer. Infuriated, he offers his services to Hyperion.

The old man is actually Zeus (Luke Evans) in disguise. He meets with Ares, Poseidon (Kellan Lutz), Athena (Isabel Lucas), Apollo (Corey Sevier) and Heracles (Steve Byers), and they discuss the fact that they can’t directly interfere with the conflict, only provide the humans the ways to win the battle by themselves. Meanwhile, Theseus returns to the village only to discover that Hyperion and his army have already attacked. Hyperion murders Theseus’ mother in front of him and sends him to work as a slave in the mines, where Theseus befriends another prisoner, the thief Stavros (Stephen Dorff).

Phaedra has a vision of Theseus fighting Hyperion after accidentally touching him and tells Stavros to make sure Theseus is always by his side. She and the other captured oracles later start a riot, in which she, Theseus, and Stravros escape alongside other slaves. Theseus decides to go after Hyperion and the others follow him. They attack a boat filled with Hyperion’s men, but are overpowered and rescued when Poseidon causes a tidal wave knocks Hyperion’s men out. On their way out, Phaedra has a vision that Theseus needs to return to his village and bury his mother, which he does.

In the process, he finds the Epirus Bow, but is attacked by Hyperion’s soldier, the Minotaur, who was warned of Theseus’ presence by Lysander, while the others are attacked by soldiers. Theseus finally defeats the Minotaur and rescues his allies using the Epirus Bow, before collapsing due to being poisoned by the Minotaur. Phaedra takes him to her house, where she cures him and they have sex, which causes her to lose her premonitory powers.

The group returns to Phaedra’s temple, only to discover that it is filled with Hyperion’s soldiers. They capture the group and steal the Epirus Bow, forcing Ares to intervene and save them. Zeus, infuriated, is forced to kill Ares, while Athena is able to provide horses for the group, which they use to ride to Mount Tartarus, under attack by Hyperion’s forces. Hyperion releases the Titans using the Epirus Bow, and they are confronted by the Gods, while Theseus and his allies join forces with the Athenian army present.

Theseus enters the temple and fights Hyperion. He is stabbed multiple times, but is able to kill Hyperion by stabbing him in the neck before dying. Meanwhile, the Gods are overpowered by the Titans, who kill Apollo and Heracles and mortally wound Athena. Before Zeus returns to Mount Olympus with her, he collapses the temple upon the Titans, killing them as well as most of Hyperion’s forces, while the rest are imprisoned by the Athenians.

Theseus is welcomed into Mount Olympus by the Gods for his sacrifice, and is awarded with a son from his night with Phaedra. The boy inherits his mother’s premonitions and is trained by the Old Man in mastering them after discovering that, in the future, there’ll be a war between the Gods and the Titans, with Theseus leading the Gods in battle on Mount Olympus.

REVIEW:

You know those films that are often panned by critics, but audiences love? I think Immortals is going to be one of those films.

Reading some of the reviews of this last night, it is obvious that the critics are being extremely critical of it. Ironically, many of the things they have issue with are the very things they nearly wet themselves with excitement in their reviews of that crappy Clash of the Titans remake.

As with almost every film I’ve seen this year, I chose not to pay for the “3D experience”. I figure why waste the money, y’know? Did I make the right choice with this one? I think so. Other than the scene where Poseidon does his this with the Black Sea, or whatever body of water that was. I honestly didn’t see any other scenes that would make me thankful I paid the extra $$$ for the rental glasses to see it in “breathtaking, eye-popping 3D”. What a rip-off!!!

The action is the main selling point of this flick, as you can see in the trailer. Well, I’m sure female viewers will flock to see 2 hrs of nothing but shirtless, sweaty, muscular men. However, the male population is going for some kick-ass action.

Unfortunately, there isn’t as much of it as one would think. Don’t get me wrong, there is plenty to go around and when they do happen, your jaw will drop with how well they are filmed. However, in between these scenes is a lot of unnecessary filler.

While said filler develops the plot and everything, it does sort of take the audience out of it. I’m not really sure why I think that, but there was just something that seemed to sort of lose my interest when they got away from the action scenes. Maybe it was the sexual tension between Theseus and Phaedra, the ridiculous headwear the gods were wearing, the fact that it is never told to us why Hyperion scars his men (though he did go on a long diatribe about why they can’t have children).

Speaking of the Gods’ headwear, I’ve seen some weird stuff worn by them in various media interpretations, but this was almost like watching something from the 70s, especially when you throw in the rest of their outfits. What was the costume designer thinking when they came up with these outrageous designs? I would really like to know.

The story is loosely based on some Greek myth. I’m not really sure why they felt the need to change it up and make it “stylish”, though. Not sure about other people, but I would have been perfectly happy with just seeing some good old-fashioned fighting and a few mythological deities and creatures here and there. Sometimes simple is better, y’know? Of course, I may be one of the handful of people who still thinks that these days.

Be warned, those of you that are on the squeamish side, there are some fairly gory scenes here. Not Saw-esque, but not exactly ponies and cupcakes, if you know what I mean. Were these scenes necessary? Well, I think of them as being as necessary as the orgy scenes in the Spartacus TV show. No, they aren’t “necessary”, but they do show the attitude of this period of time.

Henry Cavill, who will be flying your way as Superman soon, makes a pretty good lead debut here as Theseus. No, he isn’t the greatest actor, but he’s better than having Sam Worthington or worse.

Freida Pinto is nothing more than eye candy for most of the picture, especially after she loses her ability to look into the future. Having said that, those scenes when she is still a virgin oracle show that she’s more than a pretty face. We do get to see more than her face ia special scene with Theseus. I’ll leave it at that, but I can guarantee that male viewers will be quite pleased.

 Not to sound misogynistic, but it is good to have a lead actress in a film that isn’t trying to save the world, but rather be the damsel in distress. Every now and then, it is great to see this. Sorry, ladies!

Mickey Rourke is a great villain here as Hyperion. The sheer sophisticated, sadistic cruelty he portrays is surely going to net him more roles like this. My only question is…why couldn’t he have been like this in Iron Man 2?

I’ve got to tip my hat to Luke Evans, who played Zeus. He may resemble Orlando Bloom, bt unlike his character in The Three Musketeers, here he shows that he’s not him and may actually be a better thespian.

If you’re a fan of the God of War series of video games, then mix that with 300 and the original Clash of the Titans and your result is Immortals. Now, does that mean this is a great film? Not necessarily. I see plenty of potential that was not fully tapped, but the end result was still something special. The final battle alone is worth sitting through the entire 110 minutes. What are you waiting for, that crappy Twilight thing that is going to pollute theaters next week? Go watch this visual masterpiece again and again…and again!

4 out of 5 stars