Culture

Rating: 1/5

There is almost nothing in this film that we haven’t seen before. Many times before. The Mortal Instruments is an unskilful amalgamation of the tropes and character types made familiar by Harry Potter, Twilight, Lord of the Rings, True Blood, Pirates of the Caribbean … and the list goes on. Hell, they even copy Star Wars’ most famous plot twist. Sure, we can argue that this not the film’s fault but the book’s – the young-adult novel on which the film is based was first published in 2007, and there have been many fantasy films between then and now. But the screenwriter should have had the cultural awareness to make some changes, or at least to try and find something unique about these tired plot devices. She doesn’t.

Apart from the done-to-death storyline and major plot holes (one of the main characters is bitten by a vampire and is never mentioned again), The Mortal Instruments is also plagued by the small stupidities of a money-grabbing Hollywood. For example, why do the female “Shadow Fighters” chose to battle demons in skin-tight leather pants and six-inch heels? How could four teenagers kill over 100 vampires in two minutes flat and yet fail to put a scratch on Jonathan Rhys Meyers? And more importantly, why is Meyers wearing a clip-on braided rat’s tail?

But fair play, there are some genuinely scary creatures and most of the actors do their best with the lines from Hades. Most of the actors, that is, not all of them. Jamie Campbell Bower clearly decided to use the film as a platform to show the world that he is “interesting.” Instead of acting like a human being , he delivers all of his lines with sexy bedroom eyes and in a moody whisper, even if just to say “let’s go down this street.”

The fact this movie was released so soon after the International Film Festival makes it an even bigger slap in the face – the culture holiday is over, and now we’re back to our bleak reality. Please don’t watch this movie. Don’t let Hollywood get away with it again.