Ra lives in a spaceship.
Gods of Egypt is a bad movie. There's no getting around that. The acting is bad, the execution is bad, the effects are bad, and that's just scratching the surface.
But there are some bad movies that are at least enjoyably so; we can derive pleasure from them even as we understand they're not the craft at its finest, and in some ways Gods of Egypt can at least fall into that category.
Perhaps the best thing going for the movie is that all the outrage at its premise came out with the trailer. Going in, you're aware that you're in for a white washed reappropriation of Egyptian culture.
Looking beyond that, it's clear to see Gods of Egypt for what it really is: a classic high fantasy story that lacks the imagination to come up with a setting and mythology that is in any way original.
Gods of Egypt centers around god of light Horus (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) and the mortal Bek (Brenton Thwaites). On the day of Horus's coronation by his father, god of light Osiris (Bryan Brown), the king's envious brother Set (Gerard Butler), god of the desert, shows up and takes control of Egypt. Bek teams with a defeated Horus on a quest through larger-than-life landscapes to find a way to beat Set and also save the woman he loves from death.
If Gods of Egypt had been set against a mystical backdrop not based in reality, it might have been easier to forgive the fact that its gods are essentially Iron Man mixed with Power Rangers. Or that it never works exceptionally well for these gods to just be enlarged versions of humans. Or that the Ra (Geoffrey Rush) -- Set and Osiris's father -- lives on what is essentially a spaceship. Or that Set inexplicably (and often) slips a Scottish accent. Or that the beings in power bleed gold, literally. But because the movie is based in a real mythology of a real, living group of people, it's hard not to get frustrated with these characterizations that constantly beg for comparisons with the real thing.
Director Alex Proyas, best known for helming The Crow and I, Robot, created a film that probably would have been better-received during the eras those two better-received movies debuted in. Gods of Egypt has traces of The Mummy in it, but the way it bends its inspiration doesn't feel fresh in today's movie landscape.
The fact that video game CGI looks better than the shoddy green screen work here does Gods of Egypt no favors. The fight scenes are consistently underwhelming and silly, the actors often aren't integrated well into the backdrop and the slow-mo, 300-style action sequences think they're much cooler than they actually are.
The leads of the movie are all trying their best, even if some of them are glaringly out of place. Thwaites is charming and energetic as lead character Bek, and plays well opposite Coster-Waldau's Horus as he tries to rescue his love (Courtney Eaton's Zaya).
Coster-Waldau has much better offerings as Jaime Lannister on Game of Thrones, but he's never outright bad here, and that's better than some (looking at you, Chadwick Boseman).
Butler is a strong performer in his comfort zone as a king or a warrior, but his portrayal of the villainous Set never has him convincing as an Egyptian god, Scottish accent popping through or not.
Of all of them, Elodie Yung offers the best performance as Hathor, the goddess of love. The actress, who will debut as Elektra on Daredevil: Season 2, is the rare empathetic character in this movie whose emotional moments actually land. She also takes ownership of the character; Hathor never apologizes for her sexuality -- she's the goddess of love, after all -- and one key scene makes up for lot of what would have otherwise been questionable characterization.
The Verdict
Because the actors and Proyas do fully commit to the fantastical world they're building, Gods of Egypt isn't a movie so terrible as not to be enjoyable. But its weaknesses far outweigh its strengths, and the film never grounds itself in any real stakes.
At best Gods of Egypt is forgettable and at worst it's truly awful, and determining where it lands on that spectrum will be dependent on the viewer. Just don't get your hopes up for anything quality going in.
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