Review // Warcraft

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Video game adaptations are still trying to break through on the big screen. Maybe it’s because a film based on a game strips the audience of the control they’re used to having over the action, or maybe it’s because the right director has yet to match up with the right game, but there hasn’t been a successful adaptation in, well, ever. The genre reached its high-point in 2001: Angelina Jolie’s Tomb Raider made $131M domestically at the box office ($275M internationally), and Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within became the best reviewed game adaptation of all time. However, Tomb Raider was only the fifteenth highest grossing film that year – less than American Pie 2 and Mark Wahlberg’s Planet of the Apes – and Final Fantasy’s Rotten Tomato score? 44%, mostly commending the film’s ahead-of-its-time CGI effects. Needless to say, the bar has been set pretty low. Duncan Jones’ Warcraft comes so close to being a great film, but where fans of the franchise might dub it a success, casual viewers will be left wondering what all the hype is about.

World of Warcraft – the massively multiplayer online role-playing game or MMORPG (get ready for some gamer jargon) – is the most popular and widely known game in the Warcraft franchise. The film, however, is based on the series’ first instalment, the real-time strategy game Warcraft: Orcs and Humans. The orc’s home-world is dying, so its leader, the warlock Gul’dan (Daniel Wu), uses a portal fuelled by a dark magic called the Fel to discover a new land to conquer. That land is called Azeroth, and the strongest orc warriors are sent there to take prisoners, whose life force will be used to strengthen the portal enough to bring the entire horde through. Among the raiding party are Durotan (Toby Kebbell), leader of the Frostwolf Clan, his wife Draka (Anna Galvin) and his best friend Orgrim (Robert Kazinsky). Durotan quickly realizes that Gul’dan’s magic is responsible for destroying their home, and if he’s not stopped, it will destroy Azeroth as well. His only hope is to try and ally with the humans to defeat Gul’dan and then work out a deal to co-exist peacefully. Over in Stormwind, capital city of the human’s kingdom, military commander Sir Anduin Lothar (Travis Fimmel) alerts King Llane (Dominic Cooper) about the orc threat. Aided by their mystical guardian Medivh (Ben Foster) and apprentice mage Khadgar (Ben Schnetzer), they battle a group of orcs and capture a half-orc named Garona (Paula Patton) who informs them of Durotan’s plan to overthrow Gul’dan.

The humans in this film definitely take a backseat to the orcs. Warcraft’s best moments come in scenes like the one above, when we get to see Durotan fight for the survival of not just his family, but his species. The level of emotion Jones is able to get from these motion capture performances is on par with what Matt Reeves and Andy Serkis achieved in Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (where Toby Kebbell played the treacherous lieutenant Koba). I regularly found myself wanting to see what was happening with Durotan and the orcs, but was instead treated to scenes of boring old Stormwind.

Another issue I had with the film is that its pacing is all over the map. For instance, just as a battle between Durotan and Gul’dan heats up, Jones takes us back to Stormwind to watch Lothar and Khadgar discuss whether Medivh’s intentions are true. The fight’s practically over by the time we jump back to it. The events in the film feel like they play out over a day or two, which makes some of the character’s relationships seem forced and unnatural. No doubt there are scenes that were left on the cutting room floor to be used in an extended home video release. While they might not be required for those familiar with the Warcraft canon, the film’s story suffers as a result.

Despite the film’s flaws, Jones has to be commended. After reading the initial script, it was his idea to buck the fantasy trope of “humans good, orcs bad” and give the invading creatures their own piece of the overall story. The director also managed to juggle the movie’s production with immediate family concerns; his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer shortly after he started the film, and his father David Bowie passed away in early January.  If a sequel is in the works (and the record breaking international debut will definitely move those plans along) I hope Jones is brought back on to steer this franchise and perhaps turn it into the fantasy juggernaut he wants it to be.  On its own however, Warcraft will still leave gamers searching for their white whale of a film (please be good, please be good).

Reviewed by Kyle Miller.