1394. Gods Of Egypt (2016)

Starring: Gerard Butler, Brenton Thwaites, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau

Director: Alex Proyas

Running Time: 126 mins

Gods Of Egypt is an American film about a brutal war that rages between all-powerful gods in Ancient Egypt, with one mere mortal caught up in the middle deciding to fight to save the future of the empire.

Well, this is a complete and utter mess of a film. As much as it tries hard to be a big, tense and exciting blockbuster, Gods Of Egypt suffers heavily from a totally incomprehensible plot, painfully mediocre performances and ugly special effects throughout, all of which come together to make it a thoroughly unpleasant watch.

Now, whilst this isn’t the worst film I’ve ever seen, it definitely has to be a contender for one of the worst screenplays ever put together. From the off, Gods Of Egypt’s plot goes into complete meltdown with its attempts to mix mythology with modern action and sci-fi, and its insanely confusing collection of characters, whose positions and allegiances are never made clear, which as a result makes supporting or caring about anyone unnecessarily impossible.

As bad as the acting and visuals are, they’re something that can be overcome when there is a good story to tell. Unfortunately, this plot just doesn’t make sense, and once I really began to struggle to keep engaged, the other worst parts of the film appeared all the more irritating.

For one, the performances are pretty awful. With a combination of A-listers like Gerard Butler and Geoffrey Rush alongside young newcomers, you’d expect a degree of quality in the performances, but nobody really puts any effort in in Gods Of Egypt. Of course, with an appalling screenplay to work with, it’s hard to illicit much from the characters, but that doesn’t escape the fact that everybody looks insanely bored with the mad CGI extravaganza that is Gods Of Egypt, adding yet another reason to make me want to turn off halfway through.

But the one thing that puts the icing on the cake and makes Gods Of Egypt a laughably bad film is its horrifying special effects. Whilst not specifically bad like a home movie, the way in which the CGI is used in such a blaring and blinding way throughout this movie is just painful to have to watch. I was insanely bored with the incomprehensible plot, but the horrific CGI just tipped me over the edge, and left me laughing my head off at whatever madness was happening on screen.

Overall, Gods Of Egypt is a complete mess of a movie. Its story is totally nonsensical, the performances are painfully sub-par, and the visuals are disgusting to look at at every moment. It’s a film that both bored me out of my mind and had me laughing at how bad it was, but I would never recommend you subject yourself to two hours of pain like watching this movie, and that’s why Gods Of Egypt gets a 1.8 from me.