Assassin’s Creed (2016)

Review

115min

Genre:       Action, Adventure, Sci-fi

Director:    Justin Kurzel

Cast:         Michael Fassbender, Marion Cotillard, Jeremy Irons…and more

Writers:     Michael Lesslie, Adam Cooper and Bill Collage

-Synopsis-

Michael Fassbender stars as dangerous criminal “Callum Lynch”; co-opted by a powerful and advanced organisation to unlock the memories of his deadly ancient Assassin ancestors, becoming an unwitting player in an age-old sinister power game in this adaptation of the hugely successful video game series from the director of 2015’s ‘Macbeth’.

Judging from the success of the partnership between Aussie director Justin Kurzel and cinematographer Adam Arkapaw in 2015’s visually arresting adaptation of ‘Macbeth’, Ubisoft clearly saw them as a natural choice to adapt their beloved series for the screen and propel the video game company into major film production, following the recent path taken by Blizzard Entertainment with last year’s ‘Warcraft’. Moving away from the narrative of the original game and deliberately separating their gaming franchise from a potential movie one, Ubisoft and the screenwriters have changed the principal characters and moved the setting from The Crusades in the East to late 15th century Inquisition-era Spain, but keep the core of this unique story intact and introduce it to a non-gamer audience.

Thanks to his extensive acting abilities and sheer physicality, Fassbender is an inspired choice as the film’s lead “Callum”; a product of a difficult upbringing whose indiscretions as a career criminal result in the forfeit of his life, making him an unsuspecting pawn for a corporation with roots in an ancient Christian order. Under the leadership of CEO “Alan Rikkin” (Jeremy Irons) and his daughter/lead scientist “Sofia” (Marion Cotillard); they use advanced technology to propelling “Callum’s” consciousness back 500 years into the body  of his ancient assassin ancestor, unlocking his “genetic memories” to find a divine artefact which could change the course of human history, but as usual “the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry”.

Its $125 million budget allowing for top-notch visual effects, production and costume design, ‘Assassin’s Creed’ is unsurprisingly a dynamic and vivid visual spectacle, featuring impressive action set-pieces and dazzling visuals. Kurzel and Arkapaw capture the juxtaposition of a clean futuristic present against a dusty and impressively recreated Inquisition era provincial Spain, featuring the game’s blend of real historical context populated mythical figures and action-packed fictional events.

So with the full support and guidance of Ubisoft, a high-calibre cast of leads and all the technical luxuries a considerable budget can afford, all that’s left to make this more than a lavish 21st century action flick and elevate it beyond another “video game film” is the all-important narrative… but that’s just where ‘Assassin’s Creed’ starts to trip over its own feet.

Rather than leverage what made the game series so original and popular by keeping the narrative balance tipped on the side of the historical part of the story, the film is heavily slanted towards the overly familiar present day sci-fi side, effectively making what happens in the 15th century an excuse for elaborate fight sequences and “parkour” rooftop chase scenes… albeit some awesome ones to be fair.

In the all-too-brief moments when the story does jump back 500 years, the focus is on a tiny microcosm of the Spanish Inquisition, with very little story and virtually no character development happening in what should be the most interesting part of the narrative.

Perhaps the historical storyline was hampered by the choice of having everyone speak in Spanish for historical accuracy, limiting Irishman Fassbender’s scope for a dramatic performance, or perhaps the producers are teasing what may be coming in the sequel currently in development, but it’s just too little too late. And judging from the lukewarm critical reception and poor performance at the box-office, the return of “Callum Lynch” may not be imminent… unless that is if Chinese audiences have something to say about it in February.

Aside from the poor past/present narrative balance though, the thing which limited ‘Assassin’s Creed’ the most was Ubisoft’s decision to completely separate its video game franchise from the films it inspires, effectively taking storylines from “The Crusades” and Renaissance Italy off the table and depriving the writers of a much richer narrative ore to mine for characters and stories. Although this isn’t anywhere near as poor of a film as the critical consensus has judged it to be, it ultimately feels like a huge missed opportunity which we hope an inevitable sequel will make up for.

The Bottom Line…

Despite its merits as an enthralling visual spectacle and thoroughly enjoyable escapist entertainment… at times, ‘Assassin’s Creed’ isn’t a well-rounded or committed enough action sci-fi to be elevated beyond just a cinematic video game adaptation… albeit a better one than most. With a poorly balanced storyline and some questionable narrative choices imposed by Ubisoft, Justin Kurzel’s dynamic visual epic amounts to a noble effort, which ultimately fails to do justice to a unique and beloved video game series and the engrossing original story which spawned it all.

Similar films you may like (Home Video)

Avatar (2009)

Intent on exploiting the lush but wild moon of distant planet, a ruthless corporation and their hired guns use a young crippled marine and his genetic traits to transfer his consciousness into an “Avatar”, and infiltrate the fiercely protective indigenous species. But when deep connections are made and agendas are exposed, a struggle develops into a battle which will test allegiances in James Cameron’s groundbreaking visual epic and most commercially successful film of all time.

Directed by James Cameron and starring Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana and Sigourney Weaver  among others.

Comments

comments

Comments are closed.