When I saw footage for this movie at WonderCon a few months back, I wasn’t impressed so I skipped the advance screening and saw the film, “The Kids Are Alright” instead (review of The Kids Are Alright will be posted in a couple weeks with some Q&A from the writer/director). I heard a lot of bad things about Prince of Persia (it only has 39% on Rotten Tomatoes at the time of me writing this review and I’m sure it will go down) so I knew I made the right decision. Either way, I did end up watching it and in the beginning, I was really surprised – I liked it. However, as the movie continued, I saw what everyone was talking about.
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time is about a prince with no royal blood but a noble character which the King saw one day when adopting him as a boy off the streets of his kingdom. Tricked and betrayed, the prince, named Dastan and played by Jake Gyllenhaal, is turned into a wanted criminal in his own home. He flees with a princess named Tamina (Gemma Arterton) and discovers the power of a mysterious dagger which (if you couldn’t tell by the title of the movie or foreshadows in the opening scenes) can manipulate and turn back time. It’s inspired by a video game of the same name.
Jake Gyllenhaal (Prince Dastan) and Gemma Arterton (Princess Tamina)
It’s a time piece based in the time of Persia yet none of the actors looks Persian. It’s all sword fights, flying daggers, and brute strength. The fight scenes were pretty well done and there are definitely some cool parts especially with what they did with the snakes. The time effects are very visually appealing and depict what’s happening without words…when it comes to time travel and quirky chain of events, that’s sometimes hard to do and I feel that this movie did a good job on that. But don’t expect this movie to win an Oscar for set or costume design…they did have sand though, so that stayed true to the times I guess.
It’s supposed to be an action flick, period. And that part was good, but once it started trying to be something more, like a mythological drama alongside a love story between two great civilizations, the movie goes off track. As I said, I was surprised by the opening action scenes…it was entertaining and gripping. Even though a lot of it looked fake, the way it was filmed kept the flow moving fast and exciting. The action kept going for about an hour until the story started getting in the way. We’re introduced to the princess who introduces us to the legend of the dagger and the blah blah blah, I didn’t care for any of it.
The movie turned into your typical lost in the desert, find foes who turn into friends, figure out the mystery, and set things right movie like all The Mummys and other action adventure flicks. It’s a formula that writers keep using but I hope they would stop. Honestly, I got lost in the crap of the middle and end and just wanted it to end so I could get on with my life. If I controlled the dagger of time, I would go back to about an hour into the movie after one of the major action scenes and walk out of the theater.
Here’s the gist of it: Clash of the Titans follows a demigod (half man/half god) named Perseusas as he fulfils his fate to bring in the new era of man and replace the rule of the Gods. Man was created by Zeus and man’s prayers fuel the God’s immortality. However, Man started to grow tired of the Gods and started to turn on them. Hades, Zeus’s bitter brother, decides to use this opportunity to overthrow his brother and take power over both Gods and Man through his pet monster called the Kraken. Long story short (the movie is 2 hours long), this is yet another one guy goes on a journey, meets people along the way, finds himself, and saves the world movie. The visuals are pretty poor, the acting is blah, and the music is mundane. It definitely should not be in 3D, but more on that later…
