Assassin’s Creed (2016)

Elevator Pitch: In 1492 in Spain the Moors are being beaten and Torquemada has set up the inquisition. The Guild of Assassins at are odd with the Knights Templar and one of their number Aquilar de Nerha has been assigned to protect Moorish Prince Ahmed. The prince is a pawn in an attempt by the Templers to recover “The Apple of Eden”. So  much for the past. Today Callum Lynch is identified by the Templar’s Abstergo Foundation as a direct descendant of Aquilar and is recovered to their advanced facility and physically and neurally regressed to 1492, where he re-enacts the events in which he was involved, leading the subversive Templar organisation towards their goal.

Content: No sex or nudity, indeed not even a moment of romance. We see Callum rescued from a prison execution chamber and then nursed to health in the austere surroundings of the Templar’s modern research facility. He is then set up in the Animus, allowing him to regress into Aquilar, what he sees being witnessed by the scientists in the chamber. As Aquilar he is required to rescue the prince from Torquemada and later, when captured has to escape with Maria a fellow assassin from an auto da fe. So there is a lot of fighting with swords, knives and bows and arrows.

A View: The IMDb numbers say it all really. A lot of people were interested, but nobody liked it. As for the critics, panned all the way. Those who did not like it found the plot impossible to follow, but if we look at the positives, there are some splendid scenes, the best of which might be the auto da fe, where Aquilar and Maria are to be burnt. The set was built in Malta and involved 900 extras. Fantastic.  So you could have it on while doing something else. No matter how closely you watch you might not understand it anyway.

Additional Info: The video game which features the on-going battle between the Assassins and the Templars, was released in 2007. It used “the Animus” allowing the main characters to relive the lives of their forefathers.