My Thoughts on the Dungeons and Dragons Movie

[khoras2]

My Thoughts on the Dungeons and Dragons Movie


Introduction
There are a lot of reviews that came out about the D&D movie and the vast majority of them hated the film. Mark Price, the resident artist here, works for Wizards of the Coast and got the chance to see the D&D movie early. His reaction was, shall we say, extremely negative. Among his colorful descriptions of the movie was the gem...

"I've seen better porn." ~ Mark Price

He had me believing that this was the worst film of all time and I went into the theatre prepared to have my sense of decency raped. Well, here's my review of the D&D flick.




The Review
Overall, it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. Mark had me  prepared for the worst experience of my life. This wasn't.

The D&D movie was poorly written, poorly directed and poorly acted, but didn't surprise me. I got about what I expected it. A bad Hollywood movie.

I think the acting (particularly all the bad guys) was the worst part. I can forgive them there cheesy plastic armor and costumes. I can forgive them a plot with holes large enough to drive an aircraft carrier through. I can forgive them a horrible script with terrible lines. But the acting was, by far, the worst. It was an embarrassment. It was difficult to watch. I think this movie could have been saved if only the acting were improved. All the other stuff (bad costumes, bad plot, bad directing) we've seen before. Example: Judge Dread.



Things I didn't like about it:
1. The over-acting. By far, this is probably the worst thing about the whole movie.

2. The blue lipstick. What the hell was that about?

3. The plot. There are too many problems with the plot to even begin listing them all. How many years did they spend making this film? And THAT was the best plot they could come up with!?!? Suffice to say, the writers should be shot.

4. The costumes. Too much Xena-style plastic armor. And it looked fake. I would like to have seen the actors struggling under REAL armor.

5. The language. Much of the dialogue was too 20th-century slang. (Snails' dialogue was the worst example of this). I realize this may have been intentional, but I personally would have preferred a more realistic approach to the character dialogue.



Things I did like about it:
1. The special effects were ok. Not great, but good. They did the job.

2. The sets and locations were also pretty good. Not only did they have some great sets (example: the Library), but they had lots of details in the background. It was a visual feast (example: the bar scene, the dragon fight, the city).

3. The city. I liked the computer generated city and the zooming camera shots that flew around the buildings. My only criticism of that would be that the camera flew up to those sky scrapers too fast. It was almost dizzying. And also, I think that even with magic, some of those buildings were simply too tall. The architecture was beautiful, but some of those towers looked like they were 500 stories tall or more. Could a low tech society really build something that marvelous, even with magic?

4. The feel. I did like the fact that it did FEEL a bit like a D&D game. You know, like you were actually playing D&D, only with a DM who has no sense of balance or control. Kind of like Ed Greenwood. It felt like the entire audience was a bunch of gamers and we were all along for a ride through a session with Corey Solomon. This movie didn't take itself seriously and I don't think the audience should have either. It was just two hours of role-playing on the big screen. Awkward gaming moments and all. It had a lot of good nostalgia for gamers.

5. Humor. I did not expect to laugh at all in this film. Mr. Price had me expecting that every single line was a bomb. However, I laughed once or twice. Both the dwarf and Snails had some good one-liners. Nothing major, but I chuckled.



The Final Grade
My rating for this film: C-.  I have seen MUCH worse films. If this is the worst film you've ever seen, they you really need to get out more. I have also seen films that had good writing/directing/acting but bored me to death. I do not consider them better. I'd rather spend 2 hours immersed in the nostalgia of this bad film than be bored for 2 hours of "Fargo".

[Kristian]

Yeah, I didn't like that one either. Won't watch it again. If I had tried to pull off that plot in a real roleplaying game I would have been laughed out of the room. It was too much and too cliché for my tastes.

For a real roleplaying game movie I recommend The Gamers, a great little movie by Dead Gentlemen Productions. For those of you that don't know it, it's a short film about a roleplying group. The film cuts between the roleplaying table and the fantasy world the game takes place in. It's funny and filled with insider jokes.

To give an example, the group arrives at the Old Temple and need to get past the gate. The barbarian tries to rip it off. We hear the player say "Let me do it I have 95% chance of opening it" (or something like that). There's the sound of dice rolling and we cut to the barbarian pulling at the gate. The dice stop. "Aww, man!" He fails the roll and he can't get it off. The nimble elven ranger goes "Let me try" and grabs the gate. Rolling dice again, and he succeeds, rips off the gate, throws it away, turns to the panting babarian and goes: "Lift with the legs, Rogar, not the back."

There's the player whose character dies and who makes an exact copy of the old one just with a different name. There's the player who won't stop arguing with the DM over every little rule. There's the player that couldn't come because he had a date with his girlfriend, so his character just stands in the back for most of the scenes.

It's available on DVD for only $ 18 with an audio commentary by rpg games designer Monte Cook. And they even shipped it all the way to Denmark for me. It's a cheap production, the acting is bad, and it's not very long. But it's funny, and I can recommend to all roleplayers out there. There's a sequal on the way, too.

[sid6.7]

i kinda liked this movie, couldnt really tell you why but it seemed okay to me (B-)
but now we've all seen LOTR its hard to look at anything else...

[Phendar]

But will you go watch this ?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0406728/

[Kristian]

Aw, no! And that blue-lipstick-guy is back, too 

[avisarr]

Oh good lord! They made a sequel! As if the first one wasn't punishment enough. Well, at least it's NOT going to the theatres world wide. It looks like it's going straight to DVD.

[Kristian]

For a real roleplaying game movie I recommend The Gamers, a great little movie by Dead Gentlemen Productions. For those of you that don't know it, it's a short film about a roleplying group. The film cuts between the roleplaying table and the fantasy world the game takes place in. It's funny and filled with insider jokes.

Hey! I was just checking the Dead Gentlemen store to see if the second Gamers movie was out, and I saw that Professional Courtesy was for sale there. "By our good friend Mark Price"  And I was checking out the website for the movie (The Gamers 2, that is. Not Professional Courtesy) and noticed that Monte Cook plays a minor part in it as well.

This is strange... in a way. I buy a lot of the books Cook writes and check his website several times a week. I think he is one of the best commercial RPG designers/writers out there. I bought The Gamers a long time ago and have showed it to all my fellow gamers since then, and they all loved it. It's a great little RPG movie. And now Cook and The Gamers 2 come together and on the website they're selling the Khoras movie, and...

...I'm babbling. It's late here  and I don't really know what I'm getting at. It's just three RPG things I've enjoyed greatly coming together, but not. They still have nothing to do with each other. Except now they do.





You know?





I'm off to bed. 

[avisarr]

Oh yeah, I forgot about that. Mark Price has been talking to the Dead Gentlemen for awhile. Those guys are pretty good at networking and getting their product out there. Mark's movie is hitching a ride on their web site. Other than exchanged links, I don't really have much to do with those guys. Although I did talk to one of them on the phone the other day and there's the possibility of some connective tissue between Khoras and their company in the future. But I'm not holding my breath. I'm juggling enough projects right now.   Just can't take anything more on. We'll see what happens...