In the realm of movie types that arrive, my oft-repeated mantra is that I do not allow myself to get excited about video game movies. It’s a subgenre plagued with so many misfires that it should have accidentally produced at least one (non-ironically) great movie by now. Still, at least we can settle for a few better-than-average efforts and some terrific TV shows. An adaptation of Borderlands makes a lot of sense in the abstract, with the benefit of not feeling as redundant as making an Uncharted movie. Having played multiple entries in the Gearbox Software/2K game series, there’s potential to deliver a colorful action-comedy that, yes, would feel akin to doing for video game movies what Guardians of the Galaxy did for Marvel Studios. Alas, while keying into a certain visual familiarity, this Eli Roth-directed feature felt as though I was watching one of James Gunn’s Guardian entries minus the work put into making them funny, memorable, dramatically compelling, let alone interesting in any way beyond admiring the casting director’s efforts.
A brief prologue provides some backstory, and it is the first of many attempts to adopt sarcastic narration to generate humor around the idea that the story is very familiar. Essentially, deep into the future, many humans have found their way to the planet of Pandora (the other Pandora), a wasteland full of scavengers, bounty hunters, and other irreputable types. Cate Blanchett plays Lilith, a skilled bounty hunter with a mysterious past who has been sent to the desert planet to find Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt), the daughter of the most powerful businessman in the universe, Atlas (Edgar Ramírez). Tina was last seen with Roland (Kevin Hart), a former mercenary, and Krieg (Florian Munteanu), a muscled-up escaped convict and the young girl’s protector. Lilith is into this job for the money, but were she to form an alliance with this crew, they could find their way to a mysterious yet hotly desired vault said to contain all sorts of riches and power.
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Source fidelity is not necessarily the key thing I’m looking for when it comes to adaptations; however, the unique aspect of video game movies stems from the idea that they are being created with fans more in mind than average. As a result, I’ve been happy to say the film seems to at least resemble the Borderlands games in the lead-up to seeing the movie. Having now seen it, with an excessive budget for an untested cinematic IP (partially the result of reshoots and COVID factors), I can say this remains true, but the film still curiously looks expensive and cheap, often within the same moment. There’s a level of scale present to a point, and the production and costume design suggest plenty of research done to approach the heavily stylized nature of the games. At the same time, there’s something very static about a movie featuring a dynamic cast and action sequences that should rely on tons of elaborate weapons.
Director Roth has dabbled in areas outside of horror, whether it’s his unremarkable Death Wish remake or the surprisingly good YA adaptation of The House with a Clock in Its Walls. Still, whether or not he was outmatched for a sci-fi/action movie with a modest blockbuster budget, as the co-writer of the film as well, he seems to be relying a lot on the film getting by through zippy energy and amusing cast banter. Sadly, that’s just not what’s taking place on screen. Instead, so much of the film feels like it’s going through the motions of this kind of story, which would be fine if it were self-aware enough to call out its cliches. Instead, aside from some sarcastic narration beats, as mentioned, Borderlands takes the lore and the stakes surprisingly seriously while being convinced its mild quips are killing with the crowd.
The cast is of little help here. Far be it from me to say Cate Blanchett isn’t putting in her all, as she’s at least onboard. And there is something promising about a movie making a 50+ prestige actress the lead of a wacky video game movie, but that at least suggests she and Roth got along on their previous collaboration. Still, while given a funky hairdo and adopting the attitude of someone who doesn’t want to be here (without making it seem like a meta gag about the movie), her Lilith is pretty plain. Similarly, Kevin Hart (who hasn’t been in a live-action theatrical film since 2019’s Jumanji sequel) either decided to specifically not try and be overtly funny or was instructed to play it all very straight. I’m all for going against type, but it robs Roland of any personality beyond a clichéd tough guy. I could go on, but it amounts to their being precious little time spent getting to see more than just how these characters react to situations they find themselves in.
Of all the characters to latch onto, Jack Black’s Claptrap is the one with the most spirit. This is a CG character in the film, functioning here and in the games as, “What if R2-D2 was a wiseass chatterbox.” While the games have inspired all sorts of cosplay, Claptrap is essentially the mascot, and he fits well in the film as a consistent source of comic relief. That said, when you have both a mouthy but well-meaning robot and Oscar-winner Jamie Lee Curtis in the same movie, you don’t expect the robot to be the one stealing every scene. Alas, despite fun costume design for all, if this is a team Lionsgate hopes to see breakout with audiences, I’d be hard-pressed to understand why.
As the plot rolls along, various events and action sequences occur with no real flare. The games emphasize the utilization of “87 bazillion guns,” but this film has no regard for that element. Pandora, as a planet, is designed to be ugly, but it’s also full of outrageous creatures, nasty villains, and is chock-full of gore. This is a bloodless PG-13 feature that seems to count the number of monsters it can show at any one time without disturbing the budget too much. Much like the whole Rebel Moon debacle, it’s not that an R-rating would automatically make this better, but with so many generic sci-fi/action movies out there, yes, there is something that would stand out by seeing the studio behind Saw and The Expendables deliver an over-the-top kill fest about a bunch of naughty bounty hunters. Instead, this film wants to offer a new untraditional movie family to support but has done none of the work to have us relate to them, let alone find them all that interesting.
At the very least, Borderlands doesn’t seem like it took the title and threw the rest out the window. Still, that doesn’t stop this film from feeling like a generic knock-off of plenty of other movies with little of the same sort of effort put behind it. There’s a chosen one narrative, supposedly fun banter, a collection of notable songs on the soundtrack, and not a lick of originality behind any of it. It’s not quite a drag to watch, as the movie moves along quickly enough (though it does feel edited to the bone, especially the climax), but it all amounts to very little. So no, the looters didn’t rob me of time, but it still just gave me the scraps of better movies.
Borderlands opens in theaters and IMAX on August 9, 2024.
