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Let’s be honest, not every swing a Hollywood blockbuster will be a home run. But Jerry Bruckheimer is the Hollywood equivalent of Ryan Howard. So when Bruckheimer took on the task of converting the best selling video game “Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time” expectations were high for a big hit. Unfortunately the box office results were more like a single, maybe a double.
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, a Walt Disney Pictures and Jerry Bruckheimer Film directed by Mike Newhall, transport you to the mystical lands of Persia for this entertaining, epic action-adventure. It‘s a race against time when a rogue prince (Jake Gyllenhaal) reluctantly teams up with a rival princess (Gemma Arterton) to safeguard a magical dagger that gives its possessor the power to reverse time and rule the world. Filled with death-defying escapes and unexpected twists at every turn – Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time is a fun adventure in the spirit of Hollywood’s classic epic-adventures.
The is set in Persia, which had this Disney fan thinking immediately of Aladdin and the start of Prince echoed Aladdin very closely, Gyllenhaal plays Dastan, a street-rat elevated to princehood by a King looking for one son who would never have claim to the throne. But there’s a rat in the family and Dastan finds himself on the run and trying to clear his name. It’s a pretty typical movie plot.
Dastan teams with Princess Tamina (Arterton) who is charged with protecting a mystical device that literally controls the sands of time. When you add the ability to go back through time and fix errors made along the way, it’s like a gun on the mantle in act one, it’s bound to go off in act three. (Nic Cage’s ‘Next’ had a very similar plot device.) And that’s just what happens in Prince of Persia: Sands of Time.
Still, not all is lost. The movie does have that epic feel and the effects, stunts, and thrills are quite good. I particularly enjoyed the use of parkour for the chase and fight scenes. I would have liked to see even more of it.
If you do decide to add Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time to your video library, you’ll definitely want to the Blu-Ray/DVD combo. The rich beauty of the landscape and the technical digital creations of the special effects really shine through in the HD experience.
DVD Details below the cut:
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