Artemis Fowl

Amelia Emberwing started her review by admitting, “Going into Disney's Artemis Fowl, I had hoped that not reading the source material would work in the film's favor. Hoped that, perhaps, my proclivity for children's movies and young adult fare might grant it some grace. Thought that, maybe, my love for fantasy and lore intersecting with that of science would help gloss over any haphazard COVID-19 rush-jobs.”

Emberwing admitted, “I was wrong.”

Before going into all of that, the first thing to do is briefly discuss the plot. Young Artemis Fowl, played by Ferdia Shaw, is an extremely smart and gifted boy with an interest in science and respect for no one. Artemis Fowl Sr., played by Colin Farrell, has a mysterious job that keeps him away all the time, but when he’s at home he spends a lot of time teaching his son of the myths and legends of the fairy people.

It’s not that long before Artemis Fowl Sr. goes mission, and his son must solve the mystery of his disappearance. With the help of his bodyguard, Domovoi Butler, played by Nonso Anozie, Artemis quickly finds that the fairy people his father had been telling him about for years is real. Artemis, Domovoi, and Domovoi’s niece Juliet (Tamara Smart) get to work on how to rescue his father from the evil Opal (Hong Chau).

To do so, the three will put themselves against all the fairy clan by kidnapping the eager young fairy cop, Holly Short, played by Lara McDonnell. Despite Artemis and Holly’s differences, the two will eventually have to work together to save their respective homes before everything is done.

Doesn’t sound so bad, right. Emberwing said, “A bit rudimentary, sure, but it is a children's story after all. Before we dive into where Artemis Fowl goes so, so wrong, let's take a look at what works.” There aren’t many set pieces in the film, but the Fowl Manor and the small look we get of the fairy world are nice. Some of the costuming’s also neat. Yes, Josh Gad’s costume might have been stolen off of Hagrid’s, but the rest is alright.

Emberwing said, “One paragraph and eight-five words are literally all the nice things I can muster about this film.”

Emberwing admitted, “Here's the thing. There are plenty of allowances I'm willing to make for a children's film. For example, I don't care that Artemis and Domovoi immediately know how to use fairy tech, or that Holly's fairy … pod (?) plays human music despite the stringent separation laws between the two worlds.” It doesn’t really matter that Artemis starts trusting Holly for completely no reason. Kids’ movies can do that!

What any film aren’t allowed to do is introduce a character like Juliet, a young Black girl, who basically does nothing other than bring people food in the film. We see her fencing at first, but afterwards her main reason in the story is to bring people sandwiches. We know what year it is. We know that this type of stuff isn’t acceptable anymore. Yet, there it is, in front of us, in a major studio release.

Films, regardless of genre or age demographic, are also required to put forward an entire narrative. Artemis Fowl does not accomplish that. After they manage to rescue Artemis Sr. with the Aculos, the story suddenly stops. There’s no final fight with Opal, we never hear from the disloyal Briar Cudgeon, played by Joshua McGuire, again, and the device that was told throughout the entire film as too dangerous to return to the fairy people gets returned to them with no questions asked.

We’ve seen Disney do this before with what they consider to be franchise starters. They use the opening film to build up trickery so they can then launch a trilogy along with this. Sometimes they manage to get away with it. Emberwing said, “Other times it's so egregious that it's hard to believe they'll ever be able to build a sequel on top of the nothing of a story they've put forward.” “Artemis Fowl,” released in 2020, falls into the latter.

Emberwing is right when saying, “It's astounding just how much of this film manages to be bafflingly frustrating.” Josh Gad is clearly being directed to overact, ending with tiring monologues that are instead meant to inspire trickery and excitement. Meanwhile, transitions in certain scenes are so random that they almost make even Dame Judi Dench, playing Commander Root, seem like a bad actress. Some of the lines she’s forced to say are just hilariously bad. “Get the four-leaf clover out of here,” and the terribly ridiculous “top of the morning to ya,” is the first thought.

One thing to note is that “Artemis Fowl” is free to Disney+ subscribers. This is convenient, because that’s about how much you should be paying to watch it.

I know this may come as a surprise, but I have never read any of the Artemis Fowl books before I saw this film. However, with that being said, I still don’t think this movie is in any way good. Even though it looked nice, and it felt like it was starting to get good, it never got good. This just ended up being one giant disappointment for people who read the book, Disney fans, or any regular movie watcher. They did the same thing here like they did with “A Wrinkle in Time.” Just do yourself a favor and avoid this one at all cost because there is nothing good in this.

Look out tomorrow because I will wrap up “Disney Month 2021” with another terrible movie.