THOR - just what the audience needed

When I nervously waited for the end credits of the movie "Iron Man 2" to finish, I don't even have a clue of what they are going to show on the screen(as a spoiler for the future MARVEL movies). Even after they showed a desert and a hammer and some plain-clothed policemen(!), I didn't understand what's all this about.

Then I googled "hammer" and "marvel" and found that the hammer is in fact the power source or something of that sort of Thor, the God of Thunder. To hell with it, was my instant reaction as I never heard of him.

But what unfolded on the big 3D screen in front of me last week, blew a few things out of my brain. This guy(character) Thor earned himself a place next to Spiderman, Ironman and Superman in my all-time favorite list of superheroes.

Thor is a simple movie, enough for a movie buff like me to be amused. Thor and Loki are the sons of the Odin, the king of Asgard(a far-away Galaxy, for me it felt like heaven after watching on screen). Odin defeats the Frost Giants long long back and brings with him the power source of the Frost Giants, the Casket of Ancient Winters. Now, both the sons grow up and Thor is supposed to be crowned the king of Asgard when the Frost Giants sneak into the palace for the power source. An enraged Thor wants to finish off the Frost Giant race and travels to Jotunheim(the world of Frost Giants) along with a few friends, against his father's instructions.

Odin gets to know about this and brings the bunch of Asgardian warriors back to their world and banishes Thor to earth after stripping off his Godly powers. Thor's hammer, Mjolnir(courtesy Wikipedia), is also sent to Earth, but protected with a spell that allows only a worthy person to wield it.

Thor is crash-lands in Mexico where he is hit by the vehicle of a scientist, Jane Foster, who is studying the mysterious lightning patterns in the sky. The story moves on how Thor gets mingled with the earthly humans, while back in Asgard, Odin falls ill and a tale of double-cross takes place.

The rest of the story is about how Thor finds love, responsibilities and brings back peace to the world.

The plot is well supported by all the actors. Chris Hemsworth(this is the first movie I saw of this hunk), was awesome. The way he showed various emotions was worth lot of applause - be it when he says "Can I come back home?" to Loki when the latter visits him in jail or how he flashes the mischievous grin while trying to retrieve his hammer from S.H.E.I.L.D. Tom Hiddleston as Loki was absolutely fantastic. Natalie Portman and Anthony Hopkins lived up-to the expectations.

To be frank, it is the way Asgard is shown that draws immediate attention of an casual movie-goer. After AVATAR, I loved this alternate world. The visual effects were awesome and will enough to make the audience believe in the existence of such world.

There might be minor drawbacks here and there, like it would have been much nicer if Thor gets to show off a few of his elite skills on Earth(before Jane), but the movie, as a whole is an enjoyable one and is a decent family flick. My rating for this latest flick from Marvel stable will be 3.75 out of 5.

A thriller

Well well well, if you are a cricket buff and if you missed last night's World Cup match between India and England, you missed something really spectacular. So far, most of the matches in the tourney are one-sided (almost every match was predictable) and people were losing interest in the complete event itself. Even I was satisfied with seeing the live scores on the Internet rather than watching the match on TV. I read somewhere that ICC gave a press release saying something like "this tourney is an acid test for the One Day International (ODI) cricket". And then, yesterday happened. This match provided the necessary kick to the tournament and to ODI format.

For those of you who missed the match, let me tell you what exactly happened. India scored a mammoth total of 338 thanks to the masterful century by the Little Master, Sachin Tendulkar, himself. The innings of the master was masterful because of the way he paced his innings. When Sehwag was around, he just played on without much authority. Once Sehwag was out and Gambhir was settled, the master unleashed a fierce attack on the English bowlers. Greame Swann, considered as the best among the current spinners on the world, was hit for two successive sixers.

Indians would've scored more if it was not for the mad tumble of 5 wickets in the last couple of overs. However, 338 on Indian tracks is considered to be a tough score to chase and thanks to the recent form of English batsmen in ODI, everyone thought that this will be a cakewalk for the Indian bowlers. But the English captain had some other thoughts.

Strauss and Pietersen started things off very well in a classy way, fetching easy runs off the harmless Indian bowling. It needed a special bit of fielding from Munaf Patel to break this partnership. Then one more wicket fell and things looked OK for a few minutes. Then the pair of Strauss and Bell played calmly and the tide shifted slowly but gradually towards the English side. Strauss deserved an huge applause for his first century in World Cup and his career best score of 158.

With just a few runs to score that too with 8 wickets in hand, the English win seemed inevitable. Then Zaheer struck with two wickets in two balls to change the course of events and now the scales pointed towards India. Even though few more wickets fell and the bowling and fielding departments of India increased their momentum, the lower-order batsmen of England held their nerve and hit a few lusty blows in the end. After two sixes in the penultimate over and one more in the last over, the English team were left to score with 5 runs in 3 balls. A bye came in the first ball and couple in the second.

The match got tied after the batsmen had to settle for a single off the final ball.

After all, it was ODI cricket which won the last night's encounter. An epic match to bring the focus back on ODIs. I hope we get to see many more thrillers like this in the tourney.

Beowulf

Saw this movie a couple of nights back. Thought that this is some of those "He-Man" kinda movie but was terribly mistaken. The graphics were awesome and this one is worth a watch. Anyways, there's a dialog which the king tells to one of his followers:

"The Gods cannot do anything to us which we cannot do to ourselves".

How true?

Hunting Party

Saw this movie last night. This dialogue reminded me of some interview, with a war journalist, which I read long back.
A cameraman of a journalist reporting war says this about his work: "Being this close to death and being this alive, is completely addictive".
After hearing this, I wanted to become a war journo

Rambo

I heard this dialogue yesterday but forgot about the movie that contained this one as I saw some 4 or 5 movies in the last 2 days. As far as I can remember this is from Rambo 4. Enough of crap…. The dialogue goes like this:
Live for nothing, but die for something.

Halla Bol

Saw this one last weekend. The movie is ok but there was a dialogue in this which I liked very much. It goes something like this: "Even an animal cries when it gets hurt but it is only humans who can feel for others pains too". Is this true? I was seeing many contradictions now for this these days. But the dialogue was good overall.

Eragon

Saw this movie a couple nights back. I didn't like the movie but I liked the following line from the movie
which Saffira says to Eragon: "It's good to be brave but sometimes, it pays to be wise".

Rocky

As you know, most of the movies are a bit boring these days. So I started watching some old movies which I missed. This weekend, I saw Rocky I and II starring Sylvester Stallone. The movies are ok even in today’s scenario. But there were some dialogues in the second part which I liked too much. In one scene, Rocky’s wife asks him just after their marriage: “I hope… I hope you’ll never get tired of me”. Then Rocky answers in a convincing tone: “Oh no, you’ll never get rid of me”. You have to see the scene to believe the romantic moments. That is why they say “Old is Gold”.

Dhoka

Last evening, I saw this movie on Sahara One. It was a slow movie but not so bad. But there was a dialogue in the movie which mesmerized me. Anupam Kher tells the following to the protagonist(some new guy): "Aadmi woh nahin hote jo dikta hain. Aadmi woh hote hain jo woh chupata hain. You are what you hide". How true!!!!