"A tight, fast, well-made
B picture that delivered
exactly what it promised.
I liked it much."
David Edelstein New York Magazine
Tomb Raider
A new Tomb Raider adventure film starring Alicia Vikander in a series launched by Angelina Jolie in the title role more than 15 years ago. Vikander reprises the Lara Croft character in a prequel as a younger English artistocratic Lady who has the skills and ingenuity to put MI6 to shame and with a strong inclination for archeology. Dubbed the female Indiana Jones by reviewers, the new movie also stars Dominic West in an adventure that finds our heroine searching for her long lost father, an eccentric and wealthy archeologist.
TOMB RAIDER FILM REVIEW
Do we tell you your level of appreciation for Tomb Raider with Alicia Vikander very much depends on whether you are a video game player of the title from Eidos Interactive? Or perhaps you were a big fan of Angelina Jolie and just were so upset the studio cancelled the sequel after Tomb Raider Cradle of Life was panned by critics but received a much better overall review than the original?
We can’t give you three different reviews from three film reviewers because our editor wouldn’t allow it and truth is I had a few exchanges with film critics and it was very much a case of which isle you are sitting in. The casual viewer who has never had any brushes with Tomb Raider but is an action movie lover? Or the preceding cases of hardcore video player versus a stickler for the Jolie interpretation?
Warner Brothers Studios and Eidos are hoping to usher all five varieties of moviegoers into the theater including those who are fans of Alicia Vikander from Jason Bourne and Tulip Fever as well as those who don’t usually go for this kind of action film but are intrigued by the possibility of a young actress playing Lost and Survivor on The Island with a skew towards Spielberg’s and Lucas’ Indiana Jones franchise.
"Alicia Vikander worked herself into hardbody
shape for Tomb Raider,
which by contrast is a
flabby, lazy mess."
Brian Truitt USA Today
To their credit, the filmmakers with Norwegian director Roar Uthaug and his Swedish ingenue (Vikander is an Oscar-clutching pro) work their way through row after row of thugs from the Hong Kong’s docks to the Sea of Japan’s Devil Island where henchmen under the leadership of their pragmatic, fortune seeking evildoer Voguel (Walter Goggins) seek to bring into the modern world Japan’s oldest and first dynasty Queen, Hikimo, who is rumored to be the Goddess of Death (faint ehoes of Hela of Thor Ragnarok) and could burn the world should some unfortunate souls try to disturb her eternal sleep.
If you are remotely aware of the highly popular Arrow TV series (one of the marginal characters from DC Comics – The Emerald Archer aka Green Arrow– basically Batman/Bruce Wayne with super archery and survival skills – which has been on the circuit for almost seven years – oddly enough the same number of years that Lara’s dad went missing, you will note significant similarities in the story and adventure of billionaire Oliver Queen stranded on the island with some really nasty guys and forced to learn the survival skills that shape him into the superhero crime fighter of Starling City and a member of the Justice League. Although Arrow’s per episode budget is smaller and the CGI is lesser quality on some staged scenes on the island, the continuing thread of the island travails via lengthy flashbacks spanning the entire series provides viewers and lovers of such Robinson Crusoe survival and sink or swim scenarios with far more involved and satisfying storylines than a two-hour film ever could.
Working in Lara Croft’s favor is the previously mentioned much larger budget for a two-hour adventure and it shows up on the big screen from location shoots and sets to CGI and acting chops. Vikander is very good at portraying the prequel to Jolie’s version of Lara. She is more human, more fragile yet absolutely relentless and less Supergirl invincible Sharon Stone of the Quick and Dead. Credits go to the actress, director and script writers for delivering this aspect of Tomb Raider to audiences.
If you are action movie fan and video game addict, this production certainly will tease and please your fancy and that’s a great deal to say about a cinematic adventure in the later part of the second decade post New Millenium.
However if you love these video games style action movies because they are a modern reincarnation of faded and jaded Sherlock Holmes novels and you relish the style of suspense and thrills that made National Treasure and the Da Vinci Code huge box office hits, then you will likely be going home thinking something is remiss in this picture but cant quite put your finger on it just then and in the theater.
The answers might disappoint you as you replay key scenes in your mind and realize the storyline and plot structure are as flimsy as the decrepit hull our heroine wades through before plummeting hundreds of feet down from the high plateau where she sought refuge.
Telling you several major plot holes details right here and now would be terribly unfashionable and definitely in bad form, dear fellow, and so un-English like. Doing so would reveal major plot spoilers and although you are entitled to the full Monty, we advise you to proceed at your own risk. However, you may first want to go to the movies and catch a viewing before coming back and reading the entire reveal.
We will however point out right now one minor issue we noted in Tomb Raider and will go in full depth with all other five additional problems with this movie after your register and login as a member.
For starters, one of the more irritating elements of Tomb Raider, and interestingly enough, Lara Croft Tomb Raider (2001) and Tomb Raider Craddle of Life (2003) is the amount technology and hardware that is dug up, unearthed by the adventuring archeologist turned gold medalist gymnast detective and master of firearms and weapons. Let me rephrase, it is not the AMOUNT but the quality of technology and booby traps that Lara stumbles upon that was designed and built hundreds upon hundreds of years ago, sometimes thousands of years and yet is in perfectly working “mint” condition even if it was buried under a ton of sand and dirt. Levers, hydraulic systems, gates, mechanical contraptions that would become inoperable in a decade’s time are running perfectly fine and awaiting our unlucky adventurers to welcome them at their final destination.
"A film so rife with plot holes that it would make a decent pasta strainer." Johnny Oleksinki New York Post
In Tomb Raider the gate is similar to a giant safe with tumblers, and although it was built ages ago for Japan’s first ever Queen Himiko, the quality and grade of the metal work and structure looked more like late 19th Century and Turn of the 20th Century Industrial Age era workmanship, the kind made very, very indelible by the movie and TV series Wild Wild West. Despite decades of expertise in filmmaking and CGI, when it comes to depicting Antiquity era tombs and traps, Hollywood set designers are trapped by the look and feel of Jules Verne, Captain Nimo and Wild Wild West set designs which are completely anachronistic with the storyline and the era of the tomb in Tomb Raider. The same contention can be raised for its earlier efforts.
Making matters more amusing are the metaphors from modern era England that are apparently built into the cypher used to decode and deactivate some of the death traps that await those foolish enough to venture into the tomb. Apparently, the Royal Japanese court from a few thousand years were into the modern-day color schemes and their associated meanings with cryptic poems that allows Lara to decipher on her toes and literally in seconds the correct sequences to spare herself a premature Japanese style execution in the bowels of the mountain.
But this oversight is the least of offenses sparing our readers the big spoilers we warned you against. So make up your mind, you can go see the movie and come back to read about all the interesting gaps you may not at first grasp due to the pacing and editing of the film or you may throw caution to the wind and read the whole damn review right now.
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