Thor

That's MY fuckin' hammer...

How do I put this eloquently? My dick just grew sideburns in the shape of lightning bolts. Such was the raw power of Thor.
The film is based on the Marvel comics “The Mighty Thor” (obviously also pulling heavily from Norse mythology) and, as such, is unfortunately tarred with the same brush as other masterful pieces of shit as Hulk, that other Hulk with Edward Norton, any of the X-Men movies after the first, but mostly the Hulk movies. I really can’t stress that enough. Those movies were utter piss.

But I digress.

This movie is awesome. It’s like a potent injection of undiluted chest-hair-machismo right into the dick. This is probably one of the only movies that meets my beard quota of no less than 12 beards per scene.

Going into this I knew what to expect. I had no delusions that I was going to see some kind of Kubrick/Coppola cinema art here, but to be honest it surpassed my expectations. Not by much, mind you, but there isn’t a metering system on that particular phrase. My major concern was Chris Hemsworth, but I was pleasantly surprised to find him both amusing and believable (as far as one can believe that a 6’3” Australian ex-soap star with like 4 six packs on his biceps is a mythological God from another plane of existence that just happens to speak English with perfect diction), even when sharing the screen with the one and only Anthony Hopkins.

Now there is a man whose very birthright it was to portray Odin, King of Gods, on film. I have always envisioned Anthony Hopkins as a bearded Adonis wearing a bearskin toga; skin lightly bronzed from the sun and body chiselled like a Greek statue, easily hurling full grown sharks at despondent orphans ‘for funsies’. Then he washes down the taste of victory with an assortment of fine ales administered - from the carved horn of a dragon - by beautiful and scantily clad maidens who all look like Bruce Campbell with long hair.

So the movie...

There was, as much discussed over post-show drinks, far too much “space bullshit” thrown into the mix. I get that Asgard needed to be impressive, but the royal palace looked like nothing so much as the set from the Fifth Element with more braziers and less Bruce Willis. There is also the feeling that it has been a little ‘family friendly-fied’ by the publisher so pull in wider audiences. And this wouldn’t be all that bad if it wasn’t for Thor saying that the Asgardians came to earth on a bridge made of fucking rainbows. Rainbows. Norse Gods walk on bifrost, titanium and other cool sounding elements ending in ‘anium’. They most certainly do not walk on sunshine, no matter what the song may say.

There are some very clever clash-of-culture type parts when Thor is banished to New Mexico, as well as a few cameos (one from Stan Lee, as always) and references to other Marvel universe characters such as Tony Stark and Bruce Banner. It has action, drama, comedy and – to please the less Alpha of its viewers – a hint of romance. It’s clearly not going to win any awards however. It was spectacular, and dripping with manliness, but at the end of the day it’s a superhero film, and they just aren’t that brilliant. Good fun, no thinking.

I wouldn’t really recommend bringing the lady friends along to this one. It’s not that they wouldn’t like it (which they probably won’t), but mostly that they don’t shut up in the cinema. And besides, with the awesome testosterone that this movie is synthesized from she’d probably grow a pair on balls or two before the movie was out.

So basically, if you want to see a bearded man smashing shit with a hammer and massive robots shooting fire out of their eyes then this might be a movie for you.

Aladdin

Achtung, kiddies!

If you can say one thing about Disney it is that they are either mad trolling or flat out racists. Either way they have some serious balls to do what they do. And it’s no different with 1992’s Aladdin, which seemed so innocent in my youth, but I now realise is rife with subtle (and some not so subtle) racism. Hilarious.

Anyway, I sat down to watch this children’s classic with a little device I call my Racist-o-meter (which comes in totally handy at dinner parties with them coloured folk) which is set to play Johnny Cash’s ‘Ship Those Niggers Back’ ironically whenever it detects something racist (which, I’ll admit, was a programming error on my part. Damn thing loops endlessly). From the beginning of the film we get 23.4 seconds before my alarm went off. 23.4 seconds. They couldn’t even hold out until after the opening credits. Well done Disney, a new personal best no doubt. Truly appalling. I could have done it in under 10.

Have you ever listened to those lyrics? “Where they cut off your ear if they don’t like your face. It’s barbaric but hey, it’s home.” Admittedly I was watching the original version, but still, no prizes for compassion are being handed out at Disney headquarters.  I really do like that “but hey,” in there. I just don’t imagine anyone ever using the expression that casually after talking about a place where they fucking maim you because you’re some ugly munt with horse-mouth, Sarah Jessica Parker. I don’t imagine the former people of Pripyat going, “I mean, sure it’s radioactive, but hey, it’s home.”

Moving on.

Watching this again, a realisation has sprung on me. Everyone who we see as a hero in the story has minimal racially identifying features and a totally American accent. Amazingly everyone else, villain, merchant, camels, palm trees, etc has a mono-brow, a beard and an accent that, itself, borders on offensive. Jafar’s accent is a complete fucking mash or bad British and worse Arabic and, most alarmingly, NOT TIM CURRY. And don’t even get me started on Iago. The way they portray Jews as whinging, negative and thrifty people is disgraceful. What the fuck is wrong with Gilbert Gottfried anyhow? Is he an asian-jew hybrid, or is it just always really fucking sunny where he is. He’s got the mad squints on. The cunt. Anyway, Thumbs up Disney, just remarkable work there guys. 

Another thing I picked up on, and this could just be my male (superior) brain kicking in, but did anyone else find there to be slight sexual undertones with the giant tiger’s head who’s open, inviting mouth is a stairway to ‘The Cave of Wonders’? Really? It had to be a giant cat. I’m half surprised there wasn’t a cascading waterfall inside. Mostly it was just empty promises and weird stuff. At least they got that part right, eh fellas? Cha-ching... Vaginas are gross.

I also love the way this movie gives women such strong female characters as Jasmine and... well... I think the rug might be a girl too, maybe? None the less, Disney made sure to show how strong a woman can be by continually having Jasmine storm off in a hissy fit. Very empowering.

I should get the story here at some point. Jafar makes Aladdin enter the Giant innuendo in search for a magic lamp which he accidently ends up rubbing, because maybe he thought rubbing random artefacts was a good idea, and he is quite surprised to find a genie inside. The usual 3 wishes rule applies here and, yadda yadda yadda, you know the drill. He pretends to be a prince to get in on some of that fine ass, but upon learning that he must become the Sultan should the current Sultan fall ill he quickly picks up and gets the fuck out of there, because really, who wants responsibilities. Even though the Sultans job seems to be entirely made up of playing with toy animals and generally acting retarded.

Aladdin changes his mind and takes Jasmine on a magic carpet ride and seems to assume that children would be ignorant of the changes in temperature and air pressure 3000 feet in the air.

So they do a lot of other stuff and it all works out for them and they get married. Then they fly off into the night sky on a romantic carpet ride AND ARE EATEN BY A GIANT MOON FACE. The end.

The lesson here kids, if you want to bone some hot slapper, just lie and pretend you’re rich.

Just to get the education board off my our back, let’s have a look at what kids can take away from this experience.

Themes covered in this movie:

·         Slavery

·         Lying

·         Capital Punishment

·         Identity Theft

·         Racial Profiling

·         The incompetence of the Middle East’s system of government

·         A woman’s right to shut the hell up as the men around her make the decisions for her

Themes not covered in this movie:

·         Equality

·         What the hell the SPF on sun-block stands for

·         How friendly and fair a place the Middle East is

·         Sensible Foot-wear

·         Great tourist destinations in Saudi Arabia

One theme best left unexplored is Jafar’s request to marry the 15 year old princess, despite clearly being like forty something himself. That and Jafar abusing his super powers by making puns at people, like some kind of magical paedophile.

I don’t think Disney means any harm from their somewhat stereotypical depictions. They are kind of like your good intentioned grandmother pointing out how ‘well-spoken’ Will Smith is. She means well. She just dates from a different time. Even though this movie was made in the 90’s.

Clearly it’s a generational thing.