Borderlands

 Let's get a move on with Borderlands, in which Eli Roth tries to replicate the visuals and audacity of Gearbox's celebrated video games. I'm sure that a decade spent in development has given us something great, right?

Right?!

Lilith (Cate Blanchett) is an intergalactic "scumbag bounty hunter" who'd rather shoot people than talk to them. One day, Deukalian Atlas (Edgar Ramirez), the richest man in the universe, hires her for an important mission. His daughter, Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt), was taken by the rogue soldier Roland (Kevin Hart) to Pandora, a backwater planet where various rogues and monsters roam. Lilith is also from Pandora, but she doesn't want to go back home. But who can say no to a lot of money?

As it turns out, there's an ancient MacGuffin vault left by the Eridians, Pandora's previous inhabitants, that Tiny Tina was cloned to open. Roland and the masked "Psycho" Krieg (Florian Munteanu) took her to Pandora on her own volition. Lilith and her robot "buddy" Claptrap (Jack Black) join them on their Vault Hunt as soon as they find them. They're soon joined by Dr. Patricia Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis) and are briefly assisted by Mad Moxxi (Gina Gershon). Will this ragtag bunch of misfits reach the vault before Atlas does?

Theoretically speaking, the casting is fine. Technically, nothing's wrong with casting Blanchett and Curtis as Lilith and Tannis, even if they're decades older than their game characters. However, the script by Roth and Joe Crombie (along with several uncredited writers), gives them little to do. Most of the characters are rather meh, saved for the unhinged Krieg and Tiny Tina, the latter of whom has some decent pathos as she describes her life growing up in a lab. I wasn't exactly gripped when Roland had his last stand against several hostile Psychos; it was beyond obvious this wouldn't be his last stand. Atlas is a rather bland villain, while Commander Knoxx (Janina Gavankar), has a severely quick change of heart.  

What other quibbles do I have about the writing? Lilith quickly abandons her "shoot first, ask never" approach once Atlas pays her handsomely upfront. Maybe it's for the best, as it got old quickly in that one scene. The other characters refer to her as a "scumbag bounty hunter" so many times like it's her character class in Dungeons and Dragons. Is it a character class in the games? Lilith is given a constant narration to compensate for the film's protracted post-production, which had Tim Miller fill in for Roth when he was filming Thanksgiving. The film rushes Lilith to meet tour guide Marcus (Benjamin Byron Davis) the minute she lands on Pandora with the "help" of some narration. The Eridian technology buried in the Vault is as utterly irrelevant as the God-Like monster trapped with it. Let's move onto the technical stuff.

The film does a decent job in translating the games' outlandish universe into live action. I'm certain that a film with masked Psychos, Tiny Tina's bunny ears and Pandora's unusual geysers can't be taken too seriously. The production and costume designers convey that point rather well. Claptrap's CGI effects mesh well with his environments, though the humans have some glaringly obvious chroma keying in places. Steve Jablonsky's score isn't exactly memorable, but it's probably worth a listen. I think I said enough.

The phrase "Yeah, that happened" summarizes Borderlands. It's not a masterpiece, nor is it unwatchable; instead, it's a film that exists. I'm sure it'll do some good if it gets someone to play the video games. But for me, it's just a way to spend 102-minutes if you have nothing else to do. I don't want to imagine how it could have been worse. I will instead focus on the next film I have on my docket. Prepare to scream in space when it arrives either tomorrow or early Saturday.