Viewed – 18 July 2018  Online rental

I’d say it’s more than reasonable to approach videogame adaptations with a degree of trepidation, as many an attempt in the past has resulting in underwhelming or terrible interpretations of a much loved past-time.  This latest offering, a sort of reboot after the Angelina Jolie movies … stars Ex-Machina’s Alicia Vikander as the plucky adventurer.  Following the disappearance of her father Richard Croft, Lara Croft is leaned on by her father’s company to sign papers regarding the family business and her inheritance.  However this leads Lara to launch her own trip to an uncharted island in a hope of solving the mystery of what her father was up to.

The story borrows to an extent from the first game in the recently rebooted franchise which gave us a refreshingly mature take on a character who in the past had become more famous for her polygon tits & ass than the games she was starring in.  Despite the source material however, this movie chooses to take it’s own path, leaving behind much of the personality and depth of story-telling in favour of a rather brainless Indiana Jones rip-off.  Sigh.

Vikander, so nuanced in the aforementioned Ex-Machina and potentially a rising star in the making is only passable as Lara despite those ripped abs and overall likeability.  The movie fails to do anything with her character that we haven’t seen before (rich girl hiding her richness?).  Add to this a terrible villain (Walton Goggins) who seems to do every movie villain stupid thing in the book (like choosing never to actually kill Lara or her Chinese deposable friend (Daniel Wu) even when they’re of no more use to him).  Also with an ending that is all sequel-bate with little to no justification for shady organization ‘Trinity’ being on the island …  I came away disappointed that still, Hollywood failed to deliver the care, respect or talent when it came  to a videogame adaptation.

Avoid – unless you’re a total Tomb Raider obsessive … and even then you deserve better.

Verdict:  2 /5