Written by: Oren Uziel, Dana Fox, Adam Nee, Aaron Nee / Story by: Seth Gordon / Directed by: Adam Nee, Aaron Nee / Released By Paramount Pictures Home Entertainment / 2022 / 112 Minutes
20th August 2022
Film Reviewed by Rob Deb. Blu-Ray features reviewed by Paul Dunne.
The Pitch: Reclusive author Loretta Sage writes about exotic places in her popular adventure novels that feature a handsome cover model named Alan. While on tour promoting her new book with Alan, Loretta gets kidnapped by an eccentric billionaire who hopes she can lead him to an ancient city's lost treasure from her latest story. Determined to prove he can be a hero in real life and not just on the pages of her books, Alan sets off to rescue her.
THE FILM: The Lost City is a story about Loretta Sage (Sandra Bullock} a grieving romance writer, and Alan Caprison, (Channing Tatum) a Fabio-Esque cover model, who is smitten with her. Will they bicker and fight and overcome their own personal baggage to start a healthy relationship? Only one way to find out! Bullock and Tatum are great in this. Their dynamic is ably built upon with a great ensemble, including publicist Beth Hatten, Who is desperately pushing the book and making Loretta start a tour for it. A tour on which Alan will join. The two reluctantly embark on the tour, with a new social media manager whose contribution is tagging 'Shawn Mendes' a lot. I'll be frank, I'm 46. I don't know who Shawn Mendes is, but I'll google it later.
For me, it's this part of the film that entertains the most. There's a great wit at work in the film's first section (the media tour), with Tatum playing a real sense of vulnerability whilst Bullock shows us how a strong female lead doesn't need to be a Mary-Sue, until it's gatecrashed by a nonsense jungle movie you've seen before, played out again here with very little reinvention. Unfortunately, this media/entertainment tour film with a decent bit of quip, awkward meet-cutes and Tatum playing a sense of vulnerability while Sandra shows how a strong female lead does not need to Mary-sue, is gatecrashed by a nonsense Jungle movie you’ve seen before and with very little reinvention. Daniel Radcliffe arrives, playing Abigail Fairfiax, a ruthless tycoon in search of a lost temple for riches. Sadly though this amounts to spending most of the movie shouting awkwardly, and cosplaying Alan Rickman in Die Hard with none of the menace or timing, which, well, I thought he might have picked up along the way.
The actors do great work in elevating the material
There are some nice moments in the jungle with shades of Tropic Thunder filtering the references to Romancing the Stone, but they are few and far between. For the most part, we get the vague climbing peril, the awkward confessions, the inappropriate leech placements and the over-nervous sleeping arrangements we have come to expect in this genre. Sandra even rips off a lot of her clothing to create a distraction. It’s like an 80’s rerelease that could have sat comfortably next to the grindhouse films of Tarantino and Rodriguez. There is even some great revelation of the crown of fire that does bring a certain gravitas to what we have witnessed and all Sandra Bullock has endured. But it falls flat in the face of some final scene choices. There is, for all the progress, a certain distaste for the depiction of island life. Everyone is calm. Places close and villagers just seem to Hakuna Matata their day. The actors do great work in elevating the material, but some tombs should stay lost. It's not that it’s a bad film, but rather than one to stream, it's a rainy afternoon on ITV2 when the football is on the other side.
THE DISC: Paramount's transfer is excellent. The Blu-Ray shows off the wide range of colours on display, which ads to the setting and costumes especially Bullock's 'hideous jumpsuit', which like the rest of the film is crisp and clean. The disc represents the digitally acquired image beautifully, with plenty of range in the colours. The audio is of a similar quality, with several sound options available.
SPECIAL FEATURES: Dynamic Duo / Location Profile / Jungle Rescue / The Jumpsuit / Charcuterie / The Villains of The Lost City / Building The Lost City / Deleted Scenes / Bloopers
The features on the disc are short, sleight, and fun. They concentrate on the relationship between Bullock's Sage and Tatum's Caprison. They're a good watch but largely fluff. None have a very long runtime and it would have been nice to get a commentary from the writers and directors and, since so many of the other features on the disc concentrate on their relationship, Bullock and Tatum. This would have made a fuller, more satisfying home entertainment package.
The Lost City is available on Blu-Ray, 4K, and DVD now.