Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life

Review by Tom Johnson

(tomjohnson@thecinemasource.com)

As I've said before, Summer 2003 has been a surprisingly good season for movies. There have been action classics("Bad Boys II") and pleasant surprises("T3"). Even the least pleasing action fests of the summer have at least been decent("League of Extraordinary Gentlemen") so far. In fact, it would appear Hollywood had finally realized the formula for a successful summer movie: make it good. Or, at least, most of Hollywood. Proof that the tired old cut-and-paste method of moviemaking is still very much alive arrives with "Lara Croft, Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life"(that's a mouthful).

The original "Tomb Raider" was a huge disappointment for fans of the game around the world. Sure, it made bundles of cash, but the deservedly wretched word of mouth killed any box office staying power, and repeat viewings were obviously out of the question for anyone sane. The solution to finally lure disgruntled viewers back for another round? Hire blockbuster veteran Jan de Bont, who did indeed direct one genuinely great film called "Speed", on the strength of its fantastic writing(Buffy genius Joss Whedon deserves the credit there), before getting lucky on another with "Twister", then finally showing his true colors with abysmal crap like "Speed 2: Cruise Control" and the remake of "The Haunting", both of which thankfully tanked. Great solution, guys. Thanks mainly to De Bont, "Tomb Raider 2" manages to top even the original in the category of sucking ass.

As in the first, the only thing even remotely good about the film is Angelina Jolie's focused performance. She is Lara Croft, plain and simple. It's just a shame that no one around her shares her work ethic, as the writer, cinematographer, stunt coordinator, special effects guy, other actors and, oh yeah, the director, all decided to take a big long nap during the production. It's not that "Tomb Raider" is an unbearable experience to set through. It's just that it's all so horribly mediocre. Somehow, a movie that features almost nothing but action scenes bored me silly over the course of two hours. You can throw skydiving, motorcycling, gunfights and giant monsters into a movie, but if there's no energy behind any of it, you might as well be watching paint dry. No thought was given to choreography or camera tricks to spice anything up, and not a single moment of the film is cool enough to even raise an eyebrow. Well, maybe the moment we first see Lara's all-too-tight wetsuit on what appears to be a very cold day, but that only counts for so much.

The main issue that injects dullness into every scene is the movie's tone, a near-exact replica of the first movie's gray, all too serious

attitude about itself. It treats scenes like the one where Lara punches a shark and rides it to the surface, or the one where she rides her motorcycle on the Great Wall of China like casual, ho-hum slices of ordinary life, perfectly logical and not a bit unrealistic. "Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle" got away with nearly every one of its inhuman stunts, because of the tongue-in-cheek attitude it had to apply to itself to allow the scenes to work. "Tomb Raider" has absolutely no such excuse. It appears grounded in humorless reality, only to veer off to fantasy now and then without acknowledging it. Maybe the intention is to make the crowd go "wow" when one of these bizarre stunts occur, but all that really happens is a big, collective yawn.

What's the story you ask? Something about Pandora's Box being real and evil Eurotrash's quest to find it and unleash a virus versus Lara's quest to stop it. Gerard Butler plays a fellow adventurer Lara recruits to help her, igniting a blazingly lukewarm romance to add some "depth" to the proceedings. Yeah, that's about it.

With gaping plot holes and a lack of any plausibility, "Tomb Raider" is that big, generic action groaner that's managed to evade theatres so far this summer. Lacking neither the wit to wink at itself nor the talent to make something truly good of itself, the film is another lackluster entry into a franchise that seemingly had so much potential. Angelina Jolie shines like always, but she doesn't need Lara Croft to keep her career afloat. She'd be wise to cut herself loose from the whole dirty mess, assuming this stinker doesn't kill the series altogether. If you really need an action fix this weekend, see any other movie that's been released in the past two months instead. If you've seen them all, see one of them again. "Tomb Raider" has nothing you're looking for, and would easily qualify for "F" territory, along with recent garbage like "Rollerball"(Sorry Dan, it had to be said), if it weren't for Jolie. Even then, it's only worth a

D