This review first ran at www.SixSeeds.tv
The official start to summer, and the summer blockbuster season, happens this Memorial Day weekend. So far, the early blockbusters have been, as the kids say, “meh.” Iron Man 2 was acceptable, in a derivative way, but Robin Hood was a major disappointment. At last, The Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time gives us a film that lives up to expectations.
Jake Gyllenhaal plays the Prince Dastan, a street urchin picked from obscurity and adopted by the Emperor of the Persian Empire (Ronald Pickup). This monarch presides with wisdom over a vast kingdom, training his two biological sons and one adopted son in the ways of sound leadership. He relies on his trusted brother Nizam (Ben Kingsley) for advice and support.
The Persian Empire isn’t anything you’d recognize from history books, but looks like a combination of Pirates of the Caribbean and Indiana Jones. But with more guyliner.
The three brothers, on their father’s behalf, invade a holy city. Inside the lovely city, the beautiful princess Tamina (Gemma Artertion) guards a sacred dagger with fiery spunk. The dagger has mystical powers that drive the plot of the film. However, there is a traitor in the city. Soon Dastan and Tamina find themselves on the run from the entire Persian army.
They soon accumulate more enemies. A funny, tax-hating outlaw runs the Persian equivalent of a Vegas casino. He wants the royal fugitives to pay for destroying his ostrich racing ring. His deadly Nubian knife-throwing buddy wants to use them for target practice. And a tribe of spooky Hassassins, complete with pet adders, wants to steal the dagger and feed their carcasses to their snakes.
Pausing only to cross scimitars with bad guys, sneak into throne rooms, and run up walls like Spiderman, Prince Dastan and Princess Tamina spar with each other as they travel Disney’s idea of the ancient world.
The movie works because it doesn’t ever take itself the least bit seriously. You can tell it’s ancient Persia because the map tells you so. The men wear smudgy makeup, everyone speaks in British accents, and the army carries crossbows, which I’m pretty sure weren’t invented until the Middle Ages. No one cares.
Just dig a canal in the set, plug in some Persian themed boats, and you’re ready to open the latest DisneyLand attraction. The desert plains, sacred temples, stone castles, and enchanted gardens never existed in real life, but feel very familiar in a Hollywood, fairy tale way.
The entire movie is an excuse for lots of fighting with everything from broadswords to arrows to whips to throwing knives. It’s the kind of PG-13 violence in which the blows are unrelenting, but no one ever seems truly hurt. Anonymous soldiers who take an arrow to the chest simply get a goofy look on their face and fall out of the shot. Even the few death scenes are hard to get worked up over.
Dastan and Tamina have just the right adversarial chemistry that turns into a satisfying love story. She’s spunky, angry and determined. She voices her opinions of Dastan loudly. He gives as good as he gets, but retains a chivalrous core. They manage to accomplish all this tension and romance without innuendo or anything inappropriate. The film is rated PG-13 for sequences of violence and action and is appropriate for older kids.
It all works for popcorn flavored fun with an Indiana Jones vibe. At one point, Tamina even rolls under a closing gate and one can almost hear the Indian Jones theme in the background. With all the unnecessarily serious “Robin Hoods” of the world, we could use a little bit more Indiana Jones in our life.
When the end ties up with a nice bow and a sweet lesson on brotherhood, the last arrow has fallen to the ground, the last whip cracked, and the last kiss kissed, you’ll be glad you took that Disney ride. It’s a nice way to spend an afternoon.
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