So, tonight I watched Warcraft, the long awaited movie by Duncan Jones that is based on the Blizzard game World of Warcraft, which is super old, but still holds a lot of world records because of the many people that play it, the many relationships that were started and broken by it (though I am not sure if that is an official Guinness Record 😉 ). I must say, I had heard about the very bad rating it had on RottenTomatoes, so I had low expectations.

My expectations were low in general, as I am not too fond of those huge battle movies, as there usually is not too much storytelling in them. Plus, I can’t really follow action sequences that well. Anyway, low expectations, but high expectations of the cinema itself. For the first time I went to a Vue cinema, which is supposed to be the ‘best cinema in the world’, seems odd for a Dutch cinema, but whatever, it is big on experience, with great visuals and sound (Dolby Atmos). To be blunt, I think that really helped me like the movie more than I thought I would.

I mean, don’t get me wrong, Warcraft is not a good movie, but if you see what Mr Jones had to work with, he did a pretty swell job. The characters look amazing, the overviews of the world are gorgeous and it fits the game franchise pretty well. But I have never really played World of Warcraft, so I might be wrong, but it feels like it is pretty true to the series. What I disliked about it, is that there is not much storytelling, that the humor is very childish and that some things are not explained well enough for people that would not know Warcraft.

What I disliked most was the character Lothar. He could have been anyone, as he did not really bring much to the table. I did not really feel his relationship with his son, and I thought as an actor (Travis Fimmel) did not do a good job, it was not very believable. I did not like his look, I did not believe what he was saying, and he was simply not doing much. The best representation of what he was in the movie, was his “big action moment”, which took ten seconds. To use the words of the famous Miss Demeanor: “I can’t stand no minute man”.

Should you go and see Warcraft? If you are going to see it in a Dolby Atmos theatre or Imax, and you are a gamer or a Warcraft fan, you will definitely be entertained by the movie, but do not think about the stories and the connections too much, you will have a good time with it. The CGI is perfect, the way those orcs have to speak with those low teeth is interesting, and I think Duncan Jones did a good job in framing it all. The camera standpoints were very interesting, I think I enjoyed that the most. He really came up with some very original ways of filming things, and he deserves a lot more credit for that.