Assassin’s Creed

An executed criminal (Michael Fassbender) is revived by father-and-daughter scientists (Jeremy Irons and Marion Cotillard); it seems he’s a descendent of the ancient order of Assassins, and they want to use his genetic memories to locate the Apple of Eden, which the Assassins have hidden in their age-old struggle to thwart the Knights Templar in their drive for world domination. Got all that? Well, don’t bother. And don’t be fooled by the worthy names among the movie’s cast (Fassbender, Cotillard, Irons, Charlotte Rampling, Brendan Gleeson); like all movies based on video games, this one stinks. The script by Michael Lesslie, Adam Cooper and Bill Collage is historically illiterate claptrap and Justin Kurzel’s direction (if that’s the right word) is just a murky, badly edited catalog of CGI clichés. J.L.