Review of Assassin's Creed (2016) by Dale N — 14 May 2017

"Assassin's Creed" is worth watching if only to see Michael Fassbender scream-singing Patsy Cline's "Crazy" with a mechanical arm holding him aloft like a deranged puppet. It was something that I didn't know I needed in my life, but now that I have it I can't imagine living without that image somewhere in my head.

"Assassin's Creed" is based on a video game that I never played (I spend too much time watching movies, I don't have time for another time-sucking hobby) and revolves around an ancient group of assassins who have fought the Knights Templar for centuries to keep them from getting their hands on the Apple of Eden, a device which will help the Templars to eradicate free will from humanity and make them better followers for the Catholic church, apparently. Into this ages-long conflict comes Callum Lynch (Filmspotting Madness Champion Michael Fassbender), a convicted murderer sentenced to death. After getting his allegedly lethal injection, Callum awakens in a strange facility in Spain and is recruited to engage in a kind of genetic time travel where he can Quantum Leap back into one of his ancestors to learn the location of the Apple of Eden so that the people behind this project can get their hands on it (two guesses who's behind this whole experiment, and the first one doesn't count).

It's an absurd premise, to be sure, but the filmmakers inherited it from the video game and, to be honest, they achieve all that I ask from a movie: namely, that I suspend disbelief and roll with this horseshit for the film's running length. It's also a premise that could easily have gotten confusing and convoluted but, again, to the filmmakers' credit, I was able to follow this nonsense pretty well for the entirety of the film. The premise allows for some absurd sci-fi imagery (some of this movie is gorgeous, some of it looks a bit too muddled, and the CGI leaves something to be desired a lot of the time) and some genuinely thrilling action scenarios. There's a lot of parkour and hand to hand combat, and it's great fun to watch most of the time. Some of the movements onscreen were legitimately jaw-dropping, even if they were CGI-assisted. People run up walls and arrows hit targets with the assistance of crazy ricochets and it's all nuts, but it's fun. The dialogue is kinda clunky, which is probably to be expected from a movie that has to lay out this much backstory, mythology, exposition and silliness with a straight face, but the actors are astoundingly able to give all of this a kind of gravity and importance. That's the beauty of hiring people like Fassbender, Jeremy Irons, Marion Cotillard and Michael K. Williams. They can make even the most ludicrous of exposition sound legit.

"Assassin's Creed" feels like a crazy mash-up of "Quantum Leap", "The DaVinci Code" and "La Femme Nikita" (tell me that doesn't sound awesome) but I liked its themes about the importance of having Freedom of Choice and its wackaloon timey-wimey WTFery and watching great actors take all of this seriously. There isn't much intentional humor, but there are moments like the one I mentioned at the top of this review that bring a smile to the face. Also, I enjoyed the fact that it's a video game adaptation where, because the main character is essentially just experiencing ancient DNA memories second-hand, we basically just watch the main character PLAY a video game...on a Wii, I suppose, because he does move around a lot. It's absurd and thrilling and insane, and it's kind of a shame that I doubt we'll see the sequel that the movie leaves itself wide open for. But if that sequel does materialize, and Fassbender and Cotillard return for it, I'll be there with a big, goofy smile on my face.