While Cate Blanchett was prepping for her (almost) Oscar-worthy role in Tár, she had to do something that would help balance out the deep-rooted darkness of her complex character. So when she needed a break from practicing all that music stuff, she would moonlight as Lilith, the main character in Borderlands, which she filmed around the same time as Tár.
Maybe that’s where things went wrong here… Cate can only be so good at one thing at a time.
Eli Roth’s latest film Borderlands, based on the popular video game franchise of the same name, might have suffered from its long delays and various setbacks after being in production for so long. The action-packed movie stars Blanchett alongside Jamie Lee Curtis, Kevin Hart, Jack Black, Edgar Ramírez and Ariana Greenblatt, but despite having a star-studded cast filled with Oscar royalty and 1/2 of Tenacious D, it apparently wasn’t enough to make the movie enjoyable. Perhaps Blanchett was just saving all of her acting energy for Tár and you know what, that’s fine too.
The early reviews are not very kind to Borderlands, which hits theaters this weekend. Here’s what the people are saying. It’s not great!:
David Rooney of The Hollywood Reporter:
Roth’s messy storytelling is so anxious to get to the next blast of rote action — amped up by Steve Jablonsky’s hard-working synth and orchestral score and lots of shoddy CGI — that the characters have scant opportunity to form real bonds.
It’s conceivable that longtime fans of the video game might get more out of Borderlands, but I wouldn’t count on it. At one point, Claptrap returns to operational mode after a heavy-weaponry assault and says, “I blacked out. Did something important happen?” Not in this movie.
Dan Jolin, Empire:
Blanchett does her best with what little she’s given, but as great as it is to see her taking the ‘Chris’ role in a big, silly actioner, she was far more enjoyable doing this kind of thing in Thor: Ragnarok. It’s not like Borderlands is so bad it’ll do her any damage. It’s just a shame that her debut as an action-movie lead turned out to be so clunky and, we suspect, forgettable.
Matt Donato, IGN:
Borderlands is an abysmal waste of a beloved franchise that takes a kooky band of murderous misfits and drains the life out of their first adventure together. Eli Roth is no James Gunn, and this film has none of the lovable lunatics, awe-striking sci-fi visuals, and out-of-this-world storytelling of Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy. The hyper-stylized flair of the Borderlands games is replicated only on the most superficial level, and with a PG-13 rating, all the limb-severing gore, dirty-minded humor, and uniquely deranged themes are replaced by recycled blandness geared toward mass marketability. It’s the worst-case-scenario Borderlands movie that goes against everything Borderlands stands for as a series – a miserable failure.
Peter Deburge of Variety:
Roth tries to sustain that irreverent tone for the rest of the movie (as in a scatological gag when Claptrap takes a moment after being shot up by psychos to dump the bullets he’s ingested), but very little of the humor actually lands. It’s hard to fault the cast, who come across as fully committed to characters with such extreme personalities, even if their outlandish costumes tend to say more than their banter.
Since gamers no doubt have their favorites from among this crew, the movie tries to give each of the leads a heroic battle against a more powerful adversary — or in Roland’s case, a small army of them. But as the film goes on, it’s increasingly clear where things are headed. By the time “Borderlands” unlocks its vault, not even the characters seem to care what’s inside.
Clarisse Loughrey, The Independent:
In Borderlands, all the heroes do is inform each other (and the audience) that they are “insane” and “deranged”. There’s a scene where they all accidentally consume urine, another extended bit where the robot defecates bullets, while the insults don’t ever venture beyond the range of “poopy-mouthed ass faces”. No one in the film, or the film itself, ever acknowledges how deeply uncool all of this is.
It’s a race to the bottom for its actors, each of them wildly miscast, even if Blanchett can somewhat skate by on the pure, salvatory force of her sexual charisma. The film’s sacrilegious treatment of place and character will likely send its fans into a white-hot rage, while it remains simultaneously impenetrable and incomprehensible to the casual viewer. And it all plays out against a background that may as well be a blank green screen. It’s depressingly bare – as if someone put a Mad Max filter on a paintball centre. So, fair warning – if you’re a fan of any of the video games currently in the pipeline for adaptation, Borderlands may strike terror into your heart.
Amy Nicholson, The New York Times
Blanchett is forced to take a couple of tonal pivots that leave us feeing dizzy. Still, the two-time Oscar winner endures the nonsense by carrying herself like a warrior on a kitschy propaganda poster with her windswept, chili-pepper-bright coiffure capturing the digitalized light just so. In voice-over narration at the beginning, she drolly intones that the plot to come is “some wacko B.S.” We don’t disagree.
Neil Smith, Total Film:
Eli Roth’s caper has taken three years to reach us, had its reshoots entrusted to another director (Deadpool’s Tim Miller), and has a co-writer in Joe Crombie who appears to have no other credits. Small wonder it feels so messily chaotic, with cheap-looking FX and dodgy matte work adding to its woes. “Feel free to applaud” Hart quips at one point after driving an APC through the skull of a gargantuan, tentacled monster. Sorry Kevin, but the only applause Borderlands deserves is a slow handclap of derision.
Borderlands hits theaters on August 9th…luckily, Tár is currently streaming on Peacock!
