“Borderlands” stars Cate Blanchett, left, as Lilith, Ariana Greenblatt as Tiny Tina, Kevin Hart as Roland, Florian Munteanu as Krieg and Jamie Lee Curtis as Tannis. (photo courtesy of Lionsgate)

I take it back. I take it all back. The curse of the video game adaptation never lifted. A few lucky ones just slipped through unnoticed. In 102 minutes, “Borderlands” undergoes all the progress of other films and TV series that try to elevate video game stories. It sets back the clock to “Assassin’s Creed,” “Doom” and any of those “Street Fighters.” The curse is certainly back.

Then again, blaming some malediction, dubbing this invisible wall an inevitability is easier than calling out the individuals who make these flops possible. Perhaps game developers share some blame. That seemed to be the case in 2016’s “Warcraft,” a mediocre film whose director had to share creative control with Blizzard.

Here, that doesn’t seem to be the case. The “Borderlands” premise appears hollowed out, filled with add-ons nobody asked for. Why adapt something only to make it conform with far too many sci-fi actioners, I don’t know. Too bad. The premise behind so many games is often quite good, but many adaptations, like the recently canceled “Halo” series and now “Borderlands” confirm that showrunners and filmmakers don’t trust the source material, instead doing their own thing, with a few nods to the source along the way.

Frankly, things go south quick when mercenary Roland (Kevin Hart) performs a jailbreak to get Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt) away from her evil magnate Atlas (Edgar Ramirez). A clunky fight scene ensues, followed by an abrupt character intro: the meat-headed Krieg (Florian Munteanu), rocking a pseudo Jason mask. It’s all shockingly bad in execution, setting the tone for all that follows.

Next, meet bounty hunter Lilith (Cate Blanchett in quite the wig), who must return to her home world Pandora to locate her daughter. Simple enough until it all goes wrong, first when robot Claptrap (voiced by Jack Black) latches onto her for some unknown, not-at-all foreshadowing reason. Soon enough she must traverse dangerous wastelands with those fugitives, encountering familiar faces from her childhood along the way, like Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis), who spent her life searching for a hidden alien relic on the planet known as the Vault.

At this point, I should note I have no connection to “Borderlands” video games. I tried to play the 2009 original, I didn’t feel like figuring out how it worked, and I went back to shooting up the Covenant as Master Chief. So I don’t see any of the film’s diversions from the game as cardinal sins. Sometimes things change in the adaptation process. Remember 2008’s “Wanted”? Nothing went through more revisions than that (look it up, it’s wild), yet the film is still relatively solid.

But a little research on the unused plot and tone reveals a far more compelling story that goes unused here. After 15 years of anticipation for a big-screen debut, the best a ragtag group of filmmakers could do feels like Mad Max puked on “The Fifth Element.”

Perhaps that shouldn’t shock anyone considering production began in 2015, including two attached directors and around seven writers. Apparently, this bland dribble is the best that director Eli Roth (“Hostel,” “Thanksgiving”), producer Avi Arad (anything “Spider-Man”) and Lionsgate could muster.

Roth knows his way around human dismemberment as a popular slasher guy, so it’s hard to figure out why Lionsgate – the studio behind the horror franchises like “Saw,” “The Strangers,” “Sinister,” “The Descent” and “Hostel” – or he would shoot for a PG-13 rating. This is one of those times that taking a chance on R would’ve helped.

Then again, gore can’t save bad writing, clunky editing, cheap action and poor casting choices. The only thing “Borderlands” has going for it is high production value, to the tune of around $110 million, which it will not recoup. Any plans for a sequel will likely be a redo in the next seven to 15 years, hopefully in entirely different hands.

The stellar cast in “Borderlands,” which includes Cate Blanchett, left, Jack Black, Kevin Hart, Ariana Greenblatt, Florian Munteanu and Jamie Lee Curtis, fails to bring the film to its full potential. (photo courtesy of Lionsgate)