Prince of Persia : Sands of time

Year of release : 2010

Run time : 1h56m

Genre : Action / Fantasy

Cast : Jake Gyllenhaal, Gemma Arterton, Toby Kebbell, Ben Kingsley, Alfred Molina

The movie is based on the video game franchise ‘Prince of Persia’ by Jordan Mechner, mostly on the 2003 one.

In the Persian empire, king Sharaman and his brother, Nazam, rule guided by the principles of brotherhood and loyalty. The king has 2 sons, whom he loves. One day, he is impressed by the courage an orphan boy has, and adopts him.

15 years later, Persia is leading an assault against the holy city of Alamut, as they have info that the city is selling weapons to their enemies and is planning to strike them, so Persia strikes first.

The night before, they plan the attack, and talk about the princess, who is supposed to be one of the most beautiful women in the world.

Princess Tamina is warned about the Persian army which stopped by their gates and hasn’t moved since, so she and her people get ready.

Our lead, Dasdan (I don’t know if these are the kind of names they had back then,but they suck!), goes in first, climbing the city walls, while one of his brothers attacks from the front lines with his legion.

Dasdan catches a man from the city who’s running on his horse (the same man the princess sent away with something we can’t see), fights and kills him, and takes his dagger.

They conquer the city, and see that this time the rumours about the princess’ beauty are true. They decide she should marry the king’s first born, who already has too many wives (we don’t know how many ,for we never see them, but we’re told, so we must believe them).

The king is not impressed they conquered a holy city, thinking it won’t sit well with their allies.

Before the celebration of the victory and the wedding to the princess, his brother, the first born, and next in line to rule, offers Dasdan a chest with a robe, to present to their father, the king.

Celebrating the victory, at the king’s palace, Dasdan offers the king the robe, and after he puts it on, it starts to burn him, k1lling him. But not before the king decides that his first born has enough wives, and princess Tamina should be Dasdan’s first wife.

Dasdan and the princess run away, although he wants nothing to do with her. The princess wants the dagger though.

When the princes is trying to get the dagger away from him, Dasdan presses the jewel on top of the dagger, which takes him back one minute in time. He realizes whoever holds the dagger has the power to change the course of events, turning back time.

Dasdan realizes that maybe there’s more to it that meets the eye, and the siege was meant to steal the dagger, not to conquer a holy city which didn’t have any weapons in the first place, and was no threat to anyone.

In the meantime, his brother, the new king, sends his army after him, as he thinks him the king’s murderer.

I personally enjoyed the movie, it was entertaining, and even funny, through Alfred Molina’s character. I liked the world they created, the set design, the costumes.

The characters have growth, as Dasdan is pretty awful to the princess half of the movie, selling her to slave owners, and leaving her to fend for herself, but grows to love her.

It’s harder for his brothers, as the one played by Toby Kebbell is kinda dumb, because although he sees when he fights Dasdan, that he doesn’t want to k1ll him, and lets him live when he wins the fight win him, he still thinks him capable of k1lling their father, among other things.

The movie has a twist, because maybe the villain is not so obvious , but I got him figured out, based on what actors play what kind of characters, and saw it coming.

The king and his first born seem to be really good people.

The actors were good. Toby Kebbell, one of my favorite actors, looks like he belongs to this era, and acts great in this movie, although he’s a meanie.

The visual effects are good, I loved the visuals when they turn back time.

The soundtrack ,with Middle Eastern influences, is good.

The movie received mixed reviews (with a 36% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and a 50 score out of 100 on Metacritic), and grossed 336.4 million dollars at the box office, against a budget between 150 to 200 million dollars.

Cinema Score audiences graded the movie a B.

The movie was the highest grossing video game movie adaptation until Warcraft took its place in 2016.

You can watch the full movie for free, if you follow this link :

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x9gkeda

Rating : Worth a watch !