Tomb Raider (2018) No, we're not kidding about the question we pose in this post........
What's the point of putting flesh-and-blood actors in a videogame movie that's really nothing more than the game itself.......with the one exception of having pixel-created people replaced by real ones.
We know how the makers of "Tomb Raider" would answer this question..........they'd yammer on about how they've enhanced the game experience by employing an Oscar-winning actress to bring empathy, humanity and dramatic depth to Lara Croft.....(she of the intergalactic cleavage, short-shorts and the twin automatics blasting away....)
Yeh, right.
So world class actress Alicia Vikander packs on the muscles to her slim frame and sweats, strains, runs, jumps, climbs and punches for close to two hours.
And no one's going to mistake Vikander for some impossibly stoic unrealistic, invulnerable video game heroine........we're talkin' Academy Award winner here.......so as she endures an Olympics-worthy marathon of physical punishment, you get to hear her every squeal, shriek, gasp, screech, scream, groan and grunt.
The filmmakers no doubt expected her to act the crap out this crap.....giving their efforts a professional, A-List sheen. And Alicia doesn't disappoint.
She may be just in it for the paycheck, but she wants you to feel her pain, damn it,,,,,,even if she knows there's no Oscars handed out for dangling from a styrofoam cliff in a green-screened warehouse.........(not
this year, anyway. Maybe 2019)
More bad news for fanboy gamers: as an origin story, that means no spiffy, sexy masturbatory Lara Croft costume.........sorry boys.....no short pants, no torpedo boobs....nothing to objectify here......you'll have to go back to slappin' in those old Angelina Jolie DVDs........(or your granddad's copy of "Barbarella"....)
The storyline? Oh please spare us. You can read the descriptions on the back of the games this film sampled. Running. Jumping. Climbing. Tomb raiding. Avoiding all the boilerplate tomb booby traps like disappearing floors and surprise spikes from the ceiling.
In short, a game.
Which brings us right back to our original question. What's the point of putting real actors in this?
The delusions-of-grandeur bunch who put this film together might have enjoyed more success if they'd been honest with themselves about what they're making.......and cast some majestically curvy Comic-Con cosplay girl as Lara Croft.
At the end of day, guys, it's still a video game.......and no matter how many gallons of award-worthy sweat you squeezed out of Alicia Vikander........your movie never amounts to anything other than a colossal waste of her time and talent. 1 & 1/2 stars (* 1/2).......Game over, man.
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