(reviewed by our Guest Critic the Movie Knight) After a fifteen-year absence from cinema, Lara Croft has returned! Based on the worldwide popular video game the role now goes to another Academy Award winning actress, Alicia Vicander (Angelina Jolie originated the part.). This outing is an original tale as our heroine, travels to an uncharted island off Japan to help prevent a global calamity..
Naturally people will want to know who plays the better Lara Croft. Angelina never did the role justice. Unfortunately she had to star in two poorly written and produced movies. Alicia is blessed to have a much better story to which she can bring some new depth to the role.
For starters, she is not a rich socialite who goes off on some wild adventures that take her all over the planet, she’s actually poor and she works for a messenger service. She must pawn off heirlooms in order to travel. In the videos games and in the original movies, if Lara killed someone, it was never a big deal to her and she just went about her business afterwards. This time, the very first time she takes a human life, it has a great adverse effect. Director Roar Uthaug is not afraid to get some close-ups of his leading lady to really capture the emotions she is feeling. We have often seen action movies where our lead player must make their first kill. They always do it nonchalantly. In this movie, it was refreshing to see how that first kill affects Lara Croft .
It’s very hard to pull off a good action flick these days as audiences “have seen it all.” Tomb Raider pulls off some very nice scenes, whether it is a simple bike chase or Lara taking on a horde of bad guys. The 2001 and 2003 adventures did not capture the spirit of the video games that made them so popular. This time they get it right. In order to “get out of a room”, a complex puzzle must be solved. Not every element of the games get translated into this movie, but it is still more than have ever been.
Lara Croft has been kicking ass and taking names for twenty years now. At the time of her introduction there were almost no female lead video game characters. Black Panther has just become a billion dollar franchise reminding us that minorities can play leads in action films and they can be successful. Alicia Vicander will hopefully let everyone know that women can successfully take the lead in an actioner as well.
2.5 Tiaras