New Tomb Raider Film Will Be a "Character Piece"

[Andy Chalk]

New Tomb Raider Film Will Be a "Character Piece"

The producer on the upcoming Tomb Raider reboot says the new flick with be "a character piece."

I'll be honest, I'm not much of a movie guy so I'm not entirely, 100 percent certain what a "character piece" is. I assume it means that the focus of the film will be on the characters, specifically their motivations, interactions and the alchemy of personal stories that gives them depth and humanity. Sounds pretty good, anyway. Whatever it is, producer Graham King says we're going to get one in the new Tomb Raider film.

"Listen, the box office [of the first two Tomb Raider films], they weren't disasters but I find it interesting that the story that we're telling is really the story before she became Lara Croft, so it is a character piece," King told ComingSoon.net [http://www.comingsoon.net/news/movienews.php?id=84426]. "It does have a lot of really great characters, but it's a lot of action and a lot of fun, and for me, it's something very different. I've not really done a movie like that before, but I really gravitated to rebooting this franchise and we're going to give it a shot."

Okay, so maybe a "character piece" is just a movie that has characters. IMDB [http://www.amazon.com/Lara-Croft-Raider-Special-Collectors/dp/B00003CXZ1/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1321896568&sr=8-4] it's not currently expected out until 2013.


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[CardinalPiggles]

I Wasn't a big fan of the Tomb Raider films, but this looks quite interesting.

Well as interesting as a reboot can be anyway.

 

[Fasckira]

Im guessing it'll be like the new TR game, going back to when Lara wasn't a huge breasted amazingly rich female Indiana Jones and instead a young rookie adventurer. Should also mean that Angelian Jolie wont be cast (considering it'll be a younger Lara).

-10 for lack of Ms Jolie's breasts but +100 for trying to make it a more engaging storyline.

 

[Beautiful End]

Well, see, Tomb Raider could be a good movie, just like many other video game based movies. The execution, though, it what sucks. Now, Tomb Raider wasn't that bad...but it could have been better. If they're gonna base this movie on the new Tomb Raider by Square-Enix, then yay! Say what you want about Square-Enix, but they're good at storyteling. So..if Square comes up with a great plot and this is transmitted to this new movie, then we're looking at what could be one of the greatest video game based movies so far, right next to Prince of Persia (Oh, shut it, it was good!)

But this is all speculation.

 

[Sixcess]

I actually liked the first movie (second, not so much) It was slick and entertaining and Angelina Jolie looked fantastic, and sometimes that's enough.

I wish people would stop trying to invest characters like Lara with a depth and complexity that they were never designed to have in the first place. They're video game characters, for chrissake.

 

[Seventh Actuality]

Memo: breasts don't count as characters.

But for srs, this sounds promising. First two films were utter shit, they've probably realised they won't earn their money back pulling the same thing again so the only option left is to make an actual good movie.

 

[Fiz_The_Toaster]

I liked the first Tomb Raider movie, but not so much the second one.

I would see this and this is really what a reboot should be doing. They did some characterization in the first movie, but not enough to make it matter since there were shit loads of action scenes.

 

[monnes]

A character piece is generally a concept talked about in music, and means a piece bases on a single idea or concept. This seems unlikely for a Tomb Raider film, so it's probably just Graham King throwing around fancy words he doesn't even know the meaning of.

 

[Lyri]

They're video game characters, for chrissake.

Is that part of the joy of video games though?
Done right you can turn an ageing IP into something fresh and new, expanding upon the world of Tomb Raider and it's characters could be great.
I'm looking forward to the new game if nothing else.

OT: Not sure how I feel about the movie if I'm honest, I wasn't a fan of the first one. Angelina Jolie did pretty well in it and looked great but I wasn't too hooked on the story.

 

[Blind0bserver]

A character piece is generally a concept talked about in music, and means a piece bases on a single idea or concept. This seems unlikely for a Tomb Raider film, so it's probably just Graham King throwing around fancy words he doesn't even know the meaning of.

Emphasis mine.

Now, I'm not going to pretend I know diddly-squat about Graham King, what his output has been, how skilled he is, if he's a complete idiot, and so on. Granted, considering that he's part of the Hollywood machine and he's attached to a videogame project, I'm still going to assume he's an idiot.

That said, it's not hard to imagine Tomb Raider as an actual character piece when you look at how the new game is progressing. The reboot is taking away Laura's iconic guns, her calm under fire demeanor, her neigh-nontarnishable beauty and, yes, even her oversized breasts in order to utterly break her so we can see her build herself back up again and become stronger and independent for it.

If, with emphasis on if, this movie has a similar focus where Laura's development as a character takes priority, it could work. Otherwise Mr. King might as well give Mean Fox a call and get the wardrobe department to start shopping around for push-up bras with extra padding.

 

[monnes]

A character piece is generally a concept talked about in music, and means a piece bases on a single idea or concept. This seems unlikely for a Tomb Raider film, so it's probably just Graham King throwing around fancy words he doesn't even know the meaning of.

Emphasis mine.

Now, I'm not going to pretend I know diddly-squat about Graham King, what his output has been, how skilled he is, if he's a complete idiot, and so on. Granted, considering that he's part of the Hollywood machine and he's attached to a videogame project, I'm still going to assume he's an idiot.

That said, it's not hard to imagine Tomb Raider as an actual character piece when you look at how the new game is progressing. The reboot is taking away Laura's iconic guns, her calm under fire demeanor, her neigh-nontarnishable beauty and, yes, even her oversized breasts in order to utterly break her so we can see her build herself back up again and become stronger and independent for it.

If, with emphasis on if, this movie has a similar focus where Laura's development as a character takes priority, it could work. Otherwise Mr. King might as well give Mean Fox a call and get the wardrobe department to start shopping around for push-up bras with extra padding.

When you put it that way, I can definately see the possibility. Even though I'm pretty sure Graham King is still a bad producer who's only talent is picking good projects, he may actually be using the correct term here. Well argued, Vanguard.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

I want Scarlett Johansson to play Lara. Just change her hair color and she's set. She kicks ass and she's hot as hell. She's also a great actress IMO.

 

[Smooth Operator]

A character piece is generally a concept talked about in music, and means a piece bases on a single idea or concept. This seems unlikely for a Tomb Raider film, so it's probably just Graham King throwing around fancy words he doesn't even know the meaning of.

It's just a fancy word for biography / drama, how poor Lara suffered in life soap story...
I understand alot of people like that sort of thing but those people do not like Tomb Raider, so this may very well end up in the middle where fans hate it and non-fans don't get what they aimed for.

 

[Alleged_Alec]

Memo: breasts don't count as characters.

Damn... I was just going to make a joke about the movie having two characters. Oh well.


Anyhow: why still cares? The first was mediocre, the second was quite bad. I don't see a reason to assume that this movie is good, and the only thing that really keeps it going is the promise of fanservice.

 

[ckam]

I find it really funny that the critic quote says "ultimate superhero"...

 

[Metalrocks]

dint mind the first 2 movies. even when some of it was not true to the game but hell, i have seen worse

*looks as uwe boll*

this could be interesting. lets see how it turns out. shame that jolie will not be in it.

 

[Iscin]

A character piece about bewbs? About time :O

 

[ShadowKirby]

Lars von Trier's Tomb Raider.

"The slow decent of an archaeologist into madness and thievery after the death of her father."
"Movie of the year!"- NY Times
"A masterpiece in introspection."- Roger Ebert
"Lars von Trier's most shocking movie since Antichrist"- New Yorker

 

[MelasZepheos_v1legacy]

The Tomb Raider movies weren't very good.

Actually let's not mince words, they were awful. They showed exactly the reason why videogames should not be made into movies, and stand alongside Resident Evil as some of the most grossly mishandled videogame to movie properties ever.

So would anyone be surprised if I said that I'm not looking forwards to this?

Then again, I love the comic books so I'm not totally discounting the idea that they can translate to other mediums, I just think that the film industry is the worst thing ever.