Gods of Egypt

Hollywood doesn't make B-Movies anymore.  They simply take what would be considered a B-script, and throw as much money as they can at it in hopes to hide it.  Gods of Egypt is the single most goofiest movie to hit screens since Jupiter Ascending.  It's intentionally campy and corny, it's filled to the brim with CG effects that would have been dated in 2001, and it features giant monsters that would be right at home in an episode of Power Rangers.  The movie doesn't take itself seriously for a second, and that might have been fun, if only the movie had been allowed to have a knowing sense of humor to itself, instead of only being intentionally silly.

This is one of those movies that captivates us not with its plot or characters, but with just how ridiculous it is.  We stay in our seats to see what director Alex Proyas is going to throw up on the screen next.  One minute, it could be Gerard Butler turning into a cheap looking CG monster.  Next, it could be Geoffrey Rush, his entire body blazing with fire, as he flies through outer space in a cheesy looking airship.  Proyas, you may remember, started out his filmmaking career with interesting films like The Crow and Dark City.  These days, he's more well known for making disposable special effect epics like this.  You can see what he's trying to do.  He wants this to be a big, silly adventure.  Maybe something along the lines of The Mummy films with Brendan Fraser.  But what made those movies kind of work (at least the first one from 1999) is that they had humor to go along with the silliness.  This movie is just bizarre.  It has the mentality of a live action cartoon, but none of the fun and charm.  I suppose little kids will find a lot to like here.  But even judging on that level, there's better stuff out there.

The plot is set in the time of ancient Egypt, when mortals and gods live among one another.  The air god Horus (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) is about to be crowned king, when the spiteful and jealous god Set (Gerard Butler) shows up with his army, kills Horus' parents, and demands that he be Egypt's new ruler.  The two gods sword fight for a while, then decide to turn into not-so-impressive looking CG monsters, and continue fighting.  This of course begs the question as to why they didn't just turn into monsters in the first place when they started fighting.  Horus is eventually defeated, and has his eyes stolen from him by Set, causing him to go blind.  With Set now the king of Egypt, the people become enslaved to his mad wills, and Horus is banished to a crypt out in the middle of the desert where he generally spends his days moping.

Enter our other hero, a young thief named Bek (Brenton Thwaites), who seeks out to find Horus after Set's soldiers kill his girlfriend, Zaya (Courtney Eaton), sending her to the afterlife where she awaits her eternal fate.  Bek has heard that the gods have the power to return the souls of the dead back to the land of the living, so he seeks out Horus in the hopes of gaining his support in taking down the evil Set.  So, we have a buddy action film with a one-eyed god (Bek found one of Horus' eyes, which was being kept in a booby trapped treasure chamber) and a nimble young thief.  Some other gods also join in on their ultimate mission to seek help from Ra the Sun God (Geoffrey Rush), who spends all his time floating around in space, fighting off a giant worm-like creature that wants to eat the Earth.  Meanwhile, the devious Set sends various beasts and battle amazons who ride on giant fire-breathing snakes in order to stop our heroes.  And no, none of this makes any sense when you're watching the movie, either.

At the very least, Gods of Egypt knows exactly what it is, and never once pretends to be anything but that.  By all accounts, this is the kind of movie I would usually watch with a big silly grin on my face.  But, there's something missing here, and that something is a sense of fun.  Just being intentionally dumb and goofy is not enough.  If there were some rousing action sequences, or perhaps a strong sense of humor, I could actually see myself recommending this.  But, there's simply something just uninspired about this.  Even trash has to be entertaining.  Some more action and narrow escapes would have gone a long way to making this stuff work.  Also, the one liners tossed back and forth between Horus and Bek are forgettable, and don't bring about a response from the audience.  We don't get an "odd couple" relationship from these two that I think the film wants us to have.  They simply look like two actors walking across a desert, or sometimes badly inserted against an unconvincing CG backdrop.

Let's talk about those special effects, which are generally very bad, but not in a charming or goofy way.  They simply look like the artists just didn't care, and could barely be bothered to create convincing visuals.  Doing some research after I got home, I learned that the film's budget is estimated to be around $140 million.  This is simply impossible to believe.  Oh, I have no doubt this was an expensive movie, as just about every shot in the film contains a special effect of some kind.  But did anyone take a look at these effects, and approve them?  I find it hard to believe that they could spend this much money, time and effort, and end up with creatures and backdrops that look worse than some films that cost considerably less than this.  In this day and age where effects can do just about anything and make it look convincing, this movie is a reminder of what happens when those same artists just get lazy.

It really makes you sad to see a movie like this.  Here is something that could have been so much fun if it had just been allowed to truly let go and embrace its silliness full heartedly.  Instead, it embraces its goofiness, but never allows itself to have fun with it.  Gods of Egypt is simply dumb for the sake of being dumb, and that's not enough.

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