★★★☆☆
OSCAR-winner Alicia Vikander picks up the bow and arrow for this new big-screen version of archaeological adventurer Lara Croft and it’s a stylish, gritty undertaking.
Lara is the fiercely independent daughter of eccentric and extremely wealthy businessman/adventurer Lord Richard Croft (Dominic West) who is presumed dead after seven years away, now living a reckless and carefree life on her own.
As the folks now running the company are desperate for her to sign papers declaring her father legally dead, Lara discovers a clue inside an artefact to his whereabouts and what he was working on.
She then embarks on an expedition to a dangerous island in the middle of The Devil’s Sea off the coast of Japan. This leads her straight into the path of Mathias Vogel (Walton Goggins), a ruthless representative of a shadowy organization who is on the hunt for the tomb of Himiko, an ancient Japanese princess whose spirit is said to hold the power of humanity’s ultimate destruction.
Casting Vikander in the lead role is a shrewd decision indeed; she brings an effective mix of toughness, vulnerability (she thankfully isn’t portrayed as an invulnerable machine that always walks without a scratch) and strongmindedness on a path towards becoming the famous confident heroine. Using the 2013 rebooted game and sequel as its basis, plot-wise it’s fairly standard mystery-adventure stuff that’s elevated by having such a terrific actor as Goggins playing the villain with a purpose. He lifts the character out of the two-dimensional with a kind of charismatic determination and makes sure, unlike with many action baddies, you actually understand and empathise with his motivations.
The script by Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Alastair Siddons relies fairly heavily on unnecessary exposition to get by; sometimes you wish it would have a bit more confidence in the audience to work things out for themselves rather than being force fed information. But where it lacks in narrative nuance it makes up for it with a breakneck pace that barely stops for breath.
Norwegian filmmaker Roar Uthaug (The Wave, Cold Prey) directs it like he’s constantly giving the film a shot of adrenaline in the neck. However, when the set pieces are as well-executed as they are here – the use of the game’s signature temple traps are particularly fun – then being zapped along to the next one on a second’s notice isn’t exactly a bad thing.
Although it’s not really saying much but this is definitely one of the better video game movies thus far. It works pretty well as an entertaining origin story for the iconic character, finding a nice balance between both ongoing reverence for the source material and keeping it appealing to newcomers.
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