You can’t blame Swedish actress Alicia Vikander for the inconsistencies of this sprawling, cinematic reboot of the popular video game series. As a petite Lara Croft, she’s feisty and fit-as-a-fiddle. Enthusiastically proving her endurance in a grueling bike race through London, Lara won’t concede that her globe-hopping industrialist/explorer father, Lord Richard Croft (Dominic West), is dead, although he disappeared seven years earlier. After unlocking a puzzle box and unearthing papers revealing her father’s obsession with finding the tomb of Japan’s evil Queen Himiko, Lara takes off for Hong Kong, where she commandeers a boat that belongs to Lu Ren (Daniel Wu), whose father sailed with Croft to the mysterious island of Yamatai. Shipwrecked near their destination, Lara and Lu Ren are captured by mercenary Mathias Vogel (Walton Goggins), who is also searching for the tomb and tasked with excavating the site and disinterring the queen, despite repeated warnings from Richard and, later, Lara. As Lara’s adventure continues, the rapid succession of melodramatic cliffhangers make it look more and more like The Perils of Pauline. Working from a nonsensical script, the film is formulaically helmed by Norwegian director Roar Uthaug, who mostly excels at the CGI action pieces. Optional. [Note: DVD/Blu-ray extras include an “Uncovered” making-of featurette (7 min.). Exclusive to the Blu-ray are the behind-the-scenes segments “Evolution of an Icon” (10 min.), “Croft Training” (6 min.), and “Breaking Down the Rapids” (6 min.), and bonus DVD and digital copies of the film. Bottom line: a decent extras package for a so-so action/adventure franchise reboot.] (S. Granger)
Tomb Raider
Warner, 118 min., PG-13, DVD: $28.98, Blu-ray/DVD Combo: $35.99, June 12 Volume 33, Issue 4
Tomb Raider
Star Ratings
As of March 2022, Video Librarian has changed from a four-star rating system to a five-star one. This change allows our reviewers to have a wider range of critical viewpoints, as well as to synchronize with Google’s rating structure. This change affects all reviews from March 2022 onwards. All reviews from before this period will still retain their original rating. Future film submissions will be considered our new 1-5 star criteria.
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