It’s very rare to leave the cinema thinking, “I’ve really wasted more than 90 minutes of my life watching it.” Usually I get something from what it was seeing. It’s joy or uplifting at best, perhaps at worst anger or frustration. These negative emotions mean that at least I feel anything. They are the emotions I can work and speak. But when I came out of the Borderlands movie, do you think I felt… indifference? What is the general feeling of “what was the point?” This is probably the most awful thing I can say about any art, but calling the Borderlands film “art” is too generous.
The film adaptation of Borderlands has been in the works since 2015, and will finally be here in ten years. For those who know what the story originally meant to do, this is what we ended up: Lilith (Cate Blanchett), the speaker of grace who seems no one cares about anything but making her next paycheck, is entrusted by the head of a major company to save her daughter, Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt). Things don’t plan accurately. Instead, she sets out on a journey with Tina. A big hulk and an unbearable joke from a man who is not obsessed with finding Roland (Kevin Hart), the merc soldier who kidnapped Tina, Krieg (Florian Munteanu), and Patricia Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis), who is obsessed with finding annoying candles for Patricia Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis).
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Most of the time, it’s a strong cast. Blanchett and Curtis are both Oscar-winning actresses. You’ll assume that fame will permeate the film. But as a lead in Borderland, Blanchett’s performance feels damp with regret. She has previously explained that she took up the role of saving her from insanity during Covid’s lockdown, but that energy is not seen in the finished product. All the lines seem to be emphasized by the fact that she really doesn’t know why she is there, which rubs against everyone else too.
Hart has been on a painless streak and despite playing an experienced soldier, he struggles to look cool at every moment. Munteanu lacks any of the charms Dave Bautista has and gives him Discount Drax. I think Curtis is fine enough. She is seasoned well enough to pull most roles apart like Black. That said, he laughed once from me, but all the other jokes failed to land. At least, Greenblatt seemed to enjoy her, even if her days as a Disney Channel actress still held back.
In fact, there is no development. I won’t ruin anything for you, but the only change that everyone really experiences is Lilith. When you watch the movie, anyone who played the game will see the big release that comes from a mile away. But anyone who isn’t playing the game doesn’t know why they should care. Her development has absolutely no emotions, so it drives everything because it’s not because everything wants to say something about the world, but because the plot needs to happen. All other characters are relegated to the role of “be there to make jokes or be inconvenient” and the plot thread is constantly dropped in the end. It somehow becomes boring and exhausting.
There must be Some Will you save grace? Maybe it was a strong direction, or did cinematography bring fun kinetic energy? no! At best, every scene is by numbers – when we first meet Roland and little Tina (the first character we saw in the film), both are framed in medium close-ups, with classic shot reverse shots. Seriously? Is this how we want them to meet these characters? There is no life. static. I couldn’t make it clear that there was little to offer for the next 100 minutes.
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Even the action that appears to raise the central stage in Borderlands’ adaptation is messy and unvibrant. The cut is desperate and the camera is always so close to the character that you don’t feel space. And that’s a shame of crying. Because this is actually a film that has some impressive sets. It all feels like a useless opportunity. The borderland world is fun, and none of them are displayed in any meaningful form.
After all this, I can’t help but ask, “What was the point?” Seriously, I can’t understand that. In other words, you know the real answer. The key is to make money by leveraging existing popular IPs and cashing in at the cinemas during that summer vacation. Of course, it drives video game sales. What is the point? do not have Here, bring something new to the table: explore the world of video games from a new perspective. After all, that helped breakthrough the fallout television show into the mainstream.
Borderlands movies exist simply because they exist. There was clearly no desire from one member of the crew to create something that no one else had ever seen before. The attempt here is to print money. Certainly it’s mostly in Hollywood, but this particular film feels like a terrible example of a vapid and creatively bankrupt crime. Don’t watch Borderlands – ask your friends who love the game to explain how it’s really good. You will have a better time.