Hulking, tusked, muscular and festooned with fierce accoutrements, they’re like refugees from a GWAR concert. Similar to luggage at the airport, many orcs look alike. But “Warcraft” is difficult to follow from both a visual and a narrative perspective, with massive battle scenes between orcs and humans in which it’s difficult to tell who’s doing what to whom. In the midst of all that, it’s difficult to hear his voice-to see his attention to detail.Īn enormous budget and state-of-the-art technology have resulted in a movie that looks cheesy and cartoonish-a big-screen version of a video game world that more closely resembles the video game commercials you see on TV. This was clearly a formidable undertaking filled with sweeping imagery, motion-capture performances and tons of visual effects, all being projected in overwhelming IMAX 3-D. So it’s hard to figure out what happened with Jones and “Warcraft.” It’s as if the endeavor swallowed him whole. (Plus: If one Sam Rockwell is good, two Sam Rockwells are great.) Jones’ 2011 follow-up, the time-travel puzzle “ Source Code,” felt like a bit of a let-down by comparison but it was thrilling and challenging, and it showed his evolution as a filmmaker with a bigger cast and more expensive toys. His debut, “ Moon,” was my favorite movie of 2009 it was about mind-blowing, existential stuff but it had real verve, immediacy and heart. With just two features to his credit, Jones has shown a real knack for taking complex, sci-fi stories and telling them in clever, intimate ways. And it brings me no joy to report that to you because “Warcraft” comes from a filmmaker whose work I’ve been a big fan of: Duncan Jones.
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