Cinema This Fall

Holiday Movies

It’s Gods vs. Mortals, and It Isn’t Pretty

In one scene, the Gods look down at the Earth from Olympus.

The film, one of a bevy of pictures with the memorable release date 11-11-11, is the latest from Tarsem Singh, the director behind the psychological thriller “The Cell” (2000) and the stylized adventure fantasy “The Fall” (2006).

“Immortals” tells the story of Hyperion (Mickey Rourke), an evil king who wreaks havoc throughout Greece in his search for the Epirus Bow, a weapon that would help him defeat the gods of Olympus and reign over humankind. He is challenged by Theseus (Henry Cavill), a stonemason who leads a small group of warriors in an uprising.

Two of the producers, Mark Canton and Gianni Nunnari, served the same role on “300” (directed by Zack Snyder), the historical action yarn with which “Immortals” is most likely to draw comparisons. While they are certainly hoping to mirror the box-office success of “300” ($456 million worldwide), they sought to give “Immortals” a look distinct from that film by bringing in Mr. Singh.

He has used contemporary style to pay homage to bygone eras before, whether for music videos (R.E.M.) or commercials (Pepsi). This time Mr. Singh channeled the fine arts for “Immortals.”

“Everyone is making comic strips, basically,” Mr. Singh said, referring to the style of many large-budget action films. “I was wondering what it would look like if I took ideas from paintings instead. I thought if I looked at Renaissance paintings, I could use that as the inspiration as opposed to a comic strip.” He pointed to the work of Caravaggio as a particular inspiration. That artist’s use of individuals arranged in tableau inspired some of the battle scenes.

Similarly, with the film’s landscape shots, including an image of the gods looking down from Olympus, Mr. Singh wanted to reinterpret historical artworks and make them the basis for the backgrounds. This led to a look that was more hyper-real than photorealistic. To read more: (Ctrl+C to copy, Ctrl+V to paste)
[Parental Advisory: Film contains lots of violence, gore and blood.]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/movies/heads-are-exploding-in-tarsem-singhs-immortals.html?scp=1&sq=Immortals&st=cse