Released: March 2018
Director: Roar Uthuag
Rated PG-13
Run Time: 118 Minutes
Distributor: Warner Bros.
Genre: Action/Adventure
Cast:
Alicia Vikander: Lara Croft
Dominic West: Richard Croft
Walton Goggins: Mathias Vogel
Daniel Wu: Lu Ren
Kristin Scott Thomas: Ana Miller
Derek Jacobi: Mr. Yaffe
Whenever I review a movie based on a video game, I always bring up the fact that historically speaking, movies based on video games generally aren’t very good. Aside from maybe a small handful of films, most video game movies are crap. There are a number of reasons for this. First of all, you’re trying to adapt a game that may have up to several dozen hours of play time, and try to condense all that into a two-hour run-time. Obviously you can’t have a 17 hour movie as nobody in their right mind would sit through that. Unfortunately, you lose a lot in the translation and may end up skipping over some very important story bits Secondly, you have film-makers who don’t understand the source material. All you have to do is look at what Uwe Boll has produced over the past 20 years. Most of his video game-based films have a distinctly cheap and flat-looking appearance to them with horrendous effects and performances. Thirdly, the film-makers are blindly trying to market these movies towards fans of a particular game, and that doesn’t work because the fans would rather play the game. Why would you want to turn an interactive experience into a non-interactive one? You would need to try and appeal to audience members who aren’t necessarily gamers. There have been a small handful of titles that aren’t awful. They’re not great films by any stretch of the imagination, but they are passable and enjoyable. Mortal Kombat, Prince of Persia, and one or two of the Resident Evil films. Now, we have another movie based on a video game: Tomb Raider.
Based on the 2013 video game reboot of Tomb Raider, the film follows Lara Craft as she tries to make a living by being a courier. After running afoul of the police, she’s given the opportunity to sign the document declaring her father dead, so she can inherit her family’s fortune. After solving a mysterious puzzle box handed to her by the man who is signing her inheritance over to her. The notes inside indicate that her father may have been leading a double-life and disappeared 7 years prior. Searching her family’s estate, she discovers that her father was on a search for the mysterious island of Yamatai, some distance off the shores of Japan. He had been searching for a mysterious Japanese queen who may or may not have had supernatural abilities. Wanting to find out what happened, she charters a boat to take her to this island, where she runs afoul of a man, Mathias Vogel, as he is also searching for this particular tomb. The 2013 reboot of the Tomb Raider video game series is among my favorite games of all time. It was gritty, brutal and spectacular. This new film draws its inspiration directly from the 2013 game, so it skips the previous films starring Angelina Jolie. Aside from certain necessary changes, the story here is fairly faithful to the source material. It wasn’t a bad story to begin with, but seeing it come to life in this new film was surprisingly interesting and oddly enough, it works…..mostly.
I have to say, they really nailed down the look of the film. A lot of details from the game actually translated pretty well to the big screen. Lara looks like they plucked her straight from the game. Her outfit is exactly the same as it is in the digital world. I was unsure if Alicia Vikander would be good as Lara. As it turns out, she is. She does a number of her own stunts and action sequences and she’s actually really, really good. The environments and sets are mostly practical and look very good. The cinematography is absolutely stunning. It’s also beautifully gritty, much like the game. Lara gets thrown around and beat up and it looks like it hurts. Just like the game, the movie counter-part takes a beating, but she always gets back on her feet. There are a lot of elements that they lifted right out of the game. When Lara escapes Vogel, she gets trapped in an old plane, where she falls out of the cockpit with a parachute. That’s literally right out of the game, and it’s a lot of fun to watch. That’s one of several moments that come straight out of the game, but it’s done in a way that makes it feel real. There is a real sense of danger here, and it’s all because of the director, Roar Uthuag, who really wanted to bring Lara Croft to the screen properly.
The acting in this film is actually really, really good. That’s not something I would expect from a movie like this. This is Alicia Vikander’s film, first and foremost and she nails in a way that Angelina never could. Like the 2013 game, this film’s Lara Croft is not over-sexualized, but feels more like a real person thrust into a very extraordinary situation. Walton Goggins plays the film’s villain, Mathias Vogel. I have to say, I really like Mr. Goggins as an actor. He’s got a range that I rarely see from an actor these days. He’s really good at playing both good guys and bad guys, and it’s no exception here. While his character is certainly ruthless, he does have a personal reason for wanting to get off the island, but he’s willing to kill people to do so. Dominic West plays Lara’s father, Richard. This is one of those changes from the video games that I really like. In the games, Richard dies when Lara is a young girl, but in this new film, not only is he still alive, but he plays a crucial part in Lara’s development as a character. The relationship between the two characters is surprisingly touching and well-written. Even Daniel Wu’s Lu Ren gets his moment to shine.
The film not only tries to replicate the 2013 game, but it also borrows elements from the game’s follow-up Rise of the Tomb Raider. For example, the movie has Lara and Richard racing against time against an ancient violent cult known as Trinity which is searching for supernatural objects to try and control the future of humanity. The character of Ana Miller is taken directly from Rise of the Tomb Raider as well. Normally, that would give me cause for concern, but in the overall film, it doesn’t detract from the overall experience. All that being said, the film is not without its flaws. For one, we don’t really see much of Lara’s past and how she comes to be where she is and why she’s there. While the character definitely has a personal reason for traveling to Yamatai, it’s strictly for finding out what happened to her father and not really for archaeological purposes. There’s also some very questionable physics involved here, but this is a movie based on a video game, so I tend to be a little more forgiving in that regard.
Tomb Raider is one of the first games to feature a female protagonist, and to finally see her properly brought to the big screen is truly phenomenal. Some might consider her the female Indiana Jones, but I don’t see that as a bad thing, as the games have clearly drawn their inspiration from Steven Spielberg’s films as well as other adventure films. I really do like the fact that we have a strong female character that can be very empowering to women and young girls as well as just being a total bad-ass. I don’t know where they’re going to go from here, but I can’t wait to find out. As far as movies based on video games go, Tomb Raider is easily the best one out there. Granted, the bar ain’t very high, but this film managed to be very entertaining and engaging from beginning to end. I would honestly say you should check this one out. It might surprise you.
My Final Recommendation: This one puts an arrow through any other video game-to-film adaptation. 8.5/10