Richard Laurent Takes On PRINCE OF PERSIA!!

Merrick here...
Richard Laurent sent in this detaled look at the Bruckheimer produced, Mike Newell directed PRINCE OF PERSIA: THE SANDS OF TIME, which hits theaters at the end of this month. This is a pretty nice/thorough write-up, which we really appreciate Richard taking the time to share with our readers. I'll get out of his way now and let his review do the rest.
Here's Richard Laurent...

I'm going to break this review down into a few segments. Avoid the Story section if you want to avoid spoilers. The rest of it should be relatively spoiler free. So, it's based on a video game series, and apparently one specific entry of that. I haven't played Prince of Persia since my Amiga 500 days, so my knowledge of the source material is minimal. I've seen the Pirates of the Caribbean films (the most obvious reference point for Prince of Persia), and while I didn't like the first one as much as I wanted too (it was too long, and I loved the concept far more than the execution), I genuinely disliked the sequels. Keep in mind that's the POV that the following is coming from. Story (spoilers) The titular Prince Dastan (Jake Gyllenhaal) is the black sheep of his family. Plucked by the King from obscurity in the slums, he has been taken into the royal family and is the youngest of three sons. While his brothers have their distinct roles (Prince Tus - Richard Coyle is preparing for his future role as the King, Prince Garsiv - Tony Kebbell heads up the army), Darstan is in control of a band of rag-tags who are unorthodox in their methods, but seemingly successful. The Princes believe that weapons are being hidden within the nearby city of Alamut, and after conferring with their uncle Nazim (Sir Ben Kingsley), they disobey the King's orders and perform an invasion on the city. Yes, it's a really loosely veiled metaphor for the Iraq invasion. Shrug it off because the rest of the plot offers little else of depth, just plenty of crowd-pleasing antics. Dastan's group enters through the rear, ignoring the military plan, but succeeding in breaching Alamut's walls. The others follow suit and the first battle begins. The Princess of Alamut is Tamina (Gemma Arterton) who insists that the city has nothing to hide and deserves none of this invasion. Long story short, Dastan ends up with a nifty looking dagger for his efforts, and provides his father, the King, with a gift of a robe that his brother Tus has passed onto him. However, the robe is poisoned, and Dastan must flee, believed to have murdered the king. Princess Tamina helps him escape and the two head on a journey to avoid trouble and clear Dastan's name. Tamina knows the secret of the dagger Dastan has procured, and has her own motivations for the journey. Darstan immediately suspects Tus of framing him, and attempts to locate his uncle Nazim during the funeral for his father. However, he realises that Nazim has been behind the King's murder. Dastan learns of the power that the mystical dagger holds, much to Tamina's chagrin, as he turns back time to avoid an attack from Tamina in order to steal the dagger back, using all the sand within the dagger in the process, as it can only turn back time for one minute before it's empty - unless you have the source of the Sands of Time running through it, constantly refilling it as sand runs out. Now both having some idea of what power they currently hold, as well as knowing that they need to refill the dagger and stop Nazim from procuring it, they continue on their journey so that Tamina can place the Dagger of Time in some safe temple. He and Tamina end up in the Valley of the Slaves, a den of gambling, entertainment, and run by Sheik Amar (Alfred Molina). Amar keeps them captive in the Valley, serving drinks and working at the ostrich races (no joke), until Tamina and Dastan make an escape. They spend the remainder of the second act trying to trust each other while avoiding Sheik Amar, until they team up with Amar and earn his respect and proceed to lose the dagger to Nazim. The third act basically consists of the motley crew (Dastan, Tamina, Amar, Amar's knife throwing guy) making a raid on Nazim's stronghold to steal the dagger back and stop him from turning back time far enough to when he saved the his brother, the King's life as they were children, thus ensuring that Nazim would rule as King and stopping the existence of the Princes. Everything goes as expected, and time is turned back to before the invasion of Alamut, leaving Dastan to make good on his earlier mistake of heading the invasion and destruction of the city, proving his worth to the royal family. He stops his uncle's plan before it starts, and proves that the threat to the King's life came from his brother. Tamina shares a knowing look with Dastan as, while only whoever is holding the Dagger of Time remembers how things were, she understands about the dagger, and thus knows what to expect. Oh, and there's a voiceover at the start, along with text at the opening and closing. It's about destiny. The film. It's a tale of destiny. If Batman Begins was about fear, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time is about destiny. Let's move on. Performances So the big question here is obvious. How does Jake stand up to an action-adventure hero role? Pretty damn well actually. He's got the physical presence, the charm, the energy required for something like this. You know that kind of broad comedy that's wedged into every single mainstream blockbuster? He nails it. His interplay with Arterton's Tamina works well, at least on his side. Jake's going to come out of this smelling like roses and getting a fair few new job opportunities coming his way. A great pick by Bruckheimer. Oh, and his first action scene is climbing up the wall as the arrows are shot into it, as seen in one of the trailers. It's effortlessly fun. Arterton does less so. Remember the interplay between Indiana Jones and Marion Ravenwood in Raiders of the Lost Ark? Yeah… it ain't that good. It's more along the lines of their interplay in Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. It's not stilted, and it works to an extent, but it's certainly not a swing out of the park. She does the job, but the costumes don't allow her to be "sexy" enough compared to Quantum of Solace, and she comes out of the film okay, but really cannot hold up to Jake's Dastan. That's not her fault, but more in the scripting of the thing. Dastan's funny. engaging, and Gyllenhaal pulls this off perfectly. Arterton tries to match him but doesn't quite get there. Doesn't mean she's not decent in it, but she comes off second best. Sir Ben as Nazim chews the scenery, particularly in the third act. He's doing this for fun and it shows. He does the job, but he's underwhelming compared to what you know he can deliver. The other performance highlight (besides Jake) is Alfred Molina. We're talking about a character that hates taxes, governments, loves gambling and debauchery, and more importantly, the money that comes from it. Molina is really funny and definitely brings something to the table. He's having a blast making this film, and it shows every moment that he's on screen. Direction It's at this point I'd like to trademark the term "Prince of Parkour". Yes, I know it's in the game, but anyone who hasn't played the games will immediately notice the amount of free-running that is in every chase or action scene in this flick. It's not a bad thing, but there's a fair bit of it. Newell does a pretty decent job of the battles, especially during the first battle where there's a few shops that pull out from one side of the city, pan, push in on another part of the city, and keeps moving in to a specific target (an internal gate, for instance). A little bit showy without being utterly shameless, it also does something Michael Bay fails to do in Transformers (or Revenge of the Fallen): it situates the audience. It leaves the audience knowing the geography of the location, and knowing what is relative to each other as far as the intercut scenes. Is it a genius move? Nope. But it does the job. Newell manages to keep the pacing moving along, and that's the key thing here. You're not going to be looking at your watch 40 minutes into this film's 110 minutes and think to yourself "When's it going to end? Another friggin' hour?". There's some awful "modern" (read: quick cuts, slow motion, etc) in some of the fight scenes, but it's not outstandingly bad. Newell works alright as a cog in a production bigger than him, and this isn't going to be a revelatory film for him, but he does a satisfactory job. VFX With a budget this big (rumoured to be about $200M+) you don't want shonky visual effects and for the most part, Prince of Persia's effects are very successful. As with all modern blockbusters, you look at it and know it's CG because it's ridiculous and/or impossible to film it otherwise, but rarely do the effects stand out as being bad. There's a couple of dodgy shots here and there, but hey, it's like that in Iron Man 2 as well. The only issue I did have with the visuals was in the scenes where the Dagger of Time is used. As you can see in the trailer, whoever is holding it has this weird immolation-looking effect rip through them. What you don't see in the trailer is time going backwards, and when that's happening, the shots look rather… odd. Think the Marla and Jack sex scene in Fight Club. It's got a distanced, false look to it, and I believe that's an intentional stylistic choice. Did it work for me? Not hugely, but your mileage may vary. It's not distracting for the most part, and it never lasts long on screen. Overall, the effects hold up fine for what the film is without being truly exceptional. Final Thoughts The film works. It achieves what it sets out to do. Is it the next Pirates? I'm probably not the guy to ask. Jake is great fun, the story bounces along, Arterton isn't useless, and everyone is having a good time, especially Molina. The plot works fine, and if you're a fan of the game, I'm sure you'll find more to nitpick and possibly a few nods to the fanboys. As far as a videogame adaptation, it's easily the best out of the ones I've seen, and I've seen a fair few. It doesn't feel like a videogame adaptation at any point in the film, and that is, I feel, the key to this film's success. Bruckheimer has produced a film based off a videogame, just as he produced a film based off a theme park ride. He hasn't attempted to produce some kind of live action videogame that the audience merely watches as their best friend from across the street (or Bruckheimer) plays. while the audience is really just wanting to pick up the controller themselves. Will it be massive? Probably not. Will it be a big crowd pleaser coming the end of May? Definitely.

3 stars out of 5.