In the Lost Lands (dir. Paul W.S. Anderson)

by Jack Martin | Mar 17, 2025

Certificate: 15

Running Time: 101 mins

UK Distributor: Studiocanal

UK Release Date: 14 March 2025

WHO’S IN IN THE LOST LANDS?

Milla Jovovich, Dave Bautista, Arly Jover, Amara Okereke, Fraser James, Simon Lööf, Deirdre Mullins, Sebastian Stankiewicz, Jacek Dzisiewicz, Tue Lunding, Ian Hanmore, Eveline Hall, Kamila Klamut, Caoilinn Springall, Pawel Wysocki, Jan Kowalewski, Nicolas Stone, Tomasz Cymerman

WHO’S BEHIND THE CAMERA?

Paul W. S. Anderson (director, producer), Constantin Werner (writer, producer), Dave Bautista, Jeremy Bolt, Milla Jovovich and Jonathan Meisner (producers), Paul Haslinger (composer), Glen MacPherson (cinematographer), Niven Howie (editor)

WHAT’S IT ABOUT?

A witch (Jovovich) and a hunter (Bautista) venture into a post-apocalyptic wasteland…

WHAT ARE MY THOUGHTS ON IN THE LOST LANDS?

Paul W.S. Anderson is a filmmaker that prides himself so much on B-movie schlock that the notion of him making anything that’s actually of any substance – or, perhaps even trickier, anything that doesn’t star his real-life spouse Milla Jovovich – is indeed a tall order. So, what did anyone really expect when he was revealed to be working on an adaptation of George R.R. Martin’s short story In the Lost Lands? Because as intricate and deeply layered in world=building lore as Martin’s writing can be, none of it matters when someone like Anderson comes along to bring it to life, as odds are it’ll be as incomprehensible and mind-numbingly dull as much of his other works.

And lo and behold, Anderson’s In the Lost Lands is all those things and more, in a mess of a film that’s both ugly to look at and wildly artificial in its visuals and general storytelling.

Taking place in a post-apocalyptic dystopia that’s ruled by a powerful sect of religious zealots, a witch named Gray Alys (Jovovich) – an outcast being hunted for the crime of, well, being a witch – is approached by the Queen Melange (Amara Okereke) for a complicated task: head out into the “Lost Lands” and retrieve the powers of a werewolf, which she hopes to consume for herself. Gray Alys soon acquires local hunter Boyce (Dave Bautista) to be her guide through the dangerous Lost Lands, and together they set out on a horseback journey across the CG-coated landscapes that can only be described as Zack Snyder’s Fallout.

That is very much the aesthetic that Anderson has decided to go with here, with every single set and backdrop looking as though it was filmed in front of a green-screen in ways that even Snyder himself would call for some restraint. This is a movie where everything looks and feels fake, from the impractical costumes and make-up effects to even the simple illusion of riding a horse (both Jovovich and Bautista are only ever filmed in close-up whilst “riding” their stallions, except during some much wider shots that are clearly the actors’ stunt doubles), and all the while it’s impossible to gauge the scope that the direction is going for here since none of it ever feels real enough to get lost within the mechanics of it all. The effects themselves are only ever okay, but their heavy detail is often fogged over by an unappealing colour palette slathered all over the final image that draws out the artifice even further, rendering it ugly to look at in addition to being barely watchable thanks to overly speedy editing in the action scenes, where you’ll hardly be able to tell who’s fighting who.

Sadly, there’s very little else in the film to attach oneself to, as Anderson – working from a script by producer Constantin Werner – is unable to generate any proper character dynamics or introduce some genuine stakes for the audience to care about. The two leads have no discernible chemistry with one another, and are left to trade stock movie dialogue with one another instead of forming an actual connection, which is a shame because you can tell that Dave Bautista is really making an effort to come off as this gruff, soft-spoken Clint Eastwood figure, and in a few scenes where he actually gets to be a person, he actually does. However, the same cannot be said for Milla Jovovich, an actor that only ever seems to have one facial expression whenever she’s sad, angry, fearful or even the slightest bit relieved, which does her already thinly defined character no favours and leaves the actor with very little engaging screen presence to speak of. Funnily enough, this often seems to be the case whenever she’s in a film directed by her husband, with whom she still hasn’t been able to generate a genuinely good performance, even after twenty years of working together.

Elsewhere, it’s a thin plot filled with inconsistencies and predictable twists, as well as villains who are all too easily disposed of, sometimes before the third act kicks into gear, and as for the titular Lost Lands there’s little rhyme or reason to how this world operates, or even a sense of how wide the power of this totalitarian regime actually is. As someone who isn’t at all familiar with the original source material, I would bet good money that a lot of what George R.R. Martin wrote has been heavily altered by writer Werner and director Anderson to just be another generic post-apocalyptic movie, one that’s trying a bit too hard to be Mad Max: Fury Road but lacks both the style and substance that made it the genuine action classic it’s revered as today. There are points where you can tell it’s one of Martin’s stories, with much of the political scheming and focus on royal antics feeling a lot like a more green-screened Game of Thrones, but everything else seems to be a watered-down interpretation of the author’s lore-heavy storytelling style.

It shouldn’t be that surprising to learn that Paul W.S. Anderson’s In the Lost Lands is pretty bad, but it’s disappointing all the same to see such promising material be wasted on a filmmaker who’s too focused on either bringing video game visuals to life or presenting his wife as the most alluring creature in the world, to really dive deep into what could have been an intriguing and unique post-apocalyptic ride. Instead, it’s as wasteful and forgettable as anything the director has done in the last couple of decades.

SO, TO SUM UP…

In the Lost Lands is a mind-numbing waste of George R.R. Martin’s source material, where the author’s intrigue and lore has been significantly watered down in favour of generic and personality-free post-apocalyptic action slop where everything looks and feels artificial.