All is ‘Lost’
PWSA adapts cut-rate GRR Martin for a not so fresh spin on ‘Resident Evil’. Again.
In the Lost Lands
Director: Paul WS Anderson • Writer: Constantin Werner, based on the short story by George RR Martin
Starring: Milla Jovovich, Dave Bautista, Arly Jover, Amara Okereke, Fraser James
USA / Germany / Poland • 1hr 41mins
Opens Hong Kong Mar 20 • IIB
Grade: C-
You really have to admire director Paul WS Anderson’s commitment to his frequent (nine times now) leading lady Milla Jovovich. They’re the Cassavetes and Rowlands, the Jia and Zhao, the Coen and McDormand of B genre filmmaking. You also have to admire their joint commitment to making, essentially, the same film nine times. Perhaps they’re trying to get it right? After six Resident Evil films, an RE knock-off in Monster Hunter, and RE goes 19th century in the Anderson-Jovovich spin on The Three Musketeers, they’re back with another monochrome dystopia in which Ms Jovovich once again gamely swirls and kicks and shoots her way out of various dilemmas en route to completing a magical, mystical, prophetic quest.
Number nine is In the Lost Lands, based on a short story by George RR Tolkien, or JRR Martin or some shit. Kidding. It’s an old George RR Martin story that he gave up on serialising (that’s a sign, people), and indeed it includes a map with locations marked by little peaks and turrets, with names like Skull River, the Shadow’s Bane and the Fire Fields. There’s a grand inquisitor type, dirty slaves (I think), trading in coin at shady taverns and, you betcha, a Night King. Or Groot, depending on your POV. It’s the same pulpy nonsense Anderson has been coasting on since he gave up trying – probably after getting burned by Event Horizon (release the Anderson cut!).
Jovovich when asked to do this a 10th time
And there’s nothing wrong with pulpy nonsense as long as there’s a semblance of fun on display and a modicum of energy. In the Lost Lands really half-asses it, and even for fans of the genre – think Season of the Witch, The Last Witch Hunter, Solomon Kane – it’s derivative and lazy.
The world is a dystopian wasteland, so it’s 2025, and in the squalid City Under The Mountain, where the dirty slaves live in a… quarry? a neo-fundamentalist church rules with an iron fist instead of Anderson’s usual megacorporation (don’t worry, there are Umbrella references all over the place). The church’s grand inquisitor Ash (Arly Jover) is trying to hang the powerful witch Gray Alys (Jovovich and yes, Alys, like Alice) but she busts out and returns to her… stronghold? from where she grants wishes. “I refuse no one.” The queen of the City (relative newcomer Amara Okereke) comes asking for the power to change into a beast, kind of a werewolf thing living in the Lost Lands. A few minutes later, Captain of the Overwatch, Jerais (Simon Lööf), who’s in love with the queen, comes asking Alys to make sure she fails. Of course there’s some double-crossing hoo-hoo. The queen is married to the City… Overlord? but he’s convalescing and she’s just waiting to seize power.
Meanwhile, a lone outsider, Boyce (Dave Bautista), who’s also a… cowboy? comes into town for reasons. Oh, wait, he’s the queen’s side piece. Anyway, when Alys learns he’s in town she hires him to guide her to the Lost Lands to find the beast. She has until the full moon – AKA Wednesday.
Everything about In the Lost Lands feels recycled from the Resident Evil franchise, or from Game of Thrones, or 300, or Hardware, or a Sergio Leone spaghetti western, or the OG fantasy adventure Conan the Barbarian, the list goes on. The most cutting edge language Anderson uses is a combination of the requisite two-tone EMEA visual aesthetic; both North African orange-sepia and steely post-apocalyptic Eastern European blue are deployed here, created with fairly polished combination of CGI and location shooting. But we’ve seen the skulls crunching under boots a million times, as well as the indeterminate liquid dripping onto industrial ruins and the vaguely medieval un-civilisation that’s risen from the ashes of the last. Again, nothing wrong with that ungodly blend of fantasy and dystopia; Conan will never not rule, Reign of Fire (Butleeeeeeer!) wears its goofiness with aplomb, The Last of Us is almost perfect, and come on, the Mad Max franchise set the bar for this stuff (even with Mel Gibson). Even Resident Evil has its inspired moments of entertaining lunacy, but Jovovich looks over it, Bautista has been way better, and only Fraser James (Terminator: Dark Fate) hamming it up as the church’s Patriarch looks as if he’s having fun. The sometimes reliable IMDb says Anderson’s next film is The House of the Dead, which is about agents hunting down mutants created by a dodgy corporation. I can already see this – and I’ve got $20 right now says the lead agent is Jovovich.