Game turned movie Warcraft fails on every single level

Warcraftis a strange kind of epic failure. The film, based on the wildly popular M.M.O.R.P.G. (massive, multi-player online-role-playing game)World of Warcraft, begins with a strong, promising assertion of style and intent. DirectorDuncan Jones,who made the terrific little sci-fi thrillerMoonand the perfectly serviceable, B-movieJake GyllenhaalvehicleSource Code, begins the film with an ominous rumble and a flourish of fun camerawork, putting us in the point of view of an orc (it’s an orc movie) as he (or she, maybe!) stomps into battle against a human (it’s a human movie too). This cold open is bracing and tense and cleverly filmed, which raised my hopes for the rest of the film.

Those hopes were then repeatedly bashed with a club for the rest of this bizarre, utterly confusing movie. The first 30 minutes are spent setting up the, uh, world ofWarcraft, introducing us to orcs and their magic (chiefly, the evil green magic called the Fel), then humans and their towering medieval cities. It’s a mix of statelyLord of the Ringsgrandeur and crowded video-game clamor; terms and names (Lothar! Gul’dan! Medivh the Guardian! Durotan! Khadgar!) coming flying at us in a senseless deluge of jargon.

Admirably, the film—written by Jones andCharles Leavitt—aims for deadly serious high fantasy, a tricky genre that hinges on a decidedly un-cool earnestness. It’s a grand idea, introducing non-gamers to a new, sweeping world of sword and strife (while, of course, still satisfying gamers) that could lay the foundation for an epic series—one that’s rousing and transporting and moving, at a time when so many other franchise spectaculars are simply wryly entertaining. But amidst all that charmingly sinceretrying, something bad and rotten sneaks its way in—maybe it’s the Fel?—andWarcraftfalls into calamitous ruin. Which is why I say it’s a strange kind of failure. Here’s a movie that—despite its based-on-a-video-game origins in corporate synergy—feels genuinely uncynical. Its nerdy heart is in the right place, but the movie follows that heart right off a C.G.I. cliff.

What to even say about the many ways this movie goes wrong?Warcraft’s biggest problem is that it seems to change its mind about what it’s about almost from scene to scene. First, it’s the story of an orc and his quest to protect his family, then it’s about Lothar protecting his kingdom, then it’s about shifting orc power dynamics, then it’s about a good king and his good queen, then it’s about mage-on-mage action, then . . . I don’t know. A sprawling cast of plotlines and characters is not uncommon in fantasy—I know more people onGame of Thrones’ names than I do in my real life—butWarcraftis utterly inept at juggling them, giving everyone short shrift and forcing its actors to try to cobble characters out of scattered, illegible material.

They mostly do not succeed. Though the cast is strong—Travis Fimmelas human hero Lothar,Toby Kebbellas orc hero Durotan,Ben Fosteras mysterious Medivh,Paula Pattonas half-orc slave warrior Garona—no one really makes it out alive. Suffering worst of all is Foster, probably the cast’s most talented actor, who does some weird glam-rock goth-druggie thing as a tormented wizard—kudos to him for trying something, I suppose!—that is the funniest part of the movie. I’m just not sure it’s supposed to be.

Beyond that campiness,Warcraftis oddly joyless, as if the filmmakers decided that, in order to make a serious epic, the film couldn’t have a sense of humor. There are some discordant, occasional jokes that land awkwardly, but otherwise the movie trundles and groans along with zero wit, levity, or energy. It ploddingly delivers visual moments that, when strung together, play like a pitch-meeting sizzle reel instead of a coherent narrative. The battles are there, the zooming flights on some sort of griffin thing are there, the glowing magic spells and eye-popping landscapes are all there. (At times, the film looks genuinely lovely.) But it all stutters past without any urgency or meaning, not streamlining its mythology into something more easily digestible, but then not pausing to give us a second to absorb everything, let alone care remotely about any of it. It’s a staggeringly messy, poorly edited film, a lot of clunk and thunk signifying a filmmaker who perhaps never had a firm enough grasp on his material.

Perhaps some fans of the game will likeWarcraft, needing far less tutorial than an unfamiliar viewer like me. But having sat through this baffling movie’s grueling two hours, I can’t in good conscience even recommend it toWarcraftdevotees. There’s nothing here for anyone—neither man nor orc.

(VANITY FAIR)