SDCC 2011: IMMORTALS Panel and Footage Impressions
I’ve been looking forward to seeing director Tarsem Singh’s great looking film Immortals. To be honest, going into the panel I wasn’t really that all excited because I felt I’ve seen enough of the film to already get me into the movie theater to see the movie... I was wrong, I hadn’t seen enough. There is so much more beautiful badassery to be seen in this movie and I got a taste of it at Comic-Con, and it was glorious! The movie is much darker and more hardcore than what we’ve been led to believe in the trailers that we’ve seen.
Singh came out and introduced some of the cast of the film including Henry Cavill and Luke Evans, and then showed us a Comic-Con exclusive trailer, and it sure looked bloody amazing! The trailer has the same bits and pieces from the previous trailers that have been released, only this time around they added a bunch of blood splattering hardcore violence. There’s no doubt in my mind that the film is going to have a beautiful setting, and be extraordinarily epic! The scale is breathtaking, the movie is being compared to 300, and it’s being brought to us from the producers of 300, but the movie looks like it’s going to be way better than 300.
They are taking a new approach on the God character and making all of the look younger than they’ve been portrayed in films in the past. I guess if you think about, if you were a God, why would you want to be an old guy with white hair and beard for eternity? I know that if I was a God I would want to look good, if I had the power to do it why the hell wouldn’t I? It only makes sense that they would be young, so I’m sold on the concept.
Before taking questions they showed the audience one hell of an incredible action-packed sequence from the the film. It included five godlike warriors including Luke Evans as Zeus, coming down from the world of the gods in golden god armor, to do battle with a small army of demon like men. I’m not sure exactly what was going on in this part of the story, but the scene had a lot of adrenaline filling the screen, enough where it transfered over to me and gave me the goosebumps. It did a great job of getting me pumped up for the film. it was extremely brutal and bloody. The Fighting precision and Choreography is awesome! There is stuff in this clip that I’ve never really seen in another movie before. There’s no doubt that the film is going to extremely unique, but I expect nothing less from Singh. There is an interestingly cool technique where there are two people fighting each other but they are moving in different speeds at the same time. One person will be moving fast one will be moving at normal speed. I know we’ve seen this technique below, but not like this. When you see it you’ll know what I’m saying.
The film looks like an amazingly action-packed film, and after sitting in this panel and seeing what I’ve seen, I’m exited as hell to see it.
Here’s a fun sidenote... apparently the producers of the film were intimated by him Mickey Rourke on the set of the film. To get Rourke on set ever morning someone would have to go get him, and they would ask each other to do until they finally decided they would go together to approach Rourke. They just had to make sure he was on set on time. I just thought that was funny that neither one of them wanted to do it, so they dared each other to.
More detials on the film:
Eons after the Gods won their mythic struggle against the Titans, a new evil threatens the land. Mad with power, King Hyperion (Mickey Rourke) has declared war against humanity. Amassing a bloodthirsty army of soldiers disfigured by his own hand, Hyperion has scorched Greece in search of the legendary Epirus Bow, a weapon of unimaginable power forged in the heavens by Ares.
Secretly chosen by Zeus, Theseus must save his people from Hyperion and his hordes. Rallying a band of fellow outsiders–including visionary priestess Phaedra (Freida Pinto) and cunning slave Stavros (Stephen Dorff) — one hero will lead the uprising, or watch his homeland fall into ruin and his Gods vanish into legend.
Immortals is set to hit theaters on November 11th in 3D.