Lara Croft: Tomb Raider
Directed by Simon West.
Starring Angelina Jolie, Iain Glen, Daniel Craig, Noah Taylor, Chris Barrie &
Jon Voight.
Action! Excitement! Over-the-top fun and hilarity! These are largely absent from Tomb Raider, a disappointingly uninspired adaptation of the renowned computer adventure game. The story looks as though it’s straight out of the game so it’s as interesting as watching someone else play for 100 minutes. Some ancient secretive group wants to collect the ancient key of something-or-other, hidden in various exotic locations around the world. Stop me if any of this sounds familiar. Lara Croft, everyone’s favourite pin-up sprite, exudes cool smugness while she explores ancient monuments and fills them full of hot lead. And you thought archaeology wasn’t an exact science. There’s an attempt to add substance with some laboured poignancy about her relationship with her father. Jolie, pouting as though her life depends on it (her career certainly does), is effective as a supporting act for her two greatest attributes which, to paraphrase Peter Cook and Dudley Moore, seem to follow you around the room where-ever you look.
I went into this film expecting eye-candy and simple brain-stem pleasures. There’s a fight-scene on bungee-ropes which is kind of fun but otherwise its unimaginative stuff like jumping from one swinging beam to the next and avoiding animated stone statues. Have the writers not seen any action films in the last 20 years? The direction was remarkably unexciting, surprising from Simon West whose previous work includes the inane but entertaining Con Air. To enjoy over-the-top action, go for the old favourites like Indiana Jones, Jackie Chan, James Bond or even Xena. Tomb Raider is not a total waste of time but it is a disappointment. I give it 2 out of 5 power-ups.
Guy
