While the series' inaugural installment may have beaten the mutation of Young Adult cinema into a commercial monster chasing the success of “Twilight,” the first film of the “Mortal Instruments” series made its debut little over a year ago and borrows elements liberally from a countless number of other popular franchises both in and outside of its core demographic (not the least of which include Twilight, The Crow, Star Wars, Underworld and of course, Harry Potter).
It’s only a shame that lifting so many elements from beloved stories, they forgot to actually borrow the qualities of said franchises in order to make a passable film.
"City of Bones" follows brash, naive, self centered Clary Fray, who embarks on an adventure to save her mother from a conspiracy involving hierarchies of demon hunters and denizens of a mystical world unseen to ordinary humans. Assisting her are her best friend Simon and “shadowhunter” Jace, whom become entangled in a plot that threatens both worlds while maintaining a cryptic connection to Clary’s past.
What went right
Despite the mountain of problems that cripple the film, the one thing that director Harold Zwart does manage to succeed in doing is selling the world of the “Mortal Instruments” in such a way to elicit pining for a larger market for Urban Fantasy.
While ultimately derivative of superior materials, the setting of “City of Bones” feels very lively and the integration of the hidden magical world with several ordinary backdrops of an American city is surprisingly effective despite its simplicity. The numerous humanoid and inhuman creatures of the lore all carry themselves with a consistency in their outlook of other creatures that gives them a very natural feel that most stories handling such material lack. These touches of subtlety help to carry the illusion that there is much more to these societies than we are being shown.
The idea of telling a simplistic story as a means of better showcasing the setting ultimately proved to be a solid idea because the lore of “The Mortal Instruments” ultimately serves to be the films greatest asset.
And I would be remiss if I didn’t say that, despite doing almost nothing worthwhile with it as a story element, the casual inclusion and reference of a same-sex relationship and attraction in a non-stereotypical fashion was pretty bold.
What went wrong
Beyond a decent lore and an admirable usage of a progressive issue for a mainstream film, “City of Bones” almost be viewed as a blueprint of what not to do with Young Adult fiction or Fantasy storytelling in general. While I can't speak for the writing of the source material, to say "City of Bones'" screenplay needed a page 1 rewrite is like saying a Michael Bay movie is slightly underwritten. The writing of this movie is almost laughably bad.
Right from the opening, the audience is given a very poor introduction to Clary; She's rude, insensitive, self centered, pushy and has a bad tendency to brashly throw herself into harm's way despite fully knowing that she is incapable of fighting the threats that she is faced with.
Her survival is reliant almost exclusively on the fact that she is surrounded by people willing to sacrifice themselves for her, regardless of whether or not they're actually capable of defending themselves. Every element of the plot is predicated on her involvement, shutting out and ignoring side characters with more noticeable or unique traits and quirks, yet she ultimately has little to no agency in her actions, as she can only progress the plot by being escorted by somebody that is actually competent.
While this uselessness would be irritating enough on its own, she never loses or grows out of her standoffish demeanor, even when her courses of action nearly get her killed several times, leaving the impression that she is consistently ungrateful for the effort being put into her well being merely because she never gets to do what she wants in a scenario that she isn't qualified to handle.
Between the poor writing and a terrible performance by Lily Collins, this character could sink any movie on her own but the fault of her existence is only compounded by the film's several other problems that render it nigh incomprehensible.
The film's antagonist, Valentine's endgame is to utilize Clary's blood as a means of controlling all hunters and demons in order to take over the world. The leap connecting her blood to the key to this world domination is already a stretch but it took me 2 viewings of the film to even discern that as his motivation, which is only explicitly stated once in an unremarkable exposition dump, of which there are many, within the first act of the film and it's this pervasive flaw sits at the heart of everything wrong with the movie.
Despite the intriguing lore and solid production values, "City of Bones" is ultimately just a pile of exposition dumps headlined by an unlikable protagonist surrounded by underdeveloped characters portrayed by actors giving weak performances.
It forces itself through enough plot for 2 movies but could have easily been trimmed down into a single tightly focused product. Instead, it speeds through its most fascinating elements in favor of getting right into what it believes its audience is after; the contrived love triangle between the 2 men that want her despite showing almost no desirable traits and it can't even get that right.
"Twilight" may have made its characters look like stupid and terrible people but at least they felt like people. "City of Bones'" clumsy execution of the concept hits at the least appropriate point by having its horribly acted participants do the exact opposite of what even the most emotionally charged human being would have done in such circumstances.
Any given 10 minute stretch of the movie will reveal exactly why its bad but it's failure at the box office is a similar no-brainer; "The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones" radically overestimated the size of its audience.
The YA crowd may be a lucrative market for film but Hollywood does not thrive on them alone. While the Big 3 franchises began by marketing directly toward their audience, an eye was still kept toward the crowd that could actually give it a profit.
If "Twilight" relied purely on its hardcore fanbase, the series probably wouldn't have reached passed "New Moon." However, over time, it began to ride the waves of its unexpected success and market itself as a blockbuster event, which always draws in larger crowds. The following films, regardless of their quality, were seen by fans, parents of fans, curious outsiders, critics looking for buzz, haters that wanted bashing rights, fans of bad cinema, etc.
Rather than reach out to a wider audience, studio heads arrogantly anticipated that the film would sell itself and the result was financial disappointment and a hastily scrapped sequel's pre-production. While banking on an audience that is almost guaranteed to dislike a film may sound ridiculous or underhanded, which commercial is more convincing at the end of the day.
Her survival is reliant almost exclusively on the fact that she is surrounded by people willing to sacrifice themselves for her, regardless of whether or not they're actually capable of defending themselves. Every element of the plot is predicated on her involvement, shutting out and ignoring side characters with more noticeable or unique traits and quirks, yet she ultimately has little to no agency in her actions, as she can only progress the plot by being escorted by somebody that is actually competent.
While this uselessness would be irritating enough on its own, she never loses or grows out of her standoffish demeanor, even when her courses of action nearly get her killed several times, leaving the impression that she is consistently ungrateful for the effort being put into her well being merely because she never gets to do what she wants in a scenario that she isn't qualified to handle.
Between the poor writing and a terrible performance by Lily Collins, this character could sink any movie on her own but the fault of her existence is only compounded by the film's several other problems that render it nigh incomprehensible.
The film's antagonist, Valentine's endgame is to utilize Clary's blood as a means of controlling all hunters and demons in order to take over the world. The leap connecting her blood to the key to this world domination is already a stretch but it took me 2 viewings of the film to even discern that as his motivation, which is only explicitly stated once in an unremarkable exposition dump, of which there are many, within the first act of the film and it's this pervasive flaw sits at the heart of everything wrong with the movie.
Despite the intriguing lore and solid production values, "City of Bones" is ultimately just a pile of exposition dumps headlined by an unlikable protagonist surrounded by underdeveloped characters portrayed by actors giving weak performances.
It forces itself through enough plot for 2 movies but could have easily been trimmed down into a single tightly focused product. Instead, it speeds through its most fascinating elements in favor of getting right into what it believes its audience is after; the contrived love triangle between the 2 men that want her despite showing almost no desirable traits and it can't even get that right.
"Twilight" may have made its characters look like stupid and terrible people but at least they felt like people. "City of Bones'" clumsy execution of the concept hits at the least appropriate point by having its horribly acted participants do the exact opposite of what even the most emotionally charged human being would have done in such circumstances.
Why did it fail
Any given 10 minute stretch of the movie will reveal exactly why its bad but it's failure at the box office is a similar no-brainer; "The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones" radically overestimated the size of its audience.
The YA crowd may be a lucrative market for film but Hollywood does not thrive on them alone. While the Big 3 franchises began by marketing directly toward their audience, an eye was still kept toward the crowd that could actually give it a profit.
If "Twilight" relied purely on its hardcore fanbase, the series probably wouldn't have reached passed "New Moon." However, over time, it began to ride the waves of its unexpected success and market itself as a blockbuster event, which always draws in larger crowds. The following films, regardless of their quality, were seen by fans, parents of fans, curious outsiders, critics looking for buzz, haters that wanted bashing rights, fans of bad cinema, etc.
Rather than reach out to a wider audience, studio heads arrogantly anticipated that the film would sell itself and the result was financial disappointment and a hastily scrapped sequel's pre-production. While banking on an audience that is almost guaranteed to dislike a film may sound ridiculous or underhanded, which commercial is more convincing at the end of the day.
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