Review
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Now, I know when
people hear “Ultimate fan,” they suggest that the fan is disgusted by the movie
and are about to trash it. Well this movie is not to be trashed (except some
parts) and it did outstanding for a movie based off a video game. The movie
deserved a Pirates of the Caribbean touch and
I believe Disney could only make the magic look how it did. Prince of Persia
deserved the company of Walt Disney.
The movie starts with a young
Dastan (Jake Gyllenhaal). I liked how they started the movie when he was
younger; his origins. Also I liked how they mixed the different universes of
Prince of Persia together to make an outstanding universe. In the first game of
Prince of Persia that came out in 1989, the prince is an adventurer from a
foreign land who has never experienced royalty. In the remake of the trilogy
(The Sands of Time), the Prince was born a prince and was never poor. Another
different but understandable and likable thing is that they gave the Prince a name;
that’s Dastan. It wasn’t faithful to the game but respectful to the character. After
showing courage, against a guard, in the market place, he is adopted by King
Sharaman.
After fifteen years, Prince
Dastan’s stepbrothers, Garsiv and Tas, lead the Persia
army in an attack on the sacred city of Alamut,
under the assumption that the city's people are selling weapons to their
enemies. This was one of the movie’s greatest change and leads to what pisses me
off. The army was supposed to invade India,
not Alamut (in Persia).
That’s the reason they changed Princess Farah’s name to Princess Tamina. The
name Farah is from India and
the name Tamina is from Persia.
If they ignored changing that part, they would have never changed a main
character’s name. It makes since why the name changes but doesn’t make since
why they changed the true origins of Farah. This is the only thing that
disgusted me in the movie. Every time they said Tamina, I felt all wrong in my
tummy. This is like making Marvel’s Luke Cage a Caucasian male that went to a
rich white school. Please do not have any ideas. Nizam (the Vizier) is the
reason for them attacking Alamut because he deceives that Alamut’s people are
selling weapons to their enemies. However this lie is the beginning to take charge
of the thrown of his brother’s. This is something similar to what he did and
planed to do in the game.
Now, let me start to say that Jake
Gyllenhaal is the Prince of Persia! He moves like him, thinks like him, fights
like him, and especially looks like him (Warrior Within). I bet if I was on the
set he would even smell like him. While the fight in the city, Dastan battles
Princess Tamina’s guard that happens to have the Dagger of Time. The dagger
gives its owner the ability to go back in time for a short period so that the
user can try to correct any mistake or redo any moment. In the game, you only
had short time to rewind time and you needed to refill the dagger. In the
movie, The Dagger runs out of sand and Dastan needed magical sand to refill it.
I would have thought he could use it as much as he wanted in the movie but they
stayed faithful and that’s a good thing. They end up capturing Princess Tamina
like in the game and Tus offers her hand in marriage. She only agrees because
she just found out Prince Dastan wields the Dagger of Time and has defeated the
guard that was suppose to see it to safety.
The Persians celebrate and Tus
gives Dastan a gift to give to their father, Sharaman. It happened to be poison
and the king burns to death after a great speech about Dastan. This is also
mirrored from the game. In the game, Dastan releases the Sands of Time out the
Hourglass and everyone but him, Farah, and the Vizier turns to monsters. Also
meaning the death of his father because, like all the other monsters, he tried
to kill everyone else that survived, even the Prince. So to survive the Prince
had to kill him. Sorry but I would do it too. But in the movie, Nizam (the
Vizier) gives the gift to Tus to give it to Dastan and fooled Dastan gave it to
his father, the king as a gift. Prince Dastan is held as the perpetrator of his
father's murder. He escapes the castle with Princess Tamina while Bis, his best
friend, is killed trying to save them. Tamina tries to steal the dagger and
tries to kill Dastan by using a sword. Dastan accidentally uses the Dagger and
rewinds time for the first time. Like I said, this movie deserves Disney for
the effects. It deserves that magical look and feel.
On the journey back to the Persian Empire-
Wait… Isn’t the place called Babylon in thee game?
This is another stupid and unnecessary change they made in the movie. Maybe the
empire is in Babylon.
I don’t know because I don’t know that much about places. Now back to what I
was saying. On the journey back, the duo meets Sheik Amar with his friend Seso
who hails from the Ngbaka, masters of the throwing knives. Dastan offers Tamina
up as a slave in return for their hospitality. Another mirrored scene from the
game where she says, “There must be a reason why you can’t take your eyes off
me.” In the game, if you stare at her, she makes different remarks. You can
look up the cheats and codes by clicking here.
However, the bandits try to take the Dagger of Time and take Dastan to the
newly crowned Tus because of the reward for his capture; they fail in the
process, while the two escape. While escaping, they mirrored something else
from the game. In the game Farah was so skinny that she could crawl through
small cracks and holes in the wall, which grants her access to areas the player
can't reach. In the movie, she slides through a falling gate. Dastan and Tamina
return to Persia
for King Sharaman's funeral. Dastan tries to convince his uncle Nizam that he
was not the cause of his father's death, only to discover the dagger was taken
by Tamina. Instead, he notices the burns on Nizam's hands, which indicate he
was the one who set up the murder of the King. Furthermore, Nizam has set up an
ambush for Dastan along the Persian streets and after a conflict with his
brother Garsiv, Dastan escapes.
Dastan having to fight his family
and friends is mirrored from the game. It is when The Prince releases the Sands
of Time releasing a plague upon the city of Babylon. Everyone’s mind is set differently
with the transformation to monsters. They only kill like the monsters they are.
Meanwhile, back in Persia,
Nizam, aware that Dastan knows he was responsible, tries to convince the
newly-crowned King Tus and Garsiv that Dastan is trying to overthrow them and
must be killed without a trial to avoid a rebellion. When this fails, Nizam
hires the Hassansins; a group of highly-skilled warriors that Nizam kept hidden
for his own ends after Sharaman had the sect disbanded. At least we got
something close to monsters and here’s to hoping they use real monsters in the
sequel and stay more true to the sequel. On the journey, the duo does another
thing that mirrors the game. That is stopping for water. Even though on a
journey you would need water, I could see the director getting this from the
game.
Dastan and Tamina are again
captured by Sheik Amar, Seso, and their group because of the chaos they caused
back at the valley. Sheik intends to claim the reward for turning them in to
renew his business. But that night, when everyone is asleep, the Hassansin
leader attacks the group in an oasis by controlling a number of vipers. Many of
the group died, but Dastan uses the dagger to rewind time, and, foreseeing the
attack, manages to kill all the snakes single-handedly, saving Seso in the
process. The Hassansin leader then leaves in a sand dervish. The next day, now
accompanied by Sheik and Seso, travel to the secret sanctuary in the mountains
near India,
where it's possible to seal the dagger by returning it to the stone where it
came from. In order to do so, Tamina would have to sacrifice herself, but it
fails as they run into Garsiv's men. Dastan, however, manages to persuade his
brother that he is innocent, only for Garsiv to be killed by a flurry of
spike-knives thrown by a Hassansin. The Hassansin attacks while their leader
manages to snatch the Dagger of Time from Tamina by using a snake.
Tamina and Dastan, as well as
Sheik Amar and Seso, return to Alamut to reveal the truth about Nizam and the
dagger to Tus. First, they must get the dagger, which is kept in the sacred
temple, guarded by the Hassansin who killed Garsiv. Seso, the master of
throwing knives, fights the spike-wielding Hassansin to obtain the dagger. He manages
to kill the Hassansin after a well aimed throw, yet is fatally wounded in the
process. Seso manages to throw the Dagger out of the window to Sheik and Dastan
before dying. Sheik Amar then distracts the guards by serving as a decoy while
Dastan shows the truth about the Dagger to his brother Tus by killing himself,
only to have Tus rewind time with the dagger. I thought this was a sweet and
very cool scene to see someone other than Dastan rewind time. Tus is killed by
Nizam, and Dastan is incapacitated by another Hassansin. The Dagger is once
again in Nizam's hands, but Dastan manages to defeat the Hassansin with
Tamina's help. She realizes that the Hassansin had been a spy inside the city
of Alamut and
must have been the one who told Nizam about the Dagger.
Nizam goes to the Sandglass caves
beneath Alamut, as Dastan and Tamina race to stop him. Tamina opens a secret
gate leading to the chamber, allowing them to take a short cut to the
Sandglass. En route, they encounter the leader of the Hassansins; however,
after a close fight, Dastan gets the upper hand and stabs the Hassansin before
throwing him into the chasm. Dastan and Tamina then kiss. They then manage to
reach Nizam as he pierces the Sandglass with the Dagger. During the final
confrontation, Nizam knocks Tamina over the edge of the chasm and Dastan
desperately catches her hand. Knowing he cannot stop Nizam and save her, Tamina
professes her love for Dastan and let’s go, sacrificing herself to stop Nizam.
Dastan fights Nizam as they both hold their hands on the Dagger. Dastan then
uses the Dagger's button to open the Sands of Time container and use its power
against Nizam. The Sandglass slowly cracks and the sandstorm are shown
destroying Alamut.
The sand glass is nowhere near the
Hourglass from the game. The Sandglass is as huge as the Hourglass but is just
a giant standing piece of sand. This was so stupid to change. Why not use the
Hourglass from the game? The only similarities are that they both are huge and
they both have a hole for the Dagger so it can activate. I’m thinking in the
sequel the giant Sandglass can be part of the Hourglass.
Dastan is then able to use the
Dagger and turn back the time as the Sandglass breaks, ending up at the point
when he first held the Dagger during the siege of Alamut. Like in the game, he
is the only who knows of the future events. Dastan uses his knowledge to reveal
Nizam's evil plan to his brothers, gaining their acceptance by revealing what
Tus told him about the meeting with their father prior to the attack. Exposed,
Nizam attempts to kill Dastan but ends up dying by Tus' blade. After
apologizing for the ransacking of her city, Tus suggests that perhaps Tamina
should become Dastan's wife as a sign of good will. The Prince returns the
Dagger of Time to her as a gift, as she looks at him surprised. The two of them
are next shown talking to each other and Tamina expressing her surprise about
Dastan's sudden change in behavior and hinting that he may have discovered
something to which he replies that they are in control of their own destiny.
End of Movie
I really liked the movie and it
seemed pure awesome to me but if it is just how another person sees the game,
like Jake said, then why are there so
many differences. Let’s take Princess Tamina for example. She already has a
name in the game series and that is Princess Farah. I can understand that the
Prince doesn't have a name and they name him Dastan in the movie but why change
someone’s name that already has a name. Yea, Jake may be right when he said how
a person views the game but it seems like a blind man has been playing the
game. Did they also forget the other powers the Dagger holds other than the
power to rewind time? There was slow time; there was fast forward kills; and
don't forget the power to see the future. Also it wasn't just the Dagger that
was the artifact everyone searched for in the game. It was also The Hour Glass
that people was thirsty over. Without The Hour Glass how can he do The Warrior
Within movie. The Hour Glass was one of the main objectives in the game's sequel. I’m not complaining but it seems like they are
trying to sugarcoat what they're doing and trying to make their own Prince of
Persia.
Hungry News gives this movie 3½ stars out of 5