Tomb Raider
When I revisited the 2001 adaptation of the “Tomb Raider” with Angelina Jolie for our “Movie a Week” this week, I was in for a rude awakening. A movie I enjoyed, however gratuitously, in 2001 I could barely keep my attention for now. The absurdity of the situations, and one-dimensional writing of the characters (not to mention the didn’t-age-well visual effects and set pieces), did not hold up for me one bit, and it was a bit of a disappointment. (I’m curious how the Jan De Bont-directed “Cradle of Life” will fair.) My expectations for this new film, with Alicia Vikander cast as Lara Croft, the titular tomb raider, have been muted, but I definitely hoped for the best, and just getting out of it an hour ago, I feel like I got the best this film could deliver.
This is the type of adventure film, like its predecessor, that will, invariably, have you thinking of the Indiana Jones franchise, and believe me, I had Spielberg’s globe-hopping archeologist completely on the brain throughout this film. In fact, the film feels like it was cobbled together from parts of not just the Indy films but also Spielberg’s “Jurassic Park” films, with a sequence in a rusted-out Japanese Zero that plays out almost identically like the first T-Rex attack in “Lost World.” That being said, I feel like it finds its own footing through the screenplay by Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Alastair Siddons in not being JUST an Indiana Jones-wannabe, even if the story borrows liberally from “Last Crusade” when it comes to the dynamic between Lara and her father, Richard Croft (Dominic West).
“Tomb Raider” sets itself apart from its predecessors immediately by having Lara be a struggling woman on her own, almost on the run from her memory of her father, a business magnet who moonlit as a treasure-hunter after the death of Lara’s mother. Gone for seven years, Lara still has not taken her place at the head of her father’s business empire, which has been run by Ana Miller (Kristin Scott Thomas), who has been a custodian, of sorts, of his affairs in the absence of any Croft leadership. Though she has a job making ends meet as a food delivery biker, we also see that she is tough when we meet her in a boxing club, and a bit of a thrill seeker when she takes a bet on herself for a “fox hunt” with a bunch of fellow cyclists chasing her through the London streets- if she doesn’t get caught by them, she wins. When that goes awry, and she’s arrested, Ana convinces her to sign the papers that will have her taking over her father’s affairs, which is when she learns the truth about what her father actually did, and is given bread crumbs to figure out how he disappeared. Cue the near-death thrills towards finding out her father’s obsessions.
The film is an adaptation of the recently-revamped video game version of “Tomb Raider,” which explains quite a few differences between this film and the first Jolie film in terms of storyline and energy (and yes, look of the character, but, as my recent rewatching of Jolie’s first outing showed, that is inconsequential to me in my view of these movies). But the through-line between both old film and new is a bond between Lara and her father, and the screenplay here just does a better job of setting that up, as well as paying it off when Lara finds herself on a hidden island looking for the burial location of a mythical Japanese woman who could bring death to millions. The bones of Indiana Jones storytelling are very alive and well in this movie, but one of the things this film does right, that the first Jolie film didn’t do, is have Lara still in the middle of discovering who she is. This isn’t a superhuman hero but a real person put in life-and-death situations for the first time in her life, and seeing how she navigates that, while also dealing with some emotional baggage her long-thought-deceased father left her, is almost as exciting as the action scenes director Roar Uthaug stages. There’s a scene on the island, when Lara is trying to escape Vogel, the expedition leader played by the always-pleasurable Walton Goggins, with her in hand-to-hand combat, and you get the sense it is the first time she has truly been in a fight for her life, and Vikander plays it perfectly to convey that, even as she continues to show her ability to survive in bigger situations. I’m reminded less of Jolie in the role as I am Katniss Everdeen from the “Hunger Games” movies in this film, and I think that’s the right way to write a character like this. They still value human life, even as they are pulled into more escapist situations, and they are using their brain as much as they are their abilities, something they have in common with “Raiders” and “Temple of Doom” Indiana Jones, as well.
“Tomb Raider” follows similar templates for the type of movie it is, and the type of movie it wants to be, and does so effectively. The characters are all entertaining, including Daniel Wu as a ship captain who takes Lara to the island, and an uncredited Nick Frost as a pawn shop owner who lights up a couple of scenes, and the action and story mesh together successfully to make for an entertaining action flick. I don’t know that I would like this film any more watching it 17 years from now, but I really can’t imagine myself enjoying it any less like I did the first time Hollywood brought Lara Croft to the big screen. Vikander is a big part of that, but the film around her is an important part of that, as well.
