Critique: Artemis Fowl (Film)

This was a fun film, a good way to spend an afternoon.

 

*****SPOILERS*****

 

I’ll start with the good bits first.

The phrases that the mythical creatures use were fun. Especially when they’re clever takes on swear words. ‘Get the four leaf clover out of here’ was my absolute favourite.

There were other funny comments. “Most people are afraid of gluten. How would they handle goblins?” Too funny.

The world building of having a parallel universe of high tech mythical creatures underground was fascinating. People mostly think you can only have magic or technology, never both, but to have them coexist is interesting. (I know this is down to the author of the books but it made it a good choice for a film adaptation.)

The mythological creatures come from Celtic, Greek and Scandinavian sources but they all have an Irish vibe to them. That’s fine. It does make me wonder: Artemis is unusually clever. The Salmon of Knowledge is a creature of Celtic myth whereby the eater knows everything. Could Artemis have ingested the Salmon by any chance?

 

At the end of the film, Artemis tells the antagonist that he’s coming for her. But why would you give them the heads up? Yes it leads nicely into a sequel but that’s hardly an excuse for a very clever child to do something so stupid.

 

I didn’t like the centaur whinnying. Having a centaur whinny is fine. The problem I had was that the centaur didn’t whinny at appropriate times. It’s almost like the creators thought ‘a centaur should whinny’ and then shoehorned this concept into the script. It was an uncomfortable fit.

 

All the men in the Fowl family are named Artemis. Artemis is the name of a Greek goddess. I’m all for gender neutral names but it’s not practical in this instance. This naming tradition has obviously been done for a long time, long before people would even consider calling their boys after such a feminine figure. So this tradition isn’t feasible.

 

The niece of Artemis’ bodyguard was brought into the film. Her character was kind of pointless. If she wasn’t in the film, I honestly don’t think I would have noticed the difference in regards to plot and character development. Maybe she has an important role in later adaptations and it makes sense to introduce her to the audience now. Still, if this was the case, more effort should have been spent on making her a useful character. It’s a shame because the actress did a good job.

 

Like I said at the start, this film was a good way to spend the afternoon. I just wish the creators spent more afternoons ironing out the kinks.