Lara Croft: Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life Movie Review:


Following on the success of “Lara Croft: Tomb Raider” star Angelina Jolie is back in the new adventure “Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life”. Jolie plays the title character who is a wealthy English heiress who travels the globe in search of treasure and adventure. Following an earthquake in Greece, Lara uncovers a long lost tomb of treasure and is attacked by members of a crime syndicate who take the mysterious globe she has uncovered leaving her companions dead in the process.

It is learned that the globe is the key to the mysterious Cradle of Life where the legendary Pandora’s Box is set to reside. Legend tells of civilizations being destroyed should the box be opened and with an evil arms dealer Reiss (Ciaran Hinds), who specializes in selling genetic weapons to the highest bidder and will think noting of selling the box to the highest bidder.

Needing to locate the gang who stole the globe, Lara enlists the help of and old flame named Gerrard (Terry Butler), who has been imprisoned after taking to a life of crime despite his training in the intelligence community. What follows is a series of action sequences that take the duo to locales such as Mainland China, Hong Kong, and Africa as they attempt to recover the globe and unlocking it’s secrets.

The first half of the film has some nice moments and Jolie is perfectly cast as the polished yet deadly Croft. She speaks with an upper class tongue but is just as deadly with her quips as she is with all manner of weapons. What does the film in is the final part of the film. The finale was not all that interesting as plot points was resolved in a very perfunctory manner. I allow a lot of logic gapes in action films but a shark in very warm Mediterranean waters who growls and can be stopped with a single punch came across as very laughable for all the wrong reasons.

Some of the action is good, but it suffers from a weak setup. Director Jan De Bont is no stranger to action having “Speed”, “Lethal Weapon 3” and “Twister” as just a few of the films he has been involved with, but the script does not allow the characters to grow and does not setup the action scenes to the point where the audience is gripped. While better than the first film, “Tomb Raider” The Cradle of Life” is badly in need of a pulse.

2.5 stars out of 5

Gareth Von Kallenbach

Back in 2001, I was dismayed and almost heart-broken to see the character of Lara Croft brutalized into a fake, choppy and often repulsive film. The filmmakers lost the magic that was Lara Croft. Her long history that gamers have been entranced with for years wasn’t even touched. This brings me to the 2003 film incarnation of Lara Croft.

The film opens with Lara Croft (Angelina Jolie) finding a lost temple of Alexander the Great. The underwater temple holds a crystal orb or the first key in a race to uncover the secrets of the Cradle of Life or the final resting place of the legendary, Pandora’s Box. When she comes across the orb, Lara is ambushed. Lara fights a losing battle and watches the temple crumble in upon itself and her adversaries, including a Chinese mercenary named Chen Yo (Simon Lam), make off with the orb. Now she is forced to track the orb.

The orb’s trail finds Lara forcing to team-up with a disgraced MI-6 agent named Terry Sheridan (Gerard Butler) and divert the selling of the orb to a bio-weapons dealer, Jonathan Reiss (Ciaran Hinds). Unleashing the power of Pandora’s Box by a madman like Reiss could spell the end of the world. Can Lara and Terry put aside their differences and their past long enough to stop Reiss? What is locked inside Pandora’s Box? Or do we want to know?

From the opening sequence and the underwater temple sets, I knew this wasn’t going to be anything like the previous Tomb Raider film. The action was precise, exciting and amplified Jolie in her character. Jolie was the best part of the first film and in this film she builds on the character of Lara Croft. I liked seeing Lara interacting with Terry and how there was always a mutual understanding between her butler and techno-geek. I liked the fact that this film felt more like a soaring adventure film than a shoot-out at the old arcade.

This was the kind of film I wanted the filmmakers to make in the first film. I wanted more of Lara and more of who she is. I also wanted a grand quest in the vein of Indiana Jones. I also wanted to see some of the Jolie charisma to meld with the character instead of Jolie always being compared to the arcade icon. The film delivered all these in spades.

There are some really cheesy moments in the film but one tends to look past them when you can see all the improvements over its predecessor. One of the cheesiest moments involves Lara and shark. I won’t spoil it but why was it even in the film. I also found that there a couple scenes that dragged away from the pace.

One thing I also really liked about the film was the character played by Gerard Butler. Butler so embraced this ex-spy that we are never supposed to trust. I liked that the film made us question his every move to the bitter end. He was the perfect character to bring new life into the characterization of Lara. Butler is great as the character and I really look forward to see more from this actor. I still can’t believe this is the same guy who played Dracula in “Dracula 2000”. Look for him next in the adaptation of Michael Crichton’s “Timeline” starring Paul Walker.

The spirit of the epic adventurer Lara Croft and the strong woman role model is all intact in the sequel. This is how I envisioned her to be on the screen.

(3.5 out of 5)

Dean Kish

Based on the popular video game, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider became a surprise hit during the summer of 2001. Though the film was an action cheesefest, Angelina Jolie’s appealing kick-butt heroine won over some audiences. The film was a bad movie, but a guilty pleasure that was also bashed by critics.

Now comes along the sequel, Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life. This film tries to keep the same charisma as the first film, but it is utterly horrible and nothing close to being a guilty pleasure. Over the top action director Jan De Bont replaces the subdued Simon West as director of this installment. The film once again follows the gorgeous, self-confident, archaeologist/adventurer hero Lara Croft (Angelina Jolie) on another mission to save the world. In the first film Croft was after some type of time machine or portal, this time she is trying to prevent a sophisticated terrorist (Ciaran Hands) from finding the mythological Pandora’s Box, which has the power to release pain and suffering into the world. In the opeing scenes, Croft recovers a golden orb that holds the key to the location of Pandora’s Box. Of course, the evil terrorist steals the orb from Croft and then she is on her way to chasing him around the world to recover it. Her two sidekicks, the butler Hillary (Christopher Barrie) and the technician inventor guru Bryce (Noah Taylor) arise once again to assist her. Croft also enlists the services of a mercenary traitor named Terry (Gerard Butler), who also use to be her lover. The adventure begins with Croft and her ex-beau going across vast countries to find Pandora’s Box and stop a madman from bringing chaos into the world.

One of the first examples that this film is just terrible, is when the evil bad guy played by Ciaran Hands infects one of his men with the Ebola virus and then utters the line, “This is the sound of a traitor dying,” as the infected man spits up blood. The script by Dean Georgaris is dreadful and it seems that the actors would have been better off improvising. Jan De Bont takes his liberties with trying to show cool tricks and effective action scenes, but the end result of his work is dull and not the least bit exciting. He even opens the film with the credits across the water like he did in Speed 2: Cruise Control (1997). De Bont was first a cinematographer on many action films before breaking through as a director with the hit Speed (1994). Though Speed is exceptional action thriller, De Bont’s work as director ever since has not been that competent (Twister (1996), Speed 2: Cruise Control (1997), The Haunting (1999)). As this pitiful film progresses, the action gets more boring and you will feel like taking a nap through the last half. The first film was pretty bad as well, but it was at least exciting. The sequences in this sequel just seem to be reaching for so much, which include motorcycles riding on The Great Wall of China, squirrel like costumes for the heroes to glide off a skyscraper from danger, and tree-like monsters in Africa that look like trolls. In addition to, the over the top action is just too much to handle, such as one scene with a helicopter trying to land in a square, Croft punching a shark, or her pole-vaulting onto a helicopter.

The one bright spot of this film is Angelina Jolie herself as Lara Croft. She is a perfect cast and holds the screen as the likeable character once again. Jolie is very sexy and just striking with her precise performance. The talented Gerard Butler is wasted in his supporting role, as Croft’s love interest Terry. Djimon Hounsou is wasted even more with his amounting to nothing role as Croft’s African guide Koso.

Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life is just a typical bad summer blockbuster. Angelina Jolie is a joy to watch again as Croft, but this film has no pulse or electricity to make it a guilty pleasure like its predecessor.

Grade: D

07/25/03
By Joseph C. Tucker

On Tuesday July 29th, at the Empire Leicester Square, a variety of journalists and media folk attended a screening of Lara Croft Tomb Raider The Cradle of Life. As the screenplay was a little simple, the title could have complimented it too. Perhaps Lara 2 or even the overused letter abbreviations we've seen over the
years, like T2, MI:2, etc. I'll just have to rename it
myself, but instead of being crude, I'll simply name
it LC2.

Now, Lavatory Crap Two, just has to be given one of
those Raspberry Awards. One for the movie itself, one for the producers, one for the oddest casting a
romantic lead in Gerard Butler, one for the
screenwriter, one for the sound, one for the
continuous product placement, one for the worst
villain in a film and one for anybody who gives this
movie a good review. LC2 just has to be given the
Speed 2 award for terrible sequel label.

Angelina Jolie is too good to be in a film this bad
and it shows on screen. I was left wondering at one
stage whether Angelina was thinking: Can I be
bothered to continue with this English accent?

Now, the story is a good one. Devised by Steven E. De Souza, whose scripts in the past I learnt from
greatly, though he had nothing to do with the penning of this one unfortunately. It has LC jet skiing in Greece, in search of this golden ball. No, not David Beckham, though that woulda been a great plot twist, but a sphere that looks like a large Christmas Tree decoration. Clambering on board the worst fishing boat in the world, which is so beaten up and old, it looks like it's gonna sink at any moment. LC is then seen with the equally beaten up crew, on the most high-tech
diving equipment known to man. She finds this golden pendant, that the props department probably borrowed from Tom Jones, to cut down costs, manages to get the golden disco ball, but baddies arrive and take it, doing over her guys in the process.

After an absolutely ridiculous moment with LC luring a Great White shark with her blood and punching it on the nose and then riding it like it were a dolphin from Sea World in Florida, she's back at her Wayne Manor type mansion with the so underused Chris Barrie.

This is when the audience laugh a great deal and I'm not sure if it was intentional. MI6 arrive, asking LC to go on a mission at the Queen's request. Is LC a female Bond now? It sure looks that way. So she teams up with Scottish rogue, Gerard Butler, who needed to tone his accent down a wee bit. I know our shoulder sharing American cousins had to have Trainspotting re-synched or dubbed or subtitled, even though the UK
could understand it perfectly, but this was a little
hard on the ear, especially with the combination of
the poor sound. At one point, LC and Gerard are on
motorcycles, racing along the Great Wall of China
(hmm, I know it's 4000 miles long, but no tourists or
guards around?) and they're having a conversation,
though the audience couldn't hear a word of it. In
real life, motorbikes are loud, but this is movie life
and more so a computer game to movie life. We need to hear what it being said, folks.

More laughs from the audience erupted when this ultra old, inexplicable Chinese woman says to LC that she has all her clothes and guns, etc ready for her. Hmm, she just happened to have a load of gear for Gerard too. One guy shouted out in my aisle: STEROTYPICAL CHEESINESS! He then groaned when LC pinned down Gerard in one scene, handcuffing him and him saying:
" You may break my wrist, but I'm still going to kiss
you." C'mon, Chris O'Donnell got away with better
dialogue in Batman and Robin! Gerard deserves better stuff than that and you guys wasted him. In fact, he should have been made into the villain, as he had better presence. Sigh. Oh well. It's over now. It's been reported that the folks at Eidos and Core Design who run the gaming franchise are experiencing legalities and certain stresses, ousting their MD, but it's down to those dudes at Paramount who should be calling the shots. They're the movie people. Let them do their job and you do yours. Did you poke your noses in too much? Can I say anything positive about this movie?

A good CGI Return of The Jedi-esque Rancor monster at the end and a pretty cool poster.

Ben Trebilcook

After raiding Alexander The Great’s Temple of Light under the sea off the coast of Greece, Lara Croft (Jolie) discovers that the temple holds more than just the treasure of the long dead conqueror. She discovers that Alexander had located the Cradle of Life, the place where life itself began on Earth and location the object that started it all, Pandora’s box. The problem is that Lara isn’t the only one interested in the box, billionaire genetic scientist Jonathan Reiss (Hinds) sees it as the ultimate weapon and will do anything to get his hands on it. With the help of Terry Sheridan (Butler), Lara faces a race against time to find the Cradle of Life before Reiss.

After a decidingly average first outing that just happened to make a large amount of money, Lara Croft returns for a second adventure but does one of the strongest female characters ever created get the movie she deserves?

In a word, no. While this is a marked improvement on the Simon West directed original, it still doesn’t life up to the potential the character so abundantly has. She has the chance to be the modern, gadget-ridden adventurer, a female Indiana Jones with a sprinkling of James Bond thrown in for good measure but the people behind the franchise never seem to realise this.

All the elements are there. A quest for a mythical object that most people have heard of, a villain driven by greed and power, temples and ruins to raid, a partner and former lover that has a chequered past and an profusion of bad guys to fight against. Everything you need for a great adventure but the film never seems to utilise these elements fully leading to a movie that is never more than just slightly entertaining.

Angelina Jolie is the personification of Lara Croft. There isn’t anyone better to play the adventuring heroine. She is arguably one of the most beautiful women in show business and when you combine this with body hugging outfits and plenty of action but never underestimating her intelligence and skills, you have a very positive female character. Angelina gives her all in the role and you can tell she is having fun with it, especially in the action sequences but her performance is let down by the script and direction of Jan De Bont.

A once respected action director with hits like Speed and Twister, De Bont then followed this with the extremely average The Haunting and the just plain dull Speed 2: Cruise Control, so hopes for the Tomb Raider sequel were mixed. While he handles most of the action sequences well, especially the Temple of Light scene and the Hong Kong laboratory escape, the rest of the film, especially the finale, lacks any real pace or tension. In fact the finale is probably the least exciting part of the movie. Blame can be laid at the feet of the writers but a director, who can excel in this genre when he wants to, should have the experience and expertise to realise that the movie needs more excitement and tension in the final act.

The supporting characters are slightly too underdeveloped. The always-excellent Gerard Butler does his best as the love interest, whose back-story isn’t panned out enough but he handles the action extremely well. Chris Barrie and Noah Taylor are very underused as Hilary and Bryce, Ciarán Hinds is a good enough villain but he needed his motivations better explained and the Djimon Hounsou has nothing more than a cameo.

Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life is entertaining enough but also frustrating at the same time. This is a character with great potential and an actress that can, with the right people behind her, achieve this. The people at Paramount are sitting on a potential goldmine but just haven’t got the vision to see it.

Star Rating = * *

Jamie Kelwick

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