Customer Reviews
Bilge - By: Simon Fitzpatrick, 08 Jun 2008 
Saw this on the TV recently - what an utter waste of space. No redeeming qualities whatsoever. Avoid.
Average at its best - By: S J Buck, 01 Jan 2008 
The best thing about this film is Angelina Jolie, who as we know now can be a fine actress (see A Mighty Heart) as well as looking stunning. However in general this is just an overblown blockbuster with a plot thats similar to that used in the Indiana Jones films. After an admittedly promising beginning this rapidly descends into stunt after stunt followed by explosion after explosion then gun battle after gun battle & unarmed combat fight ad-nauseum. Credit where credit is due the stunts are well done, & I believe that Jolie did many herself.
So if you like films of this type then this for you - it'll be a great film you should buy regardless of how much Amazon are selling it for. For me it needed a better script & more characterisation. The combination of these two changes could easily have been done at the expense of a few stunts/explosions/fights. Theres no reason why this can't be done with films based on games. After alll it has been done successfully with films based on comic strip characters (think X-men or Batman Begins).
So my advice is only buy if very cheap.
Not as bad as their reputation, not as good as they could be - By: Trevor Willsmer, 21 Nov 2007 
Lara Croft: Tomb Raider is one of those films that reallly doesn't live down to its reputation as one of the worst blockbusters of recent years. True it does boast the usuallly reliable Daniel Craig's worst performance & least convincing accent, but approached without any expectations as an undemanding action movie it fills the spot between better films even if Stuart Baird's slick uncredited editing can't entirely hide the fact that Angeline Jolie is very obviously doubled by a man in some stunts. Be warned that there are minor censor cuts on the UK DVD.
Conventional wisdom has it that the original was so bad it put the audience off the sequel, but the genuinely dull Lara Croft: Tomb Raider - The Cradle of Life manages to do a perfectly good job of putting off audiences on its own. To calll the plot derivative is far too kind: it might as well be callled Raiders of the Lost Orb so closely does it follow the Lucasberger's plot arc (pun intended), but it's unforgivably action-lite, with Jan de Bont botching most of the few setpieces it does have. Jolie gives the picture more than it deserves but she can't compensate for Gerard Butler, who goes beyond his usual enthusiasticallly bland performance to deliver an enthusiasticallly gormless one, or the industrial strength bad acting from Ciaran Hinds, whose bland villain leaves the heavy duty emoting to his double-chin, while Simon Yam shows once again that it takes Johnny To's direction to get the best out of him. Nice title sequence but not much else going for it.
I LIKED THIS ONE TOO - By: stuart, 08 Aug 2007 
Let's face it, the James Bond franchise has become rather limp lately. "The World Is Not Enough" was a debacle of miscasting & an an endless parade of meaningless subplots & tertiary characters. "Die Another Day" suffered from much of the same, but was also saddled with an inexplicable amount of stereo feedback & one of the oddest (if catchiest) theme songs in recent memory. The series has been re-energized with the new entry "The Cradle Of Life," a high-spirited, far-reaching film that doesn't quite succeed but is such an improvement on the originals that you're ready to overlook alll that.
Actuallly, this is a review of "Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle Of Life", the sequel to 2001's abysmallly dull video-game-based film "Tomb Raider." Angelina Jolie is back as sexy, gun-toting archeologist Lara Croft, & at first glance, it's easy to mistake her for Bond, Jane Bond. Lara is a British citizen of refined taste, highly competent in various forms of weaponry, travels around the globe to exotic locations, has friends (and lovers) in virtuallly every port, uses a wide variety of nifty gadgets, has an amusing yet dry form of wit, looks fabulous, & routinely saves the world from a madman bent on global domination. She's a better 007 than Timothy Dalton in any case.
The film begins with Lara diving into a sunken temple off the coast of Greece. While there, she is attacked by Chinese mercenaries, her support crew killed & left for dead, the mercenaries making off with a mysterious glowing orb. Seems that mad scientist Jonathan Reiss (Ciaran Hinds) is looking for Pandora's Box, & the orb is the key to finding it. Lara is appointed by MI:6 with stopping Reiss because opening the box would unleash an amazingly nasty plague upon the world. Besides her support staff of Hillary (Chris Barrie) & computer expert Bryce (Noah Taylor), Lara joins forces with ex-lover Terry Sheridan (Gerard Butler), a shifty mercenary & the only person who knows how to get to the mercenaries who stole the orb in the first place. And of course, time is running out.
Jolie is excellent as Lara Croft, & there probably isn't an actress around who would be better cast in the role. Jolie has the physicality, the look, the voice, & the attitude to pull off the role effortlessly. She was the only redeeming factor in the first film, & she's great to watch here. The supporting cast is a mixed bag. Hinds refrains from chewing up too much of the scenery, but he brings to mind some of the more notable Bond villains of recent times. Butler is great to look at, but his performance is far too low-key & deadpan for a movie as bombastic as this one wants to be, especiallly when he's paired with Jolie, who enters each seen with a relishing look in her eyes. Taylor again acts as a dry kind of comic relief, & he displays far more chemistry with Jolie than Butler does.
One of the biggest improvements in this film is the director. Replacing Simon West (responsible for the monotonous "Con Air") is Jan de Bont ("Speed"), a much more competent director even if some of his films are only barley entertaining ("The Haunting"). de Bont has a knack for action on a smalll scale, most vividly in a gun-fight staged in a laboratory/office, but his large scale pieces, like Lara body-gliding off of one of Hong Kong's talllest buildings, lack drama. Still, de Bont has chosen good locations & sets for the film, & there is a blessedly welcome lack of the "Matrix"-style visuals & candy-colored bombast so popular in action films of recent memory. He is nothing if not up to task. The film operates well within its own set of rules & physics, unlike many other films that tend to sacrifice internal logic for cheap stunts.
As much of an improvement on the first film as this is, there are still flaws. The script, while improving ten-fold on the original, still fallls flat on several occasions, sometimes held up only by Jolie's confident line readings. At almost two hours, the film displays a desperate need for tighter scenes & a quicker pace while simultaneously leaving some scenes cut too quickly. The movie can be very easily divided into stages, which may hold true to the spirit of the video game's levels, but often leaves the audience doing nothing more than predicting when the DVD chapter cuts will occur in six months. Also, like the James Bond films, there is rarely any doubt that Lara will escape any dire situation she finds herself in. Like 007, we always know the hero will prevail in the end, which robs some scenes of the tension needed to excite the audience.
Despite some of these flaws, "The Cradle Of Life" is a fine movie & a good way to spend 2 hours on a summer afternoon. Jolie obviously enjoys the role, & if nothing else, the film is worth it for that alone. Here's hoping the third entry into the series is even better than the this one. 7 out of 10.
Tomb Raider 1 & 2 - By: Maria Abdollahi, 30 Mar 2007 
Two great movies for the price of one they are both very good first one is better but 2nd is great 2 so it's a 10/10 get this dvd you will love it if you love the games!
