Two decades ago, a video game about a fearless female adventurer was made into an exciting and fun action movie that launched the career of one of today’s best known and most recognizable actresses. Although she wasn’t the first choice to play Lara Croft, Angelina Jolie beat out, most notably, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Famke Janssen, Jennifer Lopez, Rhona Mitra, Elizabeth Hurley, Ashley Judd, Sandra Bullock, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Diane Lane, Demi Moore and Denise Richards, among others. When Angelina Jolie took the role she crafted Lady Lara Croft into one of the most iconic ‘badass’ women characters of all time, and will forever be linked to the role and portrayed by cosplayers in perpetuity.
Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (also known as simply Tomb Raider) was that 2001 action-adventure film, based on the Tomb Raider video game series, featuring the character Lara Croft trying to obtain ancient artifacts and keep them away from the notorious secret society known as The Illuminati. It was followed in short order by a sequel titled Lara Croft: Tomb Raider – The Cradle of Life in 2003.
The new 2018 film, simply titled Tomb Raider, is an action-adventure film directed by Roar Uthaug and written by Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Alastair Siddons, from a story by Evan Daugherty and Robertson-Dworet. It is a reboot of the Tomb Raider film series giving the Lara Croft origin story a new twist in which she embarks on a perilous journey to her father Richard’s last-known destination, hoping to solve the mystery of his disappearance.
Our 2018 Lara Croft is the fiercely independent daughter of an eccentric British adventurer who vanished when she was a young teenager. Now a young presumably orphaned woman without any real focus or purpose, Lara navigates the chaotic streets of London as a bike courier, barely making the rent. Determined to forge her own path, she refuses to acknowledge her inheritance or take the reins of her father’s global empire just as staunchly as she rejects the idea that he’s truly gone after seven years without him.
When she is arrested after a bike racing accident involving a police car, Richard’s business partner Ana Miller posts her bail and warns her that if she does not claim her inheritance very soon, her father’s estate will be sold off. Lara reluctantly accepts and just before signing comes into possession of the key to her father’s secret hidden office. There she finds a pre-recorded message from Richard detailing his research into Himiko, the mythical Queen of Yamatai who was said to command the power over life and death. Richard warns Lara to destroy all of his research, but of course Lara decides to investigate further instead.
Going explicitly against her father’s final wishes, she goes off in search of her dad’s last-known destination: a fabled tomb on a mythical island somewhere off the coast of Japan. But her mission is not an easy one; just reaching the island is extremely treacherous. Suddenly, the stakes couldn’t be higher for Lara, who — against all odds and armed with only her sharp mind, blind faith and inherently stubborn spirit — must learn to push herself beyond her limits on her journey into the unknown. It is indeed a wild ride and full of twists, turns, action and drama.
The cast consists of Alicia Vikander as Lara Croft, with Emily Carey as 14-year old Lara; Dominic West as Lord Richard Croft, Lara’s presumed deceased archaeologist father; Walton Goggins as Mathias Vogel, a rival archaeologist of Richard Croft and a member of Trinity, a shadowy organization; Daniel Wu as Lu Ren, the ship captain who helps Lara in searching for her father; Kristin Scott Thomas as Ana Miller, an associate at Richard Croft’s company, Croft Holdings; Hannah John-Kamen as Sophie, Croft’s flatmate and best friend; Antonio Aakeel as Nitin, a friend to Lara; Derek Jacobi as Mr. Yaffe; Nick Frost as Max; Alexandre Willaume as Lieutenant; and Michael Obiora as Baxter (previously seen on Luther and Doctor Who).
Having just re-watched the 2001 film I was impressed with the callbacks to some of the iconic images and tropes of the original in this film. There are some amazing stunt sequences throughout, including a crazy bike chase that puts most car chases to shame, a boat in a storm scene, and a crazy scene involving a decaying bomber airplane, not to mention the scenes inside the tomb. You will definitely not be bored! A decision was made when Vikander was cast to make the film about a more mature Lara than originally planned, that is to make her character more a young early-20s woman rather than a teenager, and that choice was a very good one. She is also is less “voluptuous” than the video game character or her film predecessor, more average in stature, and less male-fanatasy bimbo imagery and more competent young woman as heroine and modern female role model… not necessarily any less sexy, just very much less sexualized.
The new film runs 122 minutes and has a rating of PG-13 for sequences of violence and action, and for some language. The MGM film is scheduled to be released in the United States on March 16 in RealD 3D, IMAX 3D, and IMAX, by Warner Bros. Pictures, the first Tomb Raider film not to be distributed by Paramount Pictures.
