Thor: It's Hammer Time for Kenneth Branagh

It was the comic book’s intersection with his personal interest in classical literature that compelled the filmmaker to unleash his inner Michael Bay. Branagh worked closely with screenwriters for two years to develop the movie’s fraternal rivalry: Thor (portrayed by chiseled Australian movie newcomer Chris Hemsworth) and his brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston) vie for the affections of their father, Odin (Anthony Hopkins as god-king of the magical realm of Asgard). A power struggle for the throne notwithstanding, Thor’s hotheadedness—specifically, his gusto to bang heads with the Asgardians’ nemeses the “frost giants”—results in the thunder boy’s exile to Earth. Stripped of all magic virility there, he encounters Natalie Portman’s astrophysicist character and the spark of romance ignites.

“It’s an archetypal and mythic ideal: the great walking amongst the common,” Branagh explains. “There’s a coming-of-age story, a prodigal-son story, the journey from arrogance to humility. That classical structure for me means a timeless and invisible connection between the contemporary and the traditional.”

Catching himself in the act of sounding grandiloquent, the director outlines his trepidations about Thor. “How do you have fun with something you want to also take seriously? How not to pander with something too superficial that second-guesses a youthful audience? And how do you do it all without trying to wedge in some secret art film?” Branagh asks.