Thanks for checking out our Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time review
Genre: Fantasy/Adventure
Directed by: Mike Newell
Staring: Jake Gyllenhaal, Gemma Arterton, Ben Kingsley, Alfred Molina
Released: May 28th, 2010
THE GENERAL IDEA
Adopted from the streets of Nasaf by King Sharaman of Persia, young Dastan grows up amongst royalty and quickly earns his place as a mighty warrior and prince. As his brothers Garsiv and Tus plan battle strategies, a spy sends word that the Holy City of Alamut has been supplying weapons to enemies of Persia. Taking matters into his own hands, Tus orders an attack on the sacred city and upon its fall Dastan encounters the beautiful Princess Tamina. When King Sharaman dies under mysterious circumstances shortly after, and Dastan is accused of his murder, he flees with the princess on a harrowing mission to clear his name.
THE GOOD
The action was pretty good for the most part except for some of the close combat. I would have liked to see more of the Parkour they show in the trailer, but what was there was pretty good. And the visuals of the vast cities and landscapes look very good.
There is far more story in this film than even the trailer suggests. And I like how it works. I can’t get to indepth without revealing much of the “badguy” twist but everyone acts within character and acts appropriately given their circumstances. At no point did I question anyone’s judgement or their actions. This is a far rare detail in what I expected to be a light fluffy action film. The story had some hiccups, but the Characters were all spot on. Even the pointless Sheik Amar – Alfred Molina (but more on him later)
Also, the statement carries more weight than this one line but its the best movie based on a video game I have ever watched.
THE BAD
The bad is hard to say because there are things they do SO right in this but the bad is just so glaringly bad. They could have cut out Alfred Molina’s part from this movie entirely and it would have made the movie better. The entire side adventure into the “Valley of Slaves” and their overlord Sheik Amar was pointless. No, it was MORE than pointless. It detracts from the movie. I like Alfred Molina, but he was completely useless in this, and his entire involvement takes you out of the setting. Ranting about “government assassins” and paying taxes to “the man” just took me out of the mysticism and setting of Ancient Persia.
There is also a major plothole that had me rolling my eyes is that the guardian of the dagger, Arterton says the only safe place to keep the dagger is in the secret secondary temple… uh… then why didnt you keep such a valuable artifact of the Gods there in the first place? I don’t know why they added that line there aside from a plot device to have them travel to the secret temple.
And as much as I love a good villain, Kingsley was sadly a prop in this movie and I wasn’t motivated to despise him or even feel for him. Kind of a waste really.
And only when they had some really close combat did they resort to that rapidfire camera angle change to make it look more exciting. Frankly I would prefer one shot instead of trying to trick us with thirty.
OVERALL
Overall the film was fun to watch, and Arterton is beautiful. I would love to see this movie with all of Sheik Amar’s parts edited out, or reducing him to a glorified extra. He didn’t need to be in this movie at all.
Aside from that and a little plot forgiveness its a pretty good movie. Would have rated higher without those flaws, but its easily the best movie based on a video game that I have seen.
And that’s why I give Prince of Persia a 6.5 out of 10
Couldn’t quite justify the seven, but its not quite as low as a six either!
