★ ★ ★ ★ ☆
Declaring Roar Uthaug’s Tomb Raider “the best video game movie yet” sounds like damning with faint praise, but there’s nothing half-hearted about this genuinely exciting action adventure starring Alicia Vikander. We begin with some less-than-promising expository narration from Lara’s presumed-dead father, Richard, played by Dominic West (a lucky escape considering that back in the days of the Angelina Jolie movies, he would have likely been the villain-of-the-week). Our titular heroine, refusing to accept her father’s death and take command of the vast inheritance awaiting her at Croft Manor, is living as a bicycle courier with a reckless streak and no direction. When her advisor, Ana, (Kristin Scott Thomas) finally persuades Lara to open her father’s will, she finds a Japanese puzzle box containing a clue to Richard’s whereabouts, and sets off to find him.
This and a contractual obligation of a coda are the only scenes that drag, but once Lara arrives in Japan, the film and its heroine hit the ground running and barely give up the pace from there. Soon she and her guide, Lu (Daniel Wu, armed with a roguish grin), are cast adrift on the shores of the mysterious island detailed in her father’s diary. They’re in a deadly race with Walton Goggins’ deliciously named corporate operative, Mathias Vogel, to find the tomb of a legendary genocidal queen.
Despite the fact we all know the studios involved will try their darnedest to wring a franchise out of this, there’s never a moment where Lara doesn’t feel an inch from death. Vikander brings a vulnerability to the eyes of the icon without diminishing her character’s agency or competence. It’s a performance that would be astounding for any mainstream action film, let alone this particularly cursed genre. Working in tandem with Vikander’s squared shoulders is a reliance on tactile sets and bone-crunching sound design really sells the grit and grime: what a thrill it is to see a blockbuster where the star appears to be in real danger!
While Vikander and her stunt work have the physical side more than covered, the emotional ground is less confidently broadcast. The screenplay takes little time to explore Lara’s feelings of abandonment but at least attempts to resolve them towards the climax. Most of the passion comes from Tom Holkenborg’s thrilling score, which truly comes into its own during a final temple run that attempts (and largely succeeds!) to ape an Indiana Jones set piece for the digital generation. For what is Indy solving “Jehovah begins with an ‘i’”, if not the kind of puzzle a player would be confronted with in a Tomb Raider game? Spielberg’s adventures were a clear influence on the original games, and those reference points have bled through to the rebooted series from 2013 (the story of which informs Uthaug’s film).
As those games were made with a concentrated effort to be more cinematic and narrative-driven, Tomb Raider’s transition from console to cinema feels less forced than previous video game adaptations, which often fall apart due to a lack of narrative (Street Fighter) or too much (the increasingly convoluted Resident Evil series). Like Duncan Jones’ Warcraft made use of the contemporary digital moviemaking landscape to bring its fantastical world to life, Tomb Raider plays to the strengths of the updated source material by balancing Lara’s personal struggle with the exhilarating derring-do we’ve come to expect. If all involved play their cards right with the inevitable sequel, adventure may soon have a new name.
This and a contractual obligation of a coda are the only scenes that drag, but once Lara arrives in Japan, the film and its heroine hit the ground running and barely give up the pace from there. Soon she and her guide, Lu (Daniel Wu, armed with a roguish grin), are cast adrift on the shores of the mysterious island detailed in her father’s diary. They’re in a deadly race with Walton Goggins’ deliciously named corporate operative, Mathias Vogel, to find the tomb of a legendary genocidal queen.
Despite the fact we all know the studios involved will try their darnedest to wring a franchise out of this, there’s never a moment where Lara doesn’t feel an inch from death. Vikander brings a vulnerability to the eyes of the icon without diminishing her character’s agency or competence. It’s a performance that would be astounding for any mainstream action film, let alone this particularly cursed genre. Working in tandem with Vikander’s squared shoulders is a reliance on tactile sets and bone-crunching sound design really sells the grit and grime: what a thrill it is to see a blockbuster where the star appears to be in real danger!
While Vikander and her stunt work have the physical side more than covered, the emotional ground is less confidently broadcast. The screenplay takes little time to explore Lara’s feelings of abandonment but at least attempts to resolve them towards the climax. Most of the passion comes from Tom Holkenborg’s thrilling score, which truly comes into its own during a final temple run that attempts (and largely succeeds!) to ape an Indiana Jones set piece for the digital generation. For what is Indy solving “Jehovah begins with an ‘i’”, if not the kind of puzzle a player would be confronted with in a Tomb Raider game? Spielberg’s adventures were a clear influence on the original games, and those reference points have bled through to the rebooted series from 2013 (the story of which informs Uthaug’s film).
As those games were made with a concentrated effort to be more cinematic and narrative-driven, Tomb Raider’s transition from console to cinema feels less forced than previous video game adaptations, which often fall apart due to a lack of narrative (Street Fighter) or too much (the increasingly convoluted Resident Evil series). Like Duncan Jones’ Warcraft made use of the contemporary digital moviemaking landscape to bring its fantastical world to life, Tomb Raider plays to the strengths of the updated source material by balancing Lara’s personal struggle with the exhilarating derring-do we’ve come to expect. If all involved play their cards right with the inevitable sequel, adventure may soon have a new name.
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