Tomb Raider (2018): Review

This is a NON-Spoiler review for Tomb Raider (2018)

Plot Summary: "Lara Croft is the fiercely independent daughter of an eccentric adventurer who vanished years earlier. Hoping to solve the mystery of her father's disappearance, Croft embarks on a perilous journey to his last-known destination -- a fabled tomb on a mythical island that might be somewhere off the coast of Japan. The stakes couldn't be higher as Lara must rely on her sharp mind, blind faith and stubborn spirit to venture into the unknown."

I have never seen the Angelina Jolie Tomb Raider movies (I've heard they're hilarious). But I did play some of Rise of the Tomb Raider on Xbox from 2015. I enjoy the game. Personally, I'm more of an Uncharted guy. And obviously, I'm a HUGE Indiana Jones fan. So these type of deep in the jungle spooky mystery adventure movies are some that I have loved in the past. Indiana Jones is definitely the best and then the second would be...............National Treasure? And as a lot of people know, there's never really been a good video game adaptation. And the trailers didn't look good to me. And I guess I'd say that this is the best video game adaptation I've seen....which isn't saying much. Congratulations Tomb Raider, you beat Assassin's Creed. I didn't mind this movie. It's not as bad as I expected from the trailers, but it really didn't impress me.

I think Alicia Vikander was a great choice to play Laura Croft. I don't really know much about the character outside of this movie and the little bit I played, but she's an awesome actress and I think she fits what I knew about the character. And I think she's very good in this movie. No complaints with her. And except for maybe a couple of actors and a few moments, the acting is fine. But let me get down to what I think is the best thing this movie has going for it - I think the writer's hearts were in the right place for the most part. Lots of times I watch a movie and I just think that the filmmakers are literally throwing whatever they can at the screen to make something cool and make money. I just think "do you even know what makes a movie good?". It's like the people that make a sequel to a great movie and they don't know what makes it good. And I think the filmmakers behind Tomb Raider understand what they need to be shooting for, but I don't think they entirely succeeded. It's very rare that my opinion about a video game blockbuster is that they focused too much on the characters. I'll get back to that.

Some minor complaints I had - As a lot of you saw in the trailers, the CGI did not look good. But I actually thought that in the final movie, it was definitely not great but I didn't actually mind it that much. It could be that I sat in one of the very front rows of my theater, but I don't think the CGI was excessive. I also was really not a fan of the score. I found pretty cliche. Which I was very sad to find out that it was by Junkie XL (Mad Max: Fury Road). I also really don't know why Nick Frost is in this movie (trying to compete with Simon Pegg with Mission Impossible?). And I was really bored with the villain. That's one thing that I think the writers should have improved. It is not full on Jumanji level of a villain. But he's basically one of the throwaway MCU villains. He's so freaking dull and I couldn't care less about his motives (Notice that I said couldn't. NOT "could care less").

So let me talk about how they handled the character of Laura Croft. One of the biggest things that I love and many do about Indiana Jones is that Indy struggles....A LOT. And Harrison Ford knows how to get the absolute crap beat out of him and make it look great. Because we love rooting for the person who struggles. I don't know about you but I prefer to watch Indy try to take back the arc on those trucks then I like to watch Batman kill millions of space mosquitos without struggling. We like stakes. We like conflict. We like to watch people struggle and overcome their odds. And all the freaking time filmmakers just think that all the stakes you need is genocide. Can you name how many movies you've seen where the villain is threatening to destroy the world? It's funny but if the stakes are the entire planet, we actually don't care as much. And that's one thing that I really thought they weren't going to do. Usually, adventures deep in the jungle are just about people fighting over an object. But Tomb Raider figured it out. That's one of my biggest flaws with this movie.

But that's not to say Laura didn't struggle. The very first scene we meet her in she's losing a wrestling match. So that's what I mean when I say that the writer's hearts were mostly in the right places. But I think the execution wasn't the best. Because Laura struggled, but I think they definitely could have done something to make me care more. She's not over the top tough, but I was never put in the spot of - "How on earth is she gonna get out of this?". Many writers say that you have to figure out how you can get your characters to the lowest point possible and just beat the crap out of them. And this movie does okay with that I suppose. But there were some things that I really appreciated about the writing of Laura. For one, she doesn't have a love interest. She's one of the few girl characters in a long time that I've seen that doesn't have to have a love interest purely just because she's on screen. How long is it gonna take for that tradition to die? I also think some of the character beats were well written for her. They're definitely characters beats that you've seen many times before, but at least they know who to be stealing from.

But what do people really go to blockbusters like this for? ACTION! EXPLOSIONS! GUNS! I honestly think you're going to be a bit underwhelmed. I legitimately think that if you give an audience a good character, they will root for them and love the action because of it. But at a certain point I was getting bored with the attempt at making a great character and I just kinda thought "I could really go for an over the top action scene right about now." So I think they focused on character in exchange for a ton of action. And most of the time I would applaud that. But in this case, it just left me underwhelmed. I found the action very forgettable and I kinda zoned out during it. So how about ancient mystery like Indiana Jones? Really the mystery entirely consists of stuff that there's no way you can actually participate in.....or it's just totally ripping off Indiana Jones. If you see the movie, you'll recognize things that come straight out of the last act of Last Crusade. I'd actually put this a step below National Treasure in that genre.

So overall, I was mildly entertained by Tomb Raider at best. I think it's competently made but I didn't find it very creative or successful in its execution. I think this would be a great movie to watch on Netflix. Or if you have MoviePass and maybe have some kids....give it a shot. Or just stay home and watch the Angelina Jolie Tomb Raiders. I kinda feel like watching those for a good laugh now. My grade for Tomb Raider is a C+