Lara Croft is back on the big screen.

15 years since Angelina Jolie made her second, and final, appearance as the heroine of the computer game series Tomb Raider, Lara Croft returns – this time in the form of Alicia Vikander (The Danish Girl, Ex Machina, Jason Bourne), directed by Roar Uthaug.

The film serves as somewhat of a prequel to the previous films, working to establish towards the strong character that we know her to be.

Vikander stars as the young Croft – 7 years after the mysterious disappearance of her father, Lord Richard Croft (Dominic West), we find her operating as a bicycle food courier in London. Required to sign documents confirming her father as legally dead, and inheriting his wealth, she is passed a message from him left for her incase of his death. The message leads Lara on a journey of discovery, in terms of both the truth behind her fathers activities, but also one of herself as well.

In a genre that has regularly struggled to achieve (computer games into film), Tomb Raider is at the better end of this, with an interesting enough tale and Vikander’s performance in the lead role.  It operates with more of a character arc that would traditionally be the case for Tomb Raider stories.

In terms of antagonist in the film, we have Walton Goggins (The Hateful Eight) who does what he can as Mathias Vogel, someone who too seeks the secrets that Crofts father had.

Overall, its a solid, enjoyable enough adventure film but never really achieves anything of note, and aside from the Vikander’s performance (more so in the earlier parts of the film), is family unmemorable.

If you compare Lara Croft to James Bond (cinematically) this is very much her Casino Royale, just not as good.