Okay, no, this is not an article about Thor, the highly-anticipated Kenneth Branagh live-action adaptation of the classic Marvel Comics character, but it does feature the "God of Thunder."
Thor at the Bus Stop focuses on Thor's "existential funk" in the face of his own death. The God of Thunder wanders Las Vegas' suburbs getting into adventures while trying to stop the Midgard Serpent from destroying the earth.
The two filmmaking brothers behind the production,
Jerry & Mike Thompson, are graduates of the UNLV film department, and they shot
Thor at the Bus Stop after UNLV Associate Professor
David Schmoeller agreed to pay for it. The "no budget" film was shot for under $10,000. Said Schmoeller:
"No good movie is ever made on a big budget. I noticed that especially when I was working on the lines. Every time I changed a word, it was less good than what they'd written, so I did it exactly according to the script."
The only star to appear in the film is the usually-mute half of the popular comedy-magic act of
Penn & Teller, who describes his character as:
"A mild-mannered, Shakespeare-quoting, philosophic serial euthanasiast -- sort of a cute old Kevorkian."
First screened at the CineVegas film festival,
Thor at the Bus Stop sold out both showings and is now playing at The Palms in Las Vegas.