Franchise wannabe ‘Artemis Fowl’ lumbers under its own nonsense
Originally slated for theatrical release, “Artemis Fowl” released on Disney+ earlier this month due to, well, the state of the world. Even in a normal year, the $125-million film might have struggled to turn a profit given its stalled production history and controversial changes to its source material.
Based on the young adult fantasy book series by Eoin Colfer, “Artemis Fowl” the movie softens the main character, a young criminal mastermind operating in a world of underground fairies, dwarves and other magical creatures, into a more heroic figure. Young Fowl (played by Ferdia Shaw) is a hyper-intelligent rich kid working to uncover the mystery of his father’s disappearance. Fowl senior is played by Colin Farrell in a glorified cameo.
The intrigue includes the search for a missing fairy artifact, which draws the attention of the Lower Elements Police (LEP) force in the fairy world, led by Judi Dench, wholly committed to the part, pointy ears and all. LEP officer Holly Short (age 84 in fairy years but played by the decidedly younger Lara McDonnell) becomes a pawn in Artemis’ plans to find the artifact, and so the LEP recruits a dwarf thief with a rather, um, unique way of digging underground (Josh Gad, who also narrates the film as his weirdo character).
It’s all a bunch of fantasy nonsense, honestly, or it feels that way because Artemis, Holly and the rest of the quirky characters get little time to develop into multi-dimensional personalities.
Without his more anti-hero traits, Artemis lacks urgency, and the movie fails to pitch any other character into a better-defined antagonistic role. The big-bad of the movie, for example, only appears in a few short scenes and is never seen out of the shadows. It’s just one way “Artemis Fowl” feels more like a setup to a more compelling story that’s supposed to come later.
The bulk of the story focuses on a magical siege of the Fowl estate, though it provides little in the way of excitement or dramatic tension. Kenneth Branaugh, the esteemed actor with extensive directing experience that includes the recent “Murder on the Orient Express” remake and the first “Thor” movie for Marvel, puts together a few images of spectacle during this stretch, though none of it coheres into a memorable setpiece. The over-reliance on CGI also once again proves to be an issue for Disney and their live-action blockbuster efforts.
It’s clear that “Artemis Fowl” wants to be the start of an ongoing franchise, one in which the title character becomes more complicated and the big names like Farrell, Dench and Gad eventually get more to do. Franchise setup, however, rarely succeeds unless the characters are compelling from the start, and there needs to be a clear dramatic arc in place before anyone will care about all the fantastical world-building.
Given its unceremonious drop onto Disney+, whether deserved or not, it’s unlikely the “Artemis Fowl” universe continues beyond this movie. That’d be a shame if the product itself wasn’t so mediocre.
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Tyler Wilson can be reached at twilson@cdapress.com. He’s been writing professionally about movies since 2000 and is the co-host of Old Millennials Remember Movies, available everywhere you get podcasts and at OldMillennialsRemember.com.
