THE MORTAL INSTRUMENTS: CITY OF BONES
Starring Lily Collins, Jamie Campbell Bower, Jonathan Rhys Meyers
Directed by Harald Zwart
The clearest evidence that Cassandra Clare author of The Mortal Instruments young adult fantasy series got her start writing fan fiction online is her willingness to mix and match influences and rely on the question Wouldnt it be awesome if...? to serve as the catalyst for her slapdash plotting.
To wit: Wouldnt it be awesome if you (or, in this case, Lily Collins) learned that you werent just another human mundane? If you were this dimensions last line of defence against demons? If you could gain mystic powers by drawing tribal tattoos on yourself? If werewolves and vampires duked it out in New York City? If there was a High Warlock of Brooklyn who threw killer parties? If a leather-clad brooder (Jamie Campbell Bower) made eyes at you? If another leather-clad brooder (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) declared you his arch-enemy?
While you appreciate City of Bones owning its goth silliness and employing some unexpectedly grotesque creature design, its transition to the big screen is an awkward one.
Haphazardly directed by Harald Zwart, it serves as the cinematic equivalent of taking an adolescent ADHD sufferer, filling them with Red Bull, and asking them to recount the events of Clares novel from memory. Its soon tripping over its tangle of storylines and backtracking to cover important details it initially forgot.
It also leaves you wondering how, given the narratives evident surfeit of (largely borrowed) ideas, it couldnt manage a more evocative name for a key sacred relic than the cup? Unfortunately, you cant help but see the over-stuffed Mortal Instruments as half-empty.
