Orc this way.
Do you know your Azeroth from your Azkaban? Your Frostwolf Clan from your direwolf guardian? Your Elwynn Forest from your Council of Elrond? If you picked out the above Harry Potter, Game of Thrones and Lord of the Rings comparisons from those of Warcraft, the MMORPG now making its movie debut, congratulations: you’re already ahead of the game, and no doubt a large chunk of the audience that director Duncan Jones (Moon, Source Code) and his team are targeting with this latest fantasy franchise. And it puts you at a considerable advantage when it comes to one of the unavoidable challenges when trying to realize, and orientate newcomers around, a long-established, complex fantasy world.
Whereas J.K. Rowling, George R.R. Martin and J.R.R. Tolkien were able to build up their mythologies over many books (and their screen adaptations across several hours of viewing), Jones and co have the unenviable task of cramming a rambling, diffuse gaming multiverse into a stand-alone, two-hour-and-change epic and still lay the ground for potential sequels. No easy task when citadels named Ironforge and Stormwind might distract you with thoughts of 1970s heavy metal bands than help you focus on a brand new lore of the rings.
What’s refreshing about Warcraft, though, is that despite the inevitable information dump – in a nutshell, warrior orcs from dying world Draenor find a magical gateway into peaceful Azeroth and come up against its human (and dwarf and elf) inhabitants – the emphasis from the very beginning is on its character. Indeed, some may overlook just how bold a move it is to kick off proceedings with an orc couple, Frostwolf leader Durotan (Toby Kebbell) and Draca (Anna Galvin), prospective parents worrying about the fate of their clan and their newborn. You don’t get much more, well, human, that that. And only after their journey begins do we meet the actual people, chief among them Lothar (Vikings’ Travis Kimmel), right-hand man to benevolent King Llane (Dominic Cooper). Naturally the kingdom is perturbed to find signs of unwanted visitors, particularly those bearing the hallmarks of The ‘Fel’ – dark (well, green actually) magic that warps its users as much as its victims and surroundings – a magic that ruthless orc chieftain Gul’dan (Daniel Wu) wields to seize Azeroth for his own.
Scoff at these strange names all you want – because Luke Skywalker or Albus Dumbledore sound so much cooler – but it’s not the quality of geographical visualization or creature characterization that weighs Warcraft down at first, it’s the sheer quantity. We haven't even touched on Azeroth’s tricksy Guardian (i.e. wizard) Medivh (Ben Foster), sorcerer’s apprentice Khadgar (Ben Schnetzer), half-orc slave Garona (Paula Patton) and half a dozen more key players. Attempts to keep everyone in play and develop meaningful connections initially seem to be defeating Jones and co-screenwriter Charles Leavitt. Additional factors like too much rumbling, echoey orc dialogue being difficult to understand, or the pristine, digital Azeroth vistas looking too like a theme park version of its land rather than a lived-in world, don’t help make the fantasy feel real either.
Slowly but surely, however, Warcraft shapeshifts from a CG-heavy experience you’re watching to one you’re actually immersed within. Other tech specs are suitably state-of-the-art: the orcs in particular move with impressively real heft and expressiveness and Game of Thrones composer Ramin Djawadi underscores the action with rousing, tribal rhythms. Like Christopher Nolan, Duncan Jones has gone from cerebral genre hit to slick thriller to major franchise opportunity, and he directs the combat scenes with assuredness, without ever reaching the rarefied heights Peter Jackson or James Cameron.
But Jones’ real strength, and you imagine, his overall priority, is more personal than technical. The story – cribbed from the 1994 real-time strategy Warcraft: Orcs & Humans – is pretty simple at heart, but the heart – teeming with frayed connections between parents and children, separated lovers, betrayed friends – beats ever stronger. The plot even does what Tolkien/Jackson conspicuously skimped on (give or take the odd Boromir), which is to genuinely raise the stakes by killing off seemingly key characters. As a result, the climactic face-offs and cliff-hangers have far more dramatic weight than you might have imagined. “Game over” truly means something here.
The Verdict
In a time when too many bloated movie blockbusters feel like they’re impersonal video games, it’s heartening to see that an actual game can be transformed into an authentically involving movie. Yes, it suffers from an overcrowded mythology, occasional clunkiness, a few iffy casting choices (Kimmel’s Lothar in particular) and won’t attain Avatar box-office or Game of Thrones-level awards; but there’s a genuine sense of striving to get inside what made the Warcraft games beloved by 100 million participants, whether playing as human or orc, and tapping into what makes fantasy feel so personal, so real. Game on.
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