Review of Immortals (2011) by Jonathan B — 10 Jun 2012

Don't be fooled by the "hit" status Immortals somehow garnered at the box office, it is not a good movie, and this is from someone who has forgotten most of Greek mythology so as not to be grossly offended by how it screws all that up. No, this is from someone who doesn't appreciate a stupid movie with a crappy plot, shoddy characters and lackluster acting. For an action movie it sure is slow, while the story is somehow both dumb downed and unnecessarily convoluted at the same time until yet again I have no vested interest in what is happening onscreen. A the center of this is our "hero" Theseus, who one reviewer called one of the worst action protagonists ever because he fails at everything he does and has little to no consequence on the actual story. You will get no argument on that account from me.

The one thing Immortals was supposed to have going for it were the visuals, the only thing Tarsem Singh has really ever been good at. However, while that clearly is the highlight, I found them often to be as stupid or corny as they were brilliant. I don't know why so many people loved the costume design, either. There were scenes Mickey Rourke literally looked like a giant bunny rabbit, while the rest of the villains mumbled their way through ridiculous masks. Scary, I know, but not in the way I'm sure was intended. The action scenes as a whole failed to impress as well, and the only one I thought was somewhat cool was at the end when the gods squared off against the titans. Didn't matter, though. It was far too little to overcome the other 100 minutes of dull storytelling amidst a CGI wasteland.