Trailers are very helpful to the movie-going process. Sure, they sometimes misrepresent the film, but in general they offer a very good snapshot of at least what kind of movie we can expect. I for one am grateful for the trailer to the new epic fantasy action movie (it says so on the YouTube page), Gods of Egypt. For two reasons: 1) because this is two minutes of sheer CGI-fueled insanity, and 2) because now I know what Alex Proyas has been up to. Oh, and reason 3) because it tells me that this can’t possibly be anything but a ridiculous movie.
In some good “they’ve done epic fantasy before” casting, the film stars both 300‘s Gerard Butler and Game of Thrones‘ Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as two of the titular Egyptian gods, Set and Horus, respectively. Apparently in this version of what Ancient Egyptian mythology was, the gods largely look like modern day white people but can, like, suit up into their animal-headed versions. Set is a god of the desert, storms, disorder, violence, and foreigners (?) and is portrayed as the usurper in the mythology, having killed his brother, Osiris, and is constantly battling Horus, Osiris’ son. Set is also the father of Anubis (Goran D. Kleut), the jackal-headed god of the underworld—so that’s pretty neat. Not sure much of that will make it into this movie, but we’ll see.
From the looks of things, Set blinds Horus and a young human boy, played by Aussie Brenton Thwaites, has to help get Horus’ bejeweled eyes back in order for the birdy one to fight and defeat the doggy one, who’s ruling Egypt with an iron fist. Also, he sends giant, toothy snakes to fight Horus, because what blue screen extravaganza would be complete without having to dodge enormous snakes?
The film was directed by Alex Proyas (who was born in Egypt, funnily enough), and who’d previously directed the features The Crow, I, Robot, and Knowing. But he also directed Dark City which means he does have a good movie in him somewhere.
Do you think Gods of Egypt will be a February fizzle or a poorly-timed gem? How do you feel about Jaime Lannister fighting King Leonidas in the big screen? Let us know in the comments below!
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Image: Summit/Lionsgate
Kyle Anderson is the Weekend Editor and a film and TV critic for Nerdist.com. Follow him on Twitter!
