With the Thor shoot in full swing, it was only a matter of time before Kenneth Branagh got to talking about the movie as he makes it, and he’s getting the chance to explain his enthusiasm for the comic (he was a fan in his younger days) and put out rumour fires of actorly trouble on the set.
Chatting with the LA Times, Branagh revealed that he’s walking the fine line between the real world and the hero’s godly existence (at least until he gets exiled from Asgard). "Inspired by the comic book world both pictorially and compositionally at once, we've tried to find a way to make a virtue and a celebration of the distinction between the worlds that exist in the film but absolutely make them live in the same world," Branagh tells the paper.
"It's about finding the framing style, the colour palette, finding the texture and the amount of camera movement that helps celebrate and express the differences and the distinctions in those worlds. If it succeeds, it will mark this film as different.... The combination of the primitive and the sophisticated, the ancient and the modern, I think that potentially is the exciting fusion, the exciting tension in the film."
Oh, and despite talk of trouble between Anthony Hopkins and Chris Hemsworth, Branagh is quick to point out how much fun everyone seems to be having. "It's going very, very well.” We're in New Mexico now where we have a contemporary Earth part of our story. I guess we're two-thirds of the way through the story and at this stage of the game what's surprising and delighting me is the way the cast, the ensemble, has fused together. It's kind of an interesting combination of very young and very experienced people and the double up of that, it seems to me, is there is a lot of fire in the movie. It doesn't take itself too seriously, it doesn't try to be too solemn.”
Yes, we’d hate for Thor to be solemn. But while it’s only natural for Branagh to defend his cast and production, there really does seem to be genuine passion here – which makes us that much more intrigued to see something from the movie. Comic Con can’t get here quick enough…