Tomb Raider

Directed by Roar Uthaug

Starring – Alicia Vikander, Walton Goggins, Dominic West

The Plot – Lara Croft (Vikander) is the fiercely independent daughter of an eccentric adventurer who vanished when she was scarcely a teen. Now a young woman of 21 without any real focus or purpose, Lara navigates the chaotic streets of trendy East London as a bike courier, barely making the rent, and takes college courses, rarely making it to class. Determined to forge her own path, she refuses to take the reins of her father’s (West) global empire just as staunchly as she rejects the idea that he’s truly gone. Advised to face the facts and move forward after seven years without him, even Lara can’t understand what drives her to finally solve the puzzle of his mysterious death. Going explicitly against his final wishes, she leaves everything she knows behind in search of her dad’s last-known destination: a fabled tomb on a mythical island that might be somewhere off the coast of Japan. But her mission will not be an easy one; just reaching the island will be extremely treacherous. Suddenly, the stakes couldn’t be higher for Lara, who–against the odds and armed with only her sharp mind, blind faith and inherently stubborn spirit–must learn to push herself beyond her limits as she journeys into the unknown. If she survives this perilous adventure, it could be the making of her, earning her the name tomb raider.

Rated PG-13 for sequences of violence and action, and for some adult language

THE POSITIVES

– This is definitely a Lara Croft for the post Time’s Up society. Instead of her physical attributes getting her over, Vikander’s Croft uses her cunning intellect and overall ability to think on her feet in order to get five moves ahead on her enemies. Vikander’s vulnerability is also something to admire, never depicting Lara as a superhero or surreal entity by any means. Overall, it illustrates a female presence that many females young and old can feel inspired by.

– As to where the inspiration to be a Tomb Raider was slightly cryptic in the original movies, screenwriters Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Alastair Siddons carve out a spiritual side to Lara’s undertaking of this newfound hobby. This tomb and all of its mysteries is the last link to her disappearing father, so in seeking it out, she sees this as the final goodbye that she sadly never received.

– Of course with this being a video game movie, there are sporadic Easter eggs from the games that occasionally pop up. It’s even more of a benefit that this is used with patience and doesn’t deem it necessary to overcrowd the movie with cheap fan service.

– Fine camera work and sequencing with the chase and action sequences that throttle the audience and get close without being plagued by motion sickness.

– It’s odd to me that the first half of the film was the time that I felt the most immersed in this story, and not so much the actual tomb parts of the film. I believe this is because I enjoyed the up-close-and-personal backstory to Croft’s intimidating family history that she instead chooses to pave her own path, as well as my own theories for what happened towards the end of the film. More on that later.

THE NEGATIVES

– A majority of the C.G stunt-work in this film is very hollow and lacks the kind of weight of impact necessary for making Croft’s risks feel dangerous. Much of it can be blamed on her off-color shadow scheme that the graphics work supplant her with, but I blame it on the green-screen movements of the live actress feeling artificial because she isn’t in the moment and living out those situations.

– It pains me greatly that Walton Goggins is wasted away in this film as just another bad guy. This is one of the best TV villains of the past decade, so the screenwriters reserved stance in letting Goggins move through the motions of the outline that hundreds have done before him is downright shameful. You have a great actor here, people, USE HIM.

– There’s a second act plot twist that completely didn’t work for me in believability because of how underwhelming it was played emotionally. This is perhaps the single most important scene in the movie, and the actors involved treat it the same way as any other. With intent and commitment, this could’ve been the emotional center that Tomb Raider needed in cementing it as the best video game adaptation of all time.

– I mentioned earlier that the third act has many problems in this film, and I really don’t know where to start. For a movie called TOMB RAIDER, the decision to hold off on this setting until the final 35 minutes is one that comes with grave consequences mostly for video game enthusiasts just waiting to see the big budget set pieces at work. What they get is a series of rushed sequences and puzzle pieces that never take their time in amplifying the tension to keep you glued. Beyond this, the rules of the tomb’s airborne plague is one that comes with a few holes in continuity in the way things play out.

– The visual storytelling in narration exposition feels so forced that it occasionally made me cringe. Exposition is fine when used in wise doses, but the overabundance in this film made me feel like we didn’t even need the events playing out in real time if sloppy flashbacks were going to tell us everything that we need to know. People might not view it this way, but to me this is completely disrespectful on audience intelligence by thinking that they can’t put these unfolding pieces together on our own for something that (Frankly) isn’t that difficult to grasp.

5/10

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