The best video game movie of all time.

Rating: 8/10 (4 June 2016)

Warcraft is directed by Duncan Jones and depicts the story of the first meeting between orcs and humans on the fantasy world Azeroth. This film has 2 main stories which I will talk about separately as each has their own positive and negatives. These stories do intertwine with each other, but that happens far into the movie.
We begin with the orcs. We follow Durotan (played by Toby Kebbell), who is the leader of the Frostwolf clan (one of many clans of orcs living together). All he wants is the best for his clan, and he doesn't trust Gul'Dan (Excellently played by Daniel Wu, he looks and acts exactly the same in the game), who is a powerful but evil warlock. This eventually leads to Durotan trying to contact the humans for help.
First of all, the motion capture for the orcs is excellent. At some points they even looked more real than the humans, if that makes sense. This was portrayed excellently in a shot at the beginning of the film, where Durotan is just looking towards the camera for an uninterrupted 10 seconds. His face moves just like a real face, and the way his expressions change is incredibly realistic. I was worried before I saw this movie as I thought CGI orcs interacting with real humans would look odd, like in The Hobbit Trilogy. I am glad to say this wasn't the case, and it worked extremely well. The only orc I didn't like was Garona, who is half orc and half draenei (other reviews I have been reading keep saying she is half human, the film never states this so i'm not sure where they're getting that from). She isn't motion captured, which I thought was strange because all the other orcs, dwarfs and night elfs were. Her performance was pretty weak, which is a shame, as I wanted to care about her character, but I didn't.
I also liked the relationships between the orcs. They're not the bumbling idiots like they are portrayed in other fantasy licenses like Warhammer or LOTR. They actually have intellectual conversations with one another. I especially liked the scenes between Durotan and his wife, where they were discussing their worries about having a child. This is where Duncan Jones shines through, as his other films have been almost entirely character driven. Many were worried that a project as big as this wouldn't be possible for a director like Duncan, this isn't the case though and fans of both high octane fight scenes and insightful character interactions will be pleased.
The orc combat in this film is absolutely fantastic. The brutality of the orcs as they fought against each other was incredible. The same cannot be said about human/orc combat, but the orcs look real and fight like actual living breathing creatures. There's a fight scene with Gul'Dan near the end that I won't spoil, but it is amazing and will have you gripped in your seat.
The human story on the other hand is a mixed bag. We follow Anduin Lothar(played by Travis Fimmel) , a strong fighter who is trying to defend Azeroth from the orcs. We also follow a mage called Callan (played by Burkely Duffield), who is presented as an awkward, wimpy type character. There are many other characters I am not mentioning, but I'm not here to do a plot synopsis.
The humans look like they're ripped straight from the game which is brilliant. They wear shiny armor with massive shoulder plates which gave me a grin. The mages are also extremely cool, with long robes and bright blue eyes. the special effects shine through here too, with the mage's spells looking amazing and feeling real within the world of the film.
My main problem with the humans is that they're not explained enough. I didn't feel for any of the characters, unlike the orcs, who showed a surprising amount of emotion. A certain character died and I should have felt bad, but I didn't. Apparently 40 minutes have been cut from this movie, and it's obvious where things had been cut. I hope this cut gets released, if so i'll do another review.
Now i'll talk about other aspects of the overall movie.
There are many easter eggs throughout the movie which any fan of the series will notice. My favorites being a polymorph and a murloc. These are thrown in throughout and will bring on a smile from any Warcraft fan in the audience. The locations that are visited are all recognizable from the games, and seeing Ironforge and Stormwind on the big screen was great. Other races are shown throughout the film, but they are only for a short while. I wish we had more scenes with the dwarfs or night elves, they could have even helped with the battle at the end which would have been enjoyable. But, I do understand that this is based on Warcraft : Orcs and Humans, which was only about the orcs and humans. There are some differences made to the original story, but nothing was drastic and I didn't have a problem with them.
Warcraft : Orcs and Humans, what this film is based on. The pacing at the start of the film was a bit iffy, which is most likely because of the 40 minutes of deleted scenes. The film kept jumping around from place to place which would have been very confusing had I not been a Warcraft fan. My partner who I saw this film with is not a fan, and she was also confused with the start of the film as the characters traveled to 4 or 5 different locations in 30 minutes.
Overall, I really enjoyed this film and I am extremely excited for further sequels. With a lore as vast as Warcraft, they could make an entire film series out of it.