Duncan Jones is not a director who settles for half-measures. His debut film, “Moon,” hinges on a tone-shifting twist. His follow-up, “Source Code,” constructs a convoluted time-loop thriller, then uses it as a Trojan horse for a love story. If Duncan Jones was going to make a video-game movie, it was always going to be huge. The only question was: how big?
The answer, it turned out, was “Warcraft.” Jones’ least successful movie with critics became one of the highest-grossing video game movies ever, amassing more than $400 million at the worldwide box office and offering, in my humble opinion, the largest scope and most ambitious world-building of any film in the sub-genre.
“Warcraft” feels massive. Its colorful visuals pop. Its score demolishes subtlety. If its narrative stumbles, that’s part of what makes watching it such a wild experience. I’m not sure “Warcraft” is an objectively good film, but I’d rather spend two hours watching a good filmmaker take a big swing and miss than 90 minutes of mediocrity. “Warcraft” is absolutely the former.