Page 30 - ARUBA TODAY

A30 PEOPLE & ARTS
Thursday 15 March 2018
With Vikander leading, 'Tomb Raider' isn't half bad

By LINDSEY BAHR
In "Tomb Raider ," which
has elements of "Indiana
Jones," ''Batman" and even
"Tron: Legacy," but with
an angsty young woman
at the center instead of
an angsty young man, Ali-
cia Vikander takes a lot of
beatings. She is punched in
the face, and in the stom-
ach, she is thrown against
rocks and sent careening
through a forest, she is im-
paled, hit by a car, left in
an impossible one-handed
dead hang at least four
times, and she is choked,
really choked, by both men
and women alike.
And she pulls it off! The
movie itself is another,
more complicated, story,
but this video game adap-
tion is better than most with
set pieces that are both fun
and ridiculous (like a high-
stakes escape room) that
actually seem to approxi-
mate the experience of
playing a video game. This image released by Warner Bros. Pictures shows Alicia Vikander in a scene from "Tomb Raider."
After two pretty lousy at- Associated Press
tempts, and a lot of terrible
video game adaptations cent supporting actress fore her, Vikander has, ex- At the local police station, off the island.
on the way, Hollywood has Oscar winner production actly two years after her we learn the truth of Lara: It's here that the film's set
resurrected "Tomb Raider," could get their hands on. Academy Award win for an This isn't some working class pieces really start to click,
and plucked the most re- And like Angelina Jolie be- emotional drama, stepped girl at all, this is someone and Lara, whose bulging
into Lara Croft's combat who grew up wealthier back muscles are shown
boots and decided to raid than most could imagine off at every possible op-
some tombs. and whose inheritance portunity, is put through the
Directed by Norwegian won't kick in until she signs ringer trying to escape from
filmmaker Roar Uthaug some papers acknowledg- Vogel. That the production
("The Wave"), Lara is in- ing that her father, who put her in cargo pants for
troduced getting her butt disappeared seven years the duration and not the
kicked in a boxing ring. ago, is dead. Just as she's Jolie short-shorts is perhaps
The gym membership that about to concede to her a sign of progress too.
gives her access to these father's deputy (Kristin Scott The film not-so-subtly bor-
low-rent Rocky-esque facil- Thomas), she stumbles on rows from a half dozen bet-
ities is one she can't afford a clue that sends her on ter films, but even so, there
to pay. She is scrappy and a journey to find out what are definitely ways the sto-
barely getting by on her happened to her father on ry of "Tomb Raider" might
bike courier service pay- that remote island off the have been improved. Lara
check. She also isn't afraid coast of Japan. He was is for all her gumption, a
to take on a challenge looking for some ancient pretty passive protagonist,
for a few hundred bucks, "death queen" named Hi- for one.
like, say, biking through miko that we spend the As it stands, though, "Tomb
the streets of London with next half of the film talking Raider" is an often fun and
a foxtail attached to her about and searching for. visually compelling action
machine while two dozen Lara swings by Hong Kong pic, that is also sometimes
guys try to catch her. But first and gets the son of a unintentionally silly, with a
she's also not past seeing man her father knew, Lu great actress leading the
a random business man Ren (a compelling but un- whole thing.
on the street, thinking that derused Daniel Wu) to join "Tomb Raider," a Warner
perhaps it is her long-lost her on this adventure. One Bros. release, is rated PG-
and presumed to be dead harrowing boat ride later 13 by the Motion Picture
father (Dominic West) and and they've smashed into Association of America for
going into a hazy flashback the island and found them- "sequences of violence
dream that distracts her selves in the possession of and action, and for some
enough to lose focus in the Vogel (Walton Goggins), a language." Running time:
race and flip over a police mercenary who is trying to 118 minutes. Two and a half
car. get the mummified Himiko stars out of four.q