Assassin’s Creed review – a dry and lifeless adaptation

by | 1 Jan 2017 | Film Reviews

‘Callum Lynch explores the memories of his ancestor and gains the skills of a Master Assassin.’

You have to give the studios some credit when it comes to video game adaptations. After decades of mostly failed, or at best, mixed films, they still prove very tenacious and committed in churning them out in the hope of finding that perfect translation, even when the math is now hopelessly against them.

Maybe it’s because video games are becoming more cinematic in tone and story telling that they feel it’s only a matter of time before we get a truly masterful adaptation. The cynic in me though thinks it’s mostly because the studios know that the film will come already with an inbuilt audience and fan base and will make an easy profit regardless of quality.

Either way, Assassin’s Creed, directed by Justin Kurzel, is the next attempt at producing this elusive masterpiece of a movie based on a video game. Set within the same universe but following an original story and characters, the plot follows Callum Lynch, played by Michael Fassbender, as a man with a troubled life after witnessing his father kill his mother at a young age.

After being convicted of capital murder, he is executed by lethal injection only to find himself in the hands of Abstergo Industries, ran by Jeremy Irons shady CEO and his daughter Sophia Rikkin (Marion Cotillard). They connect him to a machine that allows him to relive the events of his ancestor Aguilar de Nerha, a 15th century member of a secret organisation called The Assassins who are locked in a war with the Knights Templar. They do this in order to gain the whereabouts of an ancient artefact called the Apple of Eden, with which they can subjugate mankind and end all violence.

Firstly, as a disclaimer, I have never played any of these games so I am judging Assassin’s Creed purely as a film on its own as I have limited knowledge of its similarities and differences to the games and how much they have in common. As a cinematic experience then, the story doesn’t translate well on to the big screen. It’s convoluted and overly confusing at times and the concept of tapping into ancestors memories and skills borderline on the ridiculous; this may fit within the game but feels out of place as a movie.

Also the idea of an artefact that can take away all free will seems pretty far-fetched. Sci-fi works best when it’s based on something that we could actually see happening, or taking an aspect of modern technology and exploring where it could go in a more grounded approach. In Assassin’s Creed though, these sci-fi elements are too fantastical and don’t really fit the tone of the film.

The jumping between the two time periods feels jarring and only exacerbated the already complicated plot, making it more messy. This may be in line with the game’s set up but it doesn’t seem to translate that well into the film and proves, in some cases, being too rigid and faithful to the source material can harm more than help an adaptation. Kurzel could have easily worked around this by tweaking the story and maybe just going the Captain America route and using the present day scenes as bookends and having the 1492 parts all in-between, allowing the plot to flow a lot more smoother and feel more cohesive.

In regards to the performances, Fassbender and Cotillard do their best but struggle to bring any real depth to their characters or get us to really care about them at all, particularly the latter who is lumbered with a thankless role that is heavy on the exposition due to the confusing rules of the world. Irons’ looks like his sleep walking through most of his performance and phoning it in, and everyone outside those main three are either disposable or wasted characters like Brendan Gleeson, who pops up for about five minutes and is never seen of or heard of again.

Even the action, which could have been the film’s one redeeming feature, is handled and executed really poorly. The editing is choppy and all over the place, creating a very disorientating experience. Rarely does Kurzel hold a shot for more than a second during the action scenes making it hard to follow what’s going on and having a very dizzying effect for the viewers.

It’s a shame really because underneath all that editing you can tell there is some good stunt work going on, but instead of doing any kind of slow, smooth shot so we take it all in and let it be its own thing. Kurzel seems far more interested in imitating the Bourne films, but not in a good way.

I also can’t help but think all this fast editing is used to hide the fact that Assassin’s Creed is a rather bloodless affair, so to keep that 12A rating and attracting a larger audience and filling seats. This is even more obvious in those 15th Century scenes which mostly involve the assassins stabbing and slicing their way through various people with not a single drop of blood being spilt, taking away any realism or grittiness it could have.

‘Assassin’s Creed is another dry and lifeless video game adaptation that hasn’t come anywhere close to breaking this curse like everyone was hoping.’

With an overly complicated plot, hard to follow action scenes and bad characterisation. Not even the star power of Fassbender and Cotillard combined can save this film.

David Axcell

Film Critic

David has quite a broad taste in film which includes big budget blockbusters and small indie films; including International and Arthouse cinema. As long as it’s good in that particular genre, he’ll watch anything.

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