Borderlands

First off, I know nothing about a Borderlands game. I just saw a flashy trailer with some promising stars and thought, sure, I'll give it a go.

A bit surprised to see Cate Blanchett in it... could she pull off a badass, wise-cracking bounty hunter? Turns out she could - definitely a strong point in the film. Indeed, there was quite a bit of good acting talent in it - AND Kevin Hart. And yet, somehow it all seemed wasted. (Why did they bother with Jack Black?) I quickly accepted the lurid art direction - especially after finding out its game origins. And, not having any comparisons to make, was fine with the cast. But what really let it down was the lazy writing.

I'd even go along with the fairly thin, derivative plotline if it was an enjoyable journey along the way. But the dialogue was a string of tired lines trying to be hip and edgy and falling very flat. Clearly this was intended to be action/comedy - and the action was actually ok - but Eli should have handed over some the comedy content to people with the right skills. I get a lot more laughs out of a late night talk show monologue.

So, while it looked pretty cool - and the fight scene using Motorhead's Ace of Spades sounded cool - ultimately, I just didn't get enough personality from any of the characters to care what happened to them. (With Furiosa a similar-looking movie, it gave me renewed respect for George Miller as a writer/director.)

So right up front I'm HUGE borderlands game fan. Always have been. Now with that in mind I came in with certain expectations. And I'm going to give you an honest review.

First the casting, I thought it would be dreadful, but to my surprise even though it wasn't the best casting, the actors did an amazing job playing their respective characters. Having said that the ones I would change out are Tina, Moxie, and Roland. They all did their thing, and it was good for them no doubt, but sadly they were not the right casting for those particular roles.

And here's how you can tell. Tina in this movie is a kind of lost girl with explosives, but you get this sense that she kind of needs protecting, and in the game it was completely the opposite. Even the bandits wouldn't mess with her because she was so wildly deranged. That insanity is her defining trait, not having it killed the character. Moxie was more sexy than badass in the game, in the movie the sexiness took a huge backseat and the problem with that is that it IS her personality. You can't just change that in a character. Which brings us to Roland, I love Kevin Hart. And he did a great job portraying Roland, but here's the thing Roland was a completely different physique and completely different personality in the games. He was way more serious, and that's not Kevin's forte, of course it's not, he's a comedian. So like I said, those are just bad casting choices.

Now onto the actual movie, the story was... well not the version of the story we had in the games, which is weird because you know the established fanbase wants that story right? It doesn't have to be the same exact one but it has to be close and this one wasn't it. Now even all of this I can forgive, but what I can't forgive is the PG-13 garbage. Borderlands games are a hardcore rated R+ genre, you absolutely can't change it to PG-13, gut the script to have stupid lines that don't go at all with the scenes and expect anyone to like it. It doesn't work.

6/10 Great acting, mediocre casting/plot, terrible writing. PG-13 rating sunk it.

Oh come on - it's not that bad! True, there isn't an original thought in it's hundred minute duration and it does look like a very poor relation to a video-game, but it's "Mad Max" meets "Buck Rogers" vibe just about entertained me. It's all about "Lilith" (Cate Blanchett) who is a renowned bounty hunter charged by gazillionaire "Atlas" (Edgar Ramirez) with finding his kidnapped daughter "Tina" (Ariana Greenblatt). Thing is, she's already been rescued by "Roland" (Kevin Hart) and is in no great rush to return to the loving arms of daddy. Whilst trying to track her down, "Lilith" encounters the true star of the film - the robot "Claptrap", a sarcastic pile of scrap who decides to help out whether she likes it or not, so off they go a-child-hunting. Yep - it proceeds exactly as you'd expect, except for the frankly bamboozling contribution of Jamie Lee Curtis (and her red glasses) who does look like she's enjoying herself on set but, like Blanchett, is just a complete fish out of water as the banal dialogue and set-piece combat scenes pass the entire project into the hands of the CGI developers. This is nothing at all special or memorable, just a predictable action enterprise that takes "Robot Wars" to the desert, but if you aim low and take it in the spirit it's clearly intended then it's a perfectly watchable summer adventure.

This adaptation strips everything that was fun about the Borderlands games.

The plot is as generic as they come. Even the 'shocking twist' was laughable.

The jokes mostly don't land. Clap Trap is amusing but nothing to write home about.

Most action scenes are completely unwarranted and seem to serve the short runtime or the absence of plot.

Most of all it seems as though the only that was kept from the original games are the character names and locations.

Not try to gatekeep here, it's just a bad movie. It doesn't hold up even on it's own. So people who came to see the movie not knowing what its about are bound to be disappointed.

Plot

An infamous bounty hunter returns to her childhood home, the chaotic planet Pandora, and forms an unlikely alliance with a team of misfits to find the missing daughter of the most powerful man in the universe.

Cast

Blanchett, Hart, Curtis, Greenblatt, Munteanu, Gavankar, Black, Ramírez. Nobody can say it doesn't have a great cast! And surprisingly and very out of character made by Eli Roth! (Though it doesn't feel like it).

Verdict

Borderlands was doomed straight out of the gate, and where would I even begin in explaining why.

I mean for a start video game adaptations almost always fail. Why? Because generally they're made by Hollywood folks who aren't gamers, so it's not loyal, it misses the target audience and it simply isn't what it was intended to be.

Next, the casting. I mean are you serious? This is some of the most confusing baffling casting in the history of the industry and lets look at why.

Kevin Hart as Roland? Rolland is a tough guy big muscular soldier. So they cast diddy little Hart? Who thought that was a good idea. He to his credit does his best here, but it just doesn't work.

Jamie Lee Curtis as Tannis? Just why? She's 25-30yrs too old to be in that role and her presence in the movie is so minimal she contributes absolutely nothing anyway.

Blanchett? Again, too old. And let me be clear she's a fantastic actress and I would consider myself a fan, but she was badly miscast here and as much as she makes the most of it this was a poor choice and should been a role taken by someone in their 20's or even 30's, not 50's.

And Tiny Tina? To her credit Greenblatt was great here in her role. But that role is NOT Tiny Tina. Did the writers even play the games for a moment? That was not Tiny Tina in the slightest and shouldn't be considered so.

So what with the video game curse and the offensively bad casting the movie was DOA, though to its credit they at least made a trailer that I thought looked like it could be at least half entertaining. Alas you seem to be able to do that with any movie these days because Borderlands isn't half entertaining, in fact I'd argue it's a tenth at best.

You see it's your bog standard American Hollywood formulaic CGI laden no brains and all flare foolishness. You'll predict every single scene with absolute ease and hate yourself when it the credits roll for wasting 90 minutes of your life on something which you can with confidence say you could have done better yourself.

In my opinion Borderlands isn't bad for the reasons I keep hearing but make absolutely no mistake it's bad.

Rants

One of the biggest complaints I keep seeing/hearingis that it's too cutesy, that it should be more violent, that the creators had clearly never played a Borderlands game because if they had it would be R rated. My response to this, WHY? I've played every Borderlands game and I have no idea why people are saying this.

The borderlands games....

Sex, none.

Nudity, none.

Bad language, minimal Violence, it's cartoony cel-shaded graphics with minimal blood. It's one rung up the ladder from Fortnite!

So no, the movie shouldn't have been R rated because the games most certainly aren't!

The Good

Big flashy colorful, all the things that keep your attention Most of the performances were actually good despite the poor casting Quite a few great nods to fans of the games

The Bad

Awful casting The ending was dire Too formulaic.