Movie Review: Gods of Egypt


Apparently. Gods of Egypt stuck to basic Egyptian mythology - the Egyptian God, Set, ends up killing his brother, Osiris, and then Horus (the son of Osiris) tries to avenge Osiris's death - but it felt very Lion King to me, except more brutal, and the movie failed to hold my attention; I was actually checking my watch less than an hour into its runtime.

Horus (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) is set to become the new King of Egypt when his father, Osiris, hands over the responsibility. His uncle, Set (Gerard Butler), shows up for the celebration too ... and brings his army, because Set is planning a coup. Set kills Osiris and tears out Horus's eyes, forcing him to retreat in exile. A young Egyptian, Bet (Brenton Thwaites), decides he is going to steal the eyes back, with the help of his girlfriend, Zaya (Courtney Eaton), and therefore Horus will be able to return to his rightful place as Egypt's ruler; however, this is easier said than done.

I like Coster-Waldau from Game of Thrones, as Jamie Lannister, and also from a short-lived TV show called New Amsterdam (2008), but even he nor Butler can save this film; the script might be historically accurate, but it's also boring, even though the movie is action-packed. The last movie I saw Butler in was Olympus Has Fallen (and he's in next week's London Has Fallen, too), which was a fun film, but before that he was in the dreadful Playing for Keeps, to which I gave a "No" review; he seems to have hit or miss luck nowadays as to if he is in good movies or not.

No, skip this movie. I saw it in 3D, as well, and the 3D is shaky and in fact rather distracting at the beginning of the film; by the end of the movie, it's evened out a bit more, and does work well with some sweeping views of Egypt, but it's not worth the extra cost overall. I would have liked to have given this film a Maybe review, but to me it's not even worth paying a matinee price for - if you really feel like you MUST see this movie, then wait for it to come to Redbox or a streaming service (and for some ... fun reading, check out the actual story of Set and Horus here, most of which is not shown in this adaptation).

Gods of Egypt is in theaters today, February 26th, and is rated PG-13 with a runtime of 127 minutes. 2 stars out of 5.

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