First UK STID reviews
Now that Star Trek Into Darkness has had its U.K. press screening, more reviews about our boy are starting to trickle in…
“There are moments in Cumberbatch’s hypnotic, placid performance where you’ll question whether Harrison is a villain at all - until he strikes, and you wonder how you ever doubted it. He is genuinely terrifying, quasi-reptilian, combining visceral physical threat with a knack for emotional manipulation that wrong-foots Kirk in much the same way it does us. It’s hard to imagine a starker contrast to Eric Bana’s shouty, ineffectual Nero than Harrison, who’s all level voice and simmering danger.” -Digital Spy
“But the story’s terrific villain, Benedict Cumberbatch in a role which has resonances with one of the better Trek movies of the past, is physically and haematologically a cut above the rest, and is seemingly back from the dead and speaking in a voice that would have got him a gig in the days of Hammer Horror.” -New Zealand Herald [not a U.K. review but just published]
“It’s compulsory for blockbuster villains to be British of course, and Cumberbatch runs with an imperial theatrical haughtiness rather than trying to bury it. His bad guy is distinctly human, if a little two-dimensional, and he succeeds in showing real ice running through his veins and bringing some weight to a cast that generally offers more geniality than gravitas.” -Time Out
“Benedict Cumberbatch has complained he gets typecast as a posh boy and said he wants to lose that image. Well, by going boldly into blockbuster baddie territory the man previously best-known as Sherlock has achieved that overnight…It is a performance which could put him in the iconic Brit evil mastermind club, along with Terence Stamp and Alan Rickman. Much of the success of the film is down to the fact you are not quite sure of Harrison’s true motives until two thirds of the way through.” -The Sun
“Finally, Benedict Cumberbatch’s villain is an inspired piece of casting. Cumberbatch’s ‘Morgan Freeman level’ iconic voice has a frequency and purpose in his delivery that will have you hanging on every syllable.” -Blake Howard
“And then there are the trump cards. There’s a strong argument that Star Trek Into Darkness doesn’t quite manage to scale the same heights as its predecessor, but it does have one thing that film hasn’t got: a strong villain. Eric Bana’s Nero was curtailed by limited screen time, as the 2009 Trek busied itself with setting lots of things up. But there’s a lot more space for Benedict Cumberbatch’s John Harrison to establish himself, and he’s wonderfully magnetic to watch.” -Den of Geek
“Cumberbatch is the vivid, and immensely physical, villain the universe needed and there’s no competition on the acting stakes…Great action, a compelling story and a spectacular performance from Benedict Cumberbatch make this one of the highlights of the summer movie season.” - Daniel Anderson
The storm of reviews & spoilers is here and we Finns still have a few weeks to go until we can see the movie. But how can I not read & reblog these? Wow. Go Benny!
