Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life

December 10, 2004

Rated: PG-13 Runtime: 130 min Rating: 2 out of 5 stars

Angelina Jolie is still hot, but she’s not enough to make this a really good movie.

We start off with an opening title sequence that really makes no sense, but that’s followed by Lara in a bathing suit doing stunts on a jetski, which makes perfect sense to us. From there we get Lara in a diving suit, Lara riding gear, Lara in biking gear, Lara at the mall, Lara in a parachute suit, Lara on safari… you get the idea.

There is a story here, but it’s even sillier than the first Tomb Raider movie. There’s this really bad guy who’s looking for Pandora’s Box (wasn’t that a porn movie?) which contains “anti-life” that he plans to sell as a biological weapon. This box is located in an area called The Cradle of Life, which turns out to be in Africa of course. Wait, did I just spoil something? After all, we don’t find out where the box is located until the last half hour of the movie. But of course, I can’t spoil that surprise since it’s been in every trailer for the last 6 months. Besides, who cares?

The stunt work is pretty good in this Tomb Raider adventure, but most of the stunts are just done for the sake of doing a stunt and have no real meaning in the movie. Also, some of the wire work is horrible. Specifically I’m remembering a scene where Lara is fighting among some Terra-cotta Warriors and runs along their heads.

Overall it’s not a bad way to kill an afternoon, but this one can certainly wait till DVD. And for those of you who just want to see Lara in her wetsuit, that all happens in the first 15 minutes of the movie. So next time you’re in the theater waiting on a good movie to start, just wander into The Cradle of Life and check the flotation devices to pass the time.

Posted by John | Filed Under 2 Stars, Action, Angelina Jolie, Chris Barrie, Ciaran Hinds, Djimon Hounsou, Gerard Butler, PG-13, Theatrical