Gods of Egypt

The titular characters in "Gods of Egypt" are a pretty flashy bunch. Standing a foot or so above the humans they live amongst, they're likely, when stressed out, to grow gilded wings or morph into some sort of minotaur-like beast and do battle against dizzying CGI-backdrops. When injured, they bleed a shiny gold liquid; also, they have glowing organs that they can pop in and out like pieces in dolls.

In this popcorn epic, directed by Australian Alex Proyas, this family of demi-gods appear to have walked out of some fitness magazine -- they're a buff bunch, but not a terribly happy one, especially when one of them, vengeful meanie Set (Gerard Butler) crashes the coronation of his nephew Horas (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau). Taking charge, Set kills his brother, the current king, blinds and exiles Horas and takes the crown for himself.

All of this takes place in a dizzying fashion in the first ten minutes of this sometimes diverting, but too often dispiriting, mythic fantasy that attempts to use CGI to re-create the B-movie fun of Ray Harryhausen epics that once ruled Saturday matinees at movie theaters. (Now you can catch such titles as "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad" and the original "Clash of the Titans" on TCM.)

It sometimes succeeds at achieving its modest, anachronistic goals -- its characters, both demi-gods and humans, banter with sit-commy humor that lightens the titanic family struggle at its center. The script -- by Proyas, Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless -- attempts to create its own mythology of Ancient Egypt, a magical place with glistening palaces right out of a dream resort. This Egypt looks like a great place to visit, but I'm not so sure I'd want to live there, especially after Butler takes over and proceeds to enslave his citizens to build his own version of Trump Tower, an obelisk that soars to the heavens meant to impress his grandpa, the god Ra (Geoffrey Rush), who cruises the stratosphere on a rickety spaceship where he protects the Earth (which is flat, it turns out) from an amorphous, Kraken-like cosmic beast.

Some of this is silly, engaging fun. In one sequence Horas and Bek (an adorable Brenton Thwaites), the mortal that befriends him, fight a pair of vicious, cobra-like beasts in the style of a video game. In another, Bek must evade a group of lethal mechanical dolls to reclaim one of Horas's stolen eyes. (Don't ask.) Director Proyas skillfully stages these sequences; too bad he falls victim to the portentous turn the script takes towards the end, when the power-mad Set decides to bring heaven and hell to Earth in order to become immortal. At this point what fun there's been is drained from the film, replacing it with a seemingly endless battle right out of a lesser Marvel epic. Butler doesn't help matters much, bellowing through the climax in roid rage mode. The Scottish actor remains a sublimely oblivious actor who continues to capitalize on his macho charm, but brings little else to his characterization of this angry god with some serious daddy issues.

Not that it matters much: "Gods of Egypt" doesn't aim to be any more eloquent than "Guardians of the Galaxy," nor does it attempt to render ancient Egypt with any historical accuracy. That the film's been criticized for its all-white casting turns out to be the least of its problems. This is Hollywood back-lot Egypt, not the real thing, and to fault its casting is like criticizing Disneyland for not representing the real America. Rather, "Gods of Egypt" disappoints because it loses the light tone as its plot unfolds. Early on there's a nice, comic rapport between Coster-Waldau and Thwaites, most charming as a fearless thief who becomes the disposed king's confidante; and there's a welcome campy turn by Chadwick Boseman as Thoth, the god of knowledge, who is the divine equivalent of Wikipedia, with hundreds of lookalike minions in his thrall. But when the dynastic battle takes over, "Gods of Egypt" becomes a noisy, familiar retread.

This is too bad, because Proyas aims to create a fun mythic adventure reminiscent of old school Hollywood. To this end he employs a wall-to-wall symphonic score by Marco Beltrami that's something of a homage to the work that Bernard Herrmann brought to the Hayerhausen epics he composed late in his career. Working with his design team, Proyas also creates a luxe fantasy world bathed in gold and rendered in pop-up book-styled 3D; but, perhaps because so much of the film was filmed in green screen, the actors appear to be disconnected from the action. Whatever the reason "Gods of Egypt" is a big, gaudy bauble that may in time become a camp classic, but won't become the tentpole franchise it wishes to become.