The Assassin’s Creed movie by 20th Century Fox is hoping to break the video game movie curse. Does this new film deliver the goods?
2016 was not a good year for video games movies (or anything really). Ratchet & Clank was a Box Office bomb and Warcraft failed to excite the casual audience. Ubisoft and 20th Century Fox now presents to us Assassin’s Creed.
I’ve heard a lot of bad things about the Assassin’s Creed movie and my expectations were very low going into it. I heard it was slow, boring and the action was bad. Well to my surprise, the movie was not as bad as everyone claims it is.
First of all, let’s talk about the story. Michael Fassbender plays the role of Callum Lynch and he has been captured by Abstergo. Abstergo (controlled by the Templars) want Callum to revisit the past in order to find out the location of the Apple of Eden. Whoever holds the Apple of Eden controls the free will of all mankind.
I will say this movie is better to watch if you have played the Assassin’s Creed video games. If you are a novice, you may not know what’s going on as the movie doesn’t do a good job of telling you the importance of the Apple of Eden or anything else for that matter.
There are some plot twists along the way and the story picks up the more you watch it until the end. The only parts that really drag on is when Callum is stuck inside Abstergo not doing much. There are slow boring parts, although they don’t last too long since the movie itself is less than 2 hours.
The action set pieces are exciting and are choreographed really well. Many of the deadly moves you see in the games have been added here including the famous swan dive. The stunt guys did a really good job in this movie as the fights are great.
The only thing that ruins the action is that the editing gets too choppy at times. It goes back to the past and present constantly to show us that Callum is replicating the movie in the Animus machine. This is different from the games where Desmond is just lying there.
Another thing that might annoy some people is the fact that the film takes place in the present more than it does in the past. You only get to see the Spanish Inquisition time era three times in the entire movie. You don’t really get to know the characters in this timeline as the story elements mainly focus on Callum in the present.
As for the acting, it’s really good. Michael Fassbender is one of the most consistent actors in Hollywood today and does a great job playing as both Callum and his ancestor Aguilar de Nerha. Marion Cotillard is also solid as Sophia Rikkin who works at Abstergo.
Verdict:
Overall, Assassin’s Creed the movie is not a perfect film, but it’s not the train-wreck that other people have been saying. The movie was paced well and the action was great. The main flaws is that it focuses well too much in the present day and people that haven’t played the games won’t understand the story.
