Warcraft – Thoughts & Rambles

Warcraft is based off the popular game franchise from Blizzard entertainment, I would like to state that Blizzard Entertainment used to be one of my all-time favourite video game companies and that I’ve been an avid fan of Warcraft since early childhood. Therefore, this blog post will not be written by the want-to-be “movie reviewer” but instead the inner fanboy inside. 

Warcraft follows the story of the Orcish Horde who have to travel to the planet Azeroth, to find a new home for themselves and thus forcing themselves into a war against the Human Kingdom of Stormwind.

Unbeknownst to both the Horde and Kingdom of Stormwind is that there is a greater threat manipulating said events, and it is up to the protagonists Knight Anduin Lothar (Travis Fimmel) and the Orc Chieftain Durotan (Toby Kebbell) to find peace between the warring factions.

Right out of the bat, I have to say that the Orcs not only looked absolutely stunning, but they we’re all distinct and unique looking behemoths. No expense was spared on the visual effects, and the same goes for the set pieces build for the movie.

It was a great decision to have CGI characters act in real locations, instead of rendering everything into a special effects extravaganza. It truly felt like you were in the world of Azeroth.

The Horde just steals the show, no question about it. You have Toby Kebbell portraying this honourable Orc Warrior and on the other side of the coin you have the darker, more menacing warrior Blackhand the Destroyer (Clancy Brown) alongside the terrifying and outright monstrous Gul’dan (Daniel Wu), you also learn what it’s like to be an outcast in the Horde with the half-orc reject Garona (Paula Patton).

it just is a more interesting perspective on the matter of conflict and they do a great job ensuring that the audience doesn’t see the Orcs just as these generic monsters.

Fortunately besides the valiant knights, you also learn about the Mages of Kirin Tor and we’re introduced to both Medivh (Ben Foster) & the apprentice Khadgar (Ben Schnetzer). Both characters bring more magic to the screen and the spell casting looks just as stunning as the Orcs do and give some cool action scenes to go along the sword fights.

There we’re some great action sequence shots, I especially appreciated the “god’s view” shots of the massive armies fighting all around the Kingdom, it was a clever way to reference the game’s roots as a real-time strategy war game.

However, the movie isn’t all shine and polish unfortunately. There has been a quotation from director Duncan Jones that 40 minutes of footage was cut from the movie.  I’m going to assume a lot of the Human side of the story got removed, because compared to the Horde, I truly felt the Kingdom of Stormwind lacked as much character.It also didn’t help that King Llane by Dominic Cooper felt highly miscast, a king should have a presence of authority and charisma, which Cooper simply lacked in this movie altogether.

However I’m not saying the movie needs to be longer, because it builds Azeroth from the ground up for the audiences, so it already feels immersive.

Despite all of this, I had the most wonderful time at the cinema and it was a dream come true to see the Warcraft universe in the big screen. If you’re a fan or aware of the game series it is definitely a must see, but if you’re a fantasy action fan as well I would definitely recommend to see the movie as well.

I’m jubilant to see this franchise finally begin and cannot wait to see what’s next in store.

Captain America: Civil War – Movie Review

The First Avenger gave us the origin story of Captain America with a naive take on Nazi super villains, the organisation Hydra.

 

The Winter Soldier told us the story of surveillance vs. individual freedom, but ruins the theme by having Hydra literally take the role of a scapegoat.

Civil War takes on Information warfare & Psychological warfare. How easily peoples’ perception regarding facts can be altered, when you mold the story. After all, you don’t need to search far in the internet, to see how news can have drastically altered viewpoints, because we influence facts into what we want to believe, and make them real for us. 

 With information warfare already screwing our viewpoints, it doesn’t take much to affect our psychology and have people in a circle of cynical violence. This cycle can never be broken, until the people part of the chain themselves, will finally leave it all behind and end the escalation.

This is why Civil War is the best out of the three because we can all relate into this screwed perception of information and the way people act around this, it’s what makes the villain all too real.

Now I’m not sure whatever I am onto something or simply being overanalysing, but has it been a deliberate and chosen decision to make Iron Man the successful sympathetic villain in Marvel’s movies?

Or has it been a happy accident that began with Iron Man 3, continued with Age of Ultron and now culminated with Civil War that makes it look like such a genius story to tell? 

We don’t know has this been done on purpose and we possibly will never learn that either, but to me, it was one of the best decisions they took when making Civil War and what makes this the cherry on top, the crown jewel accomplishment of the Captain America trilogy.

I want to believe this is the case. Robert Downey Jr. ensured a bigger role in the movie, this would also mean the screenwriters and directors had to come up with a lengthier story involving Iron Man, which would mean they definitely had the time to see what would be the next step for Tony Stark after the Age of Ultron.

Again it doesn’t truly matter whatever it was a stroke of pure genius or a happy accident, I’m just happy about it.

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice – Movie Review

Zack Snyder’s sequel to Man of Steel continues the heroics of Superman, while introducing the audiences to a larger cinematic world as before. The story of Superman parallels with Jesus Christ, as the almighty and powerful hero simply wants to do good, but humanity doubts, mocks and attacks him.

 

The world has become sceptic and cynical, but Superman doesn’t stop there, because Superman never gives up.

 After the horrific events from Man of Steel, the Dark Knight (played by Ben Affleck) returns  to do the impossible: Kill the Man of Steel. (Henry Cavill)

But behind the curtains lies a darker threat, the world’s smartest man, the menacing Alexander Luthor (Jesse Eisenberg), manipulates everyone behind the scenes.

 Making the world doubt our saviour, pushing the mentally damaged Caped Crusader to a darker path, making him the judge, jury and executioner to Gotham’s worsts.

 “Black and blue. Fight night. The greatest gladiator match in the history of the world. God versus man. Day versus night! Son of Krypton versus Bat of Gotham!”- Lex Luthor

Ben Affleck’s Batman is easily the best part of the movie, it is the biggest tribute to Frank Miller’s take on the Bat.  The combat scenes are exhilarating, Batman does detective work, the Batmobile chase sequence is out of this world and Batman’s nightmares are blessed with Snyder’s artistic visuals.

Hans Zimmer’s & Junkie Xl’s score has a variety of tunes, using the Man of Steel tunes again for Superman with adjustments, while giving new scores for Batman, Lex Luthor and Wonder Woman. It pumps up the adrenaline with action sequences for sure.

So what went wrong then? ”the Dawn of Justice” segments, the movie is 2 hours and 30 minutes long & could have easily squeezed out thirty minutes, to have a better flow with the main plot.

 Scenes become padded with cross-marketing for future DC Comic movies such as Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot) and the Justice League, world building is done once again to rich the DC Cinematic Universe while leaving characters hollower.

The scenes could have been better to just leave in the upcoming 3 hour Ultimate Cut. Granted, Batman v Superman might become another “Watchmen” or “Kingdom of Heaven” situation, where the Ultimate cut becomes a vastly superior, cohesively story-structured movie that fans will actually like and praise. 

Already, we are receiving marketing for the said cut, which shows important character development and what will reflect upon the sequel – Justice League.

The movie has a lot of good, but sadly the cross-marketing just drags the enjoyment down, making the experience just about average.