Dungeons And Dragons - Honour Among Thieves

Gelatinous Expectations

Dungeons And Dragons -
Honour Among Thieves
Directed by John Francis Daley & Jonathan Goldstein
United States/Canada/United Kingdom
/Iceland/Ireland/Australia  
2023 Paramount
UK cinema release print

Warning: Minor sequence spoilers.

I wasn’t going to bother with Dungeons And Dragons - Honour Among Thieves, initially. Primarily because I used to love the game when I was a kid and didn’t see how a movie could do that kind of experience justice (yeah... still can’t actually). I remember my dad getting this game somewhere between the early to late 1970s and I used to love reading the various descriptions and images... pretty much none of which I can now remember except the one creature that always intrigued me... the gelatinous cube which slowly digests you if you get caught inside it. So I’m really glad, actually, that the gelatinous cube has made it into this movie incarnation... that’s a big plus in its favour. But, that being said, I’d have to say that I don’t have a clue about all the many obvious in-jokes in the film although, I did notice a vaguely familiar band of adventurers in a cameo during a sequence at the end, where everyone is trying to get through a giant maze.

However, the trailer to the film is really fun (although some of the line deliveries and dialogue are, I think, from different takes than used in the final cut of the movie) and, honestly, I haven’t seen a bad word about the film in any review... even from those from people who are not RPGers (which is the camp I would consider myself in now... it’s probably been nearly four decades since I played). So I thought I’d give it a go and, the first thing which surprised me about the film is that it’s... drum roll... based on a property from Hasbro! Seriously? When did this happen? I remember the set we used to have (and probably still have somewhere) was branded up as TSR Games. Did they sell it?

Anyway, this is going to be a very short review I think because, I can tell you right away that I’m not as enthusiastic about the film as all the other people I‘ve seen talking about it. It is, however, a fairly entertaining romp of an adventure, to be sure. Chris Pine and Michelle Rodriguez play thieves Edgin and Holga (my favourite class of D&D character... the one I always used to pick to play) who escape from their prison at the start of the movie and go on a quest to try and regain Edgin’s daughter (Chloe Coleman) from the clutches of traitorous former partner Forge (played by Hugh Grant). To do this they have to go on a quest for a legendary artefact and band together with a few other characters played by Justice Smith, Sophia Lillis and, in what amounts to a very good extended cameo section, Regé-Jean Page.

And all of the actors I just mentioned in this are absolutely wonderful performers and they all have great chemistry. So I’m not quite sure why my personal reception of the movie was somewhat diminished because I can tell you for sure that the movie is certainly pacey, has plenty of fantasy action and has a lot of humour with a script that walks a delicate tightrope between peril and humour with ease. And, to boot, the dialogue isn’t bad either... I suspect I would like this a heck of a lot more if I watched it a second time, now that my head has processed the entire experience. Some movie just hit me like that and I get so much more out of them on subsequent rewatches (such as The Mummy Returns, La La Land and Knives Out, for example).

The highlight sequence, for me, asides from the appearance of the gelatinous cube, would be the sequence with all five heroes in a cave being chased by what has become, the fattest, roly poly dragon I’ve ever seen in a movie. This sequence is a real testament to how easily the film can play with your expectations, throw up a ludicrous concept... because that huge, fat dragon sure looks silly not being able to fly, falling over and rolling around almost crushing our heroes... and still present it as a credible and quite threatening enemy to the other characters. There’s also a great sequence where our heroes are using an incantation to wake one of the dead to ask an alloted five questions and that becomes an extended sequence of wasted, ‘I didn’t mean that as one of the questions’ moments and continued digging up of dead bodies, until the characters finally get the information they want.

So, yeah, I didn’t quite gell with the movie but I certainly don’t have a bad thing to say about it either. For me, Dungeons And Dragons - Honour Among Thieves was an okay time at the cinema with a movie which entertained but didn’t bowl me over completely. As someone who hasn’t played in almost forty years, I still found it quite accessible and I don’t think you have to be a hardcore RPGer to enjoy the movie. I would certainly recommend it to experienced players who are going to have a lot richer experience than I did, due to understanding a lot more of the references and jokes but, yeah, I think a lot of people will find this one entertaining and have a good time with it.

Resident Evil: Retribution 3D

Vile Bodies Of Evil In War

Resident Evil: Retribution 3D 
2010 Germany/Canada
Directed by Paul W.S. Anderson
Screening at UK cinemas now

Warning: Here be evil spoilers!

So here we are again. This is the fifth movie in what I think I’m right in saying is the most popular and lucrative series of films to be based on a computer game series ever. On the other hand, the original games are so overloaded with cultural references to various horror movie classics over the years, the most obvious being the large influence of George A. Romero’s zombie movies, that it’s sometimes hard to realise where the line between the two formats and their various homages blur, in actual fact.

What I am certain of, is that this film, while not as good as a lot of the others, is still a solid and respectable entry into the series. It’s walks a very risky tightrope between trying to correct things and undo things which have been added to as elements as the series has progressed, while at the same time driving those knitted together components to give the series new directions in which to continue. That it manages to do this actually quite well, while still managing to pack the flick with what is extensively wall to wall action, is somewhat good news.

The trailers for this promised the return of many characters who had died in previous episodes of the film series, which I’ve reviewed here (1, 2 & 3) and here (4). Although I had some idea in the back of my mind how this could work, the explanations for the reemergence of characters (played by Michelle Rodriguez, Colin Salmon, Sienna Guillory and Oded Fehr etc) who were sliced, diced, defected to the umbrella corporation or exploded, and so forth, in the previous movies... was actually better handled than I expected. It was good to see these faces again and, for anyone else who thinks they’ve figured out what the deal was here, all I’m going to confirm is, yes, these actors do have multiple roles in this installment.

We also get answers, of a sort, or a least a little more elaboration, of the non-sequitur of the giant sized hammer dude from the last movie and also this film goes some way to give more context to the brilliant “Tokyo in the rain” opening credits sequence of Resident Evil: Afterlife 3D. Interestingly, the sequence in this film where this opening was addressed has the added musical attraction of using the same composers' music for that sequence, layered in over the top of this one. The music in this one by Tomandandy (literally, a two man team of composers called, um, Tom and Andy) is quite serviceable, although I didn’t enjoy it as much as I did their last one. But congratulations to them because I think I’m right in saying that this is the first Resident Evil movie to retain a composer over from the previous film. So while this movie, as all of the sequels, feels like a reinvention of the last, it has the musical glue to keep continuity with the last one more, finally, and that’s helpful because this one starts off exactly where the cliffhanger ending from the last one left us.

Talking of which, the credits on this one are quite nice and also fairly arrogant in that they show a slowed down action sequence which runs backwards (in excellent 3D for a change, just like the last one) until it gets back to where we left it... we then have Mila Jovovich’s Alice character (yeah, this one continues with the slight allusions to Alice In Wonderland in it, with the Red Queen once again popping up as the computerised villain of the piece) recapping the previous installments... like she always does. We then catch back up to the last film again and see the action sequence ran back at full speed this time, but going forwards to propel us into the rest of the movie proper... it lasts maybe less than a minute this time, though.

The performances are all good again, (especially Michelle Rodriguez in the non-villainess version of her, um, character) and the action sequences all excellent and, it has to be said, unrelenting... although I did find some of the passages in the movie a little light on emotional context and thus a bit dull. This film also undoes, right at the end when they’re setting up the sixth film in the series, my main concern about the last one... by reintroducing the “T-virus” back into Alice’s system and returning her “super powers” to her... although one of Michelle Rodriguez’s characters also has those super powers, so she will obviously be back as a villain at some point, I suspect.

For a movie which reunites so many cast members, it seems unusual that Ali Larter was not in this one properly. I can’t quite remember, but I’m pretty sure she didn’t die at the end of the last one, did she? The absence of this character is conveniently circumvented right at the start when Alice is literally blown out of the action on the ship from the last movie and thus we don’t know the final fate of her companions. I’m pretty sure they will bring Larter back when they do the next one though... at least I hope they do.

Another and, frankly, much bigger loss to the series is that there’s no “Alice Versus Zombie Dogs” fight in this one. This is the first Resident Evil not to have a little scene where Alice fights off zombie dogs... and that kind of disappointed me to be honest. Their inclusion in the last three were so obviously forced in their because the fans love them... so it’s a shame they’re absent here.

And that’s pretty much all I have to say about this one. If you’ve not seen the last one, even though this does have a handy recap, you’ll probably be lost in it and even if you aren’t, you won’t have any emotional set up to the characters. If, on the other hand, you’re already a fan of the series in general... well it’s not as good as some of them but, even so, it doesn’t let the side down and serves as a good set up, I assume, to whatever the next part of the arc is... which seems to look like it’ going to include some kind of war with flying dragonish looking things (I don’t think they were zombie Pterodactyls anyway... hard to tell). So, no worries if you’re into the Resident Evil movies already... this one’s still a hefty installment. You can watch without peril.

Machete Junction

Machete 2010 US

Directed by

Ethan Maniquis & Robert Rodriguez

Screening at UK cinemas

Travel in your mind with me to the dim and distant past... back to those heady and pre-recession days of 2007 when life was good. That year, stateside only, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino decided to unleash on the, fairly, suspecting public their new combined movie with trailers... Grindhouse!

The concept was simple... to make two trashy movies (one each) in the style of the old 70s American exploitation films of the 70s and in between their would be some equally retro-trailers (made specifically for the movie) by other guest directors. The idea being that a knowing post-modernistic audience would lap it up!

Unfortunately the reality of the situation was that Grindhouse did badly... really badly. So badly, in fact, that it didn’t get a proper release here in the UK! Instead, Miramax decided to just release the two separate movies with a few additional scenes and only leave on a couple of the trailers. Tarantino’s second half, Death Proof, was released first as he is a bigger name to tag your marketing on. Rodriguez half, Planet Terror, was released a month or two later to much less fanfare. Unfortunately, I don’t think the producers realised what they had in these two films. I was lucky enough to see the full version of Grindhouse on DVD way before it even got a release in cinemas in the US... hey, the offer was there and I took it since there was umming and ahhing over any release at all at the time.

Rodriguez' half was brilliant and that’s because he kinda exceeded his brief, in my opinion. He didn’t make a Grindhouse movie, he made a movie that tipped its hat to the Grindhouse style while at the same time playing with it and looking back on it with affectionate nostalgia... and it really worked as a fun experience at the movies. The normally wonderful Tarantino fulfilled his brief perfectly. He made a perfect, fake US exploitation movie exactly as it would have been made at the time. Unfortunately, what people failed to remember is that a lot of these movies were just plain dull affairs with an unsatisfying conclusion. And, in my humble opinion, on this occasion this is exactly what Tarantino made... a dull movie with an unsatisfying conclusion.

However, a silver lining to join the brilliance that was Planet Terror. One of the trailers on Grindhouse was for Machete... a made up film starring Danny Trejo as a machete wielding avenger of justice to help the Mexican people and free them from the oppression of the government. Three years on, Ethan Maniquis & Robert Rodriguez have made that movie... again in the retro-rose-tinted, nostalgic Grindhouse style and... frankly... it’s a really great time at the cinema.

Trejo’s ex-cop Machete is deadpan, supermacho and funny all at the same time “Machete Don’t Text!”. The movie contains unparalleled levels of goriness and mayhem and deserves to be seen by anyone who has an inkling of the kind of movies that this film is trying to ape. And that powerful cocktail of humour and violence makes you kind of giddy while you’re watching it. For example, a deliberately obvious set up line about a man's intestines being 60ft long gets a wonderful pay off a few minutes later in a spectacular escape from a hospital where Danny Trejo... well, I don’t want to give too much away... let’s just say that if you combine internal organs with Douglas Fairbanks style stunts you get a guaranteed laugh!

This film has a lot on offer too: a topless Lindsay Lohan who has sex with the title character and her own mother at the same time for her web page and then gets into a whole shotgun wielding nun kick. A gun toting priest played by Cheech Marin (this film offers you the crucifixion of Cheech people) and the likes of Robert De Niro, Jessica Alba and Steven Seagal all sharing considerable amounts of screentime together. And then, to top it off, Michelle Rodriguez as the leader of an underground Mexican resistance, SHE! As opposed to Che I guess.

All I can say is... if you liked what Rodriguez did on Planet Terror, Machete ups the ante somewhat and frenetically delivers the kind of thrills and chills that people would very much have liked to see as the second half of the Grindhouse experience from 2007. If you’re going to go and take a look at this bloody eye candy, do it quick as it already seems to be on its way out at the cinema. Oh, and if you do, make sure you stay for the announcement of the next two movies in the series after the “rides off into the sunset” shot has faded.

This reviewer will review these movies too in Machete Junction Kills and Machete Junction Kills Again!

One last thing... make sure you check out @filmforagers art piece inspired by the movie. You can also buy it on etsy right here... http://www.etsy.com/listing/55936591/michelle-rodriguez-as-she-drawing?ref=v1_other_1!

Also... check out @filmforagers own review of Machete here... http://www.filmforager.com/2010/09/machete-2010.html