The film, pun fully intended, is an ungodly mess. What could have been an adventurous buddy comedy, an old-fashioned, Ben-Hur style epic, or a knowingly deranged B-movie ends up being an early contender for the worst film of the year. Too bad. Those trailers looked good.

Interestingly, there a handful of jokes are scattered throughout the script. Some cheeky lines delivered deadpan-style could have livened things up greatly if the writers were more generous with it. If kitsch mythology and a swords-and-sandals clad Butler along with various bosomy lasses float your boat, it’s passable.

Gerard/Nikolaj fans might lap this one up. The rest of us have better things to do. Like, have faith that there won’t be a sequel to this.

While you may admire the physical magnificence of the pyrotechnics on display, there’s little that can take your breath away. This is a tiresome exercise at regaining immortality and the gamey nature of the pursuit only makes it worse.

This is definitely not even in the so-bad-it’s-good territory, but with just a tiny extra push into the ridiculous, this 127-minute slog could have been made into a caustic 90-minute satire.