Part retro adventure Part action template circa 2001

Rating: 6/10 (25 May 2010)

As soon as I saw the casting and the general vibe of the movie in production I sussed it would, at best, be a throwback to the "Sinbad/Arabian Adventure" style movies of the 1970s (of which I have very happy memories of rushing to see at my local flea pit as a child!) Seeing the movie last night that's exactly what we got with A) An American actor in lead wearing wig and dark make up B) The most English actress in England as exotic beauty also wearing wig and dark make up C) Very established serious character actor with vaguely foreign look hired as evil villain D) A sinister tall henchman in black who says very little to do all the dirty work E) Cheap cardboard looking generic Arab city sets filled with very few extras milling around F) Some tasty location work in Morrocco doubling for wherever it was meant to be G) Couple fall instantly in love after 2 seconds H) Rubbishy generic "What Westerners think Middle Eastern music sounds like" soundtrack I) Poorly defined quest plot centring on magical macguffin device J) Robust comic relief dirty brigand character with his easy to make laugh gang of smelly ruffians who start out evil but end up good K) Everyone speaks in English accents of varying types (Acceptable since the alternative of doing it all in funny fake Middle Eastern accents is worse - see "Golden Voyage of Sinbad") So I was pleasantly happy that my meagre expectations of this film were fulfilled, at least for the first hour and 10 minutes or so, when the movie turns very suddenly and very violently into some generic fantasy actioner from 2000-2002 with all the drop off that entails. Not only "The Mummy" and it's wonderful sequel, but also "Tomb Raider" (With VERY similar time travel turn around previous tragedy and battle result) "Bulletproof Monk" and many others, not to mention the Russian "Daywatch" (Again similar 'Wipe out previous disaster with magic time travel artifact' end) and even Jet Li's "The One". So we have a diverting little cut and paste movie capturing somewhat jarringly two separate stages in fantasy movie history. Of course as many have said there is not one single original molecule in the entire film, but then when was the last time we actually saw ANYTHING original in our cinemas, especially in summer? Dumb but fun and instantly forgettable, that is perhaps what fantasy cinema of this type is all about, so in that sense it is a triumph.