Artemis Fowl Review by Chris Stuckmann - A Missed Opportunity for Fans

Artemis Fowl finally arrives on Disney+ after years of development, delays, and multiple creative hands passing through the project. Based mostly on the first book in the popular series, the film had all the ingredients to become a major Disney fantasy franchise: recognizable source material, Kenneth Branagh directing, a large budget, and a cast that includes Colin Farrell, Judi Dench, and Josh Gad.

The result is incredibly disappointing.

The core story involves Artemis Fowl II trying to rescue his kidnapped father while searching for a powerful secret object that multiple characters want. There is also an underground fairy world, a military-style fairy organization, and a dwarf character played by Josh Gad who narrates much of the film through an interrogation framing device.

On paper, that might sound like enough to build a fantasy adventure around. In execution, the movie has almost no sense of story.

The first several minutes are almost entirely exposition, and that continues throughout the film. Characters explain who people are, what things mean, and why certain objects matter, but the movie never finds a natural way to make any of it engaging. It is heavy-handed, constant, and strangely ineffective, because even with all the explanation, the film still feels unclear and unfocused.

The title character is also a major problem. Artemis is repeatedly presented as brilliant, clever, and special, but the film never makes him interesting. He comes across more like a concept than a character. The performance is stiff, and while it is difficult to place too much blame on a young actor in his first major role, the result simply does not work.

The fairy-world storyline is slightly more interesting than Artemis himself, but even that material is poorly handled. Judi Dench’s character, the fairy military, the troll sequences, and the time-freeze action all feel like pieces from a larger movie that never fully formed.

That is the biggest issue with Artemis Fowl: it does not feel like a complete film. It feels like a hodgepodge of scenes strung together until they reached feature length. The characters do not feel developed, the world does not feel immersive, and the story does not feel properly built.

For a debut franchise movie, it is also surprisingly short, which only makes the rushed storytelling more noticeable. There is very little room for the film to breathe, explain its world properly, or give the audience a reason to care.

The reported budget makes the whole thing even more confusing. With this much money, this source material, and this level of talent involved, the final product should not feel this empty.

Final Verdict

Artemis Fowl is barely a movie and barely a story. It is over-explained, underdeveloped, oddly assembled, and deeply disappointing. Fans of the books will probably have an even harder time with it.

Rating: F