Images courtesy of Apple Studios
FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH– 2 STARS
At the center of the new Apple Studios streaming film, Fountain of Youth, is a pair of argumentative siblings played by the headlining duo of John Krasinski and Natalie Portman. A union between People magazine’s reigning “Sexiest Man Alive” and the Black Swan Academy Award winner—aging wonderfully in their mid-40s—boasts an intriguing charisma match. One doesn’t have to dive very far down the hallways of entertainment journalism clickbait to find a decent list of the best brother-sister duos in film history. With the right chance and material, these two should have the credentials to claim a spot on that linked list.
Aha! There’s the keyword: Material. Apple had an answer with a big project aiming high with hitmaker director Guy Ritchie at the helm. They secured Portman and Krasinski for a wayfaring global adventure seeking the titular mythical spring believed to restore youth to drinkers and bathers. Putting those stars together with that concept surely has to generate some sizzle with the history and mythology crowds, right? Well, with all pun intended, leave it to Apple and professional retreading screenwriter James Vanderbilt (currently stewarding Netflix’s Murder Mystery series and the legacy sequel vapors of the Scream franchise) to go back to a fading Hollywood well, leap in, and find it dry.
While unassigned at the start as a mild expat man on a scooter cruising in Bangkok and finding himself surrounded by men in black SUVs with guns pointed at him from rolled down windows, Krasinski plays Luke Purdue, a high-end art thief who learned everything he knows from his departed father. The security team he fleeced in Thailand are in hot pursuit, as well as a shadowy woman named Esme, played by Eiza Gonzalez (her second spin with Ritchie after The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare). The painting rolled up in a leather tube on Luke’s back is one of many he’s secured for his employer, the world-renowned billionaire Owen Carver (Star Wars sequel trilogy heel Domhnall Gleeson), each believed to contain hidden clues passed down for centuries that lead to the location of the Fountain of Youth.
Luke’s next heist in Fountain of Youth ropes in his very own sister, Charlotte Purdue (Portman), while working as a museum curator in London. He uses a “fancy seeing you here” conversation to lift a Rembrandt off the wall and uses her as a shield for his daring Shelby Mustang getaway through Trafalgar Square. Now looking like an accomplice to her brother’s crimes—work she herself used to enjoy in her younger days before going straight as a married mother—Charlotte sees her father’s old squad (the underused Laz Alonzo of The Boys and Alien: Covenant’s Carmen Ejogo), hears her brother out, and gets the lowdown on the whole quest to come.
LESSON #1: FAILING TO FIND WONDER IN THE WONDER– On paper, the atlas hopscotch in Fountain of Youth, stretching from Bangkok and London to Vienna and Giza, framed around a National Treasure-esque intellectual obstacle course of long-guarded secrets, should leap off the swashbuckling page. That is not the case in Ritchie’s expensive film, and there are three reasons why. The first is the aforementioned dry well.
Face it, folks. Indiana Jones is re-retired, and, unfortunately, the genre went into hospice with him. The heydays of The Da Vinci Code and National Treasure are two decades old. Moreover, Dirk Pitt never took off 20 years ago after Sahara, Tomb Raider is looking at its second reboot, and any sequel for Uncharted languishes in developmental hell. In an era where exotic locations can be reached in virtual fashions with devices in your very hand and many historical myths have been debunked by spelunking reality television shows and the documentary film scene, the Fountain of Youth isn’t interesting enough to draw poignant wonder. The heft is as thin as the paper of a workplace breakroom poster that says “Life is about the journey, not the prizes.”
This meager bedtime story counts as doomed material from the start, sinking the appeal of the matched stars involved in Fountain of Youth. The second cardinal issue is how John Krasinski and Natalie Portman are used. She’s the sister going through a divorce with custody challenges, who ends up lugging her conveniently brilliant pre-teen son, Thomas (Benjamin Chivers from Napoleon), around to solve puzzles during the criminal escapades. He’s the mercilessly sarcastic brother chiding her about leaving the family business, goading her into throwing away her present and future on this trek, and rashly putting her and his nephew in danger.
LESSON #2: NO ONE WANTS TO GO ON AN ADVENTURE WITH BICKERING SIBLINGS— This is not the best use of these two A-listers, and the resulting dynamic creates a pair of bickering relatives that are more insufferable and preposterous than engaging and endearing. When it’s between pestering siblings and not romantic interests, the patter of dialogue that should be creating colorful character tension is greatly reduced. Maybe Eiza Gonzalez’s “Protector of the Path” guardian, deputized by the Vatican elder played by Stanley Tucci (also atrociously underused), should have gotten greater focus and involvement. In any case, no one wants to go on a big-screen adventure, let alone a streaming couch night on AppleTV+, with that kind of annoying energy for two hours and change.
The final fatal flaw for Fountain of Youth is the script’s execution. Granted, lucky conveniences are the bread-and-butter of a good treasure-hunting film. We want to be dazzled by dextrous skills and lightbulb moments of educated decipherment that thrust our heroes towards the next conquest. However, Vanderbilt’s screenplay and Ritchie’s action prowess flatly use several PG-13-rated semi-automatic shootouts that pile up an inexplicable body count to get itself out of jams. Sure, Harrison Ford dispatched his fair share of Nazis to the pearly gates. But, call me old-fashioned, the violence in this movie when you’re toting a kid along is just downright silly and borderline senseless. Either take the kid out and increase the peril to suit the threat level, or write better conflicts and set pieces that fit the included crowd.
It’s a shame Fountain of Youth turned out this way. Guy Ritchie is normally (I see you, Aladdin) better than this. With little consistent conviction of characters, tired tantrums, and very obvious twists, dumb brawn is taking away from brains at too many junctures. Even when someone is finally dipping a toe in the mystical waters promised, this is a movie that cannot, for the life of itself, stop and soak in the awe for us to be able to feel any awe too.
LOGO DESIGNED BY MEENTS ILLUSTRATED (#1307)
