While I still consider myself a gamer, Minecraft came at a time beyond me. I’d argue it has mostly made sense for me to be familiar with the many video movies that have come out over the years, as part of the appeal is building generational interest. Now I’m at a point where that sort of interest also applies to A Minecraft Movie, which takes away my ability to connect with how faithful the movie version is to the source material. Perhaps this is all just an elaborate way of saying I know I’m getting older, but that doesn’t mean it’s beyond me to enjoy a film like this based on what it’s aiming for. That said, despite some effort from all involved to embrace the goofiness that comes with this premise (based on what I know about the game and the filmmakers involved), A Minecraft Movie ends up feeling more like a building blocks chore than a secret world of imagination that I wanted to see more of.
Following a prologue that serves as an excuse to explain why Jack Black’s Steve acts the way he does (super confident, constantly improvising songs, a touch of emptiness), we meet our four regular human characters. Garrett “The Garbage Man” Garrison (Jason Momoa) is a former gaming champion who is dealing with tough times. Natalie (Emma Myers) and Henry (Sebastian Hansen) are recently orphaned siblings who now find themselves in a new home, making do with what they have. Dawn (Danielle Brooks) is a real estate agent who aspires to be a zookeeper. Through various circumstances, the four are pulled into a mysterious portal leading to the Overworld, a strange cubic wonderland that can be crafted through imagination. Once they team up with Steve, the group goes on an adventure, allowing them to realize their best selves while also fighting off random cube monsters from the Nether.
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In the realm of films focused on “The Special” type characters that must overcome all odds and save the day, this film is far more in the camp with The Super Mario Bros. Movie, which rides heavily on nostalgia and has little time for its own cinematic identity, as opposed to The LEGO Movie, which feels more and more like an animated masterpiece when looking at all the attempts to replicate that success. Sure, Super Mario is also one of the biggest hit animated films ever, so drafting off that energy is not a bad thing from a studio’s perspective. Still, this film similarly feels unwilling to engage with its source material outside whatever feels familiar.
For a movie set in a world where the characters can craft anything, A Minecraft Movie doesn’t entirely avoid having some cute gags and visual invention (as hideous as live-action block animals and food may feel at times), but the film still comes up short on doing anything that thinks outside of the literal cube boxes that make up this world. So much of this film, which comes from a team of writers following years of development with a variety of known filmmakers, seems to thrive on the idea that having Black put in some extra energy as a way to tag different scenes can make up for that fact that everything focuses on the plot at hand.
Honestly, it was the real-world scenes that fair best. I was more compelled by the characters we were watching and seeing them interact with a world around them that already seemed different. Once arriving in the Overland, while I’m sure fans will enjoy seeing the various creatures, landscapes, and whatever else rendered in decently expensive looking visual effects (and constant reminders that these actors were rarely in practical locations), I had a tough time getting past our heroes relying on the story mechanics as a means to keep up with the runtime. While the film is not paced slowly, I certainly felt less engaged when everyone involved constantly spoke in terms of where they needed to go and what they needed to do next.
Having already pointed out the visual effects, I’ll just note that the character designs are similarly off-kilter in a way that didn’t exactly invite me in. Seeing Momoa with that hair and his retro jacket works once, but a movie seemingly game to keep reveling in garish production and costume design only goes so far. Perhaps that could be countered by the various performances, but nothing here amounts to any real level of cleverness that served something like the Jumanji sequels quite well. While some self-awareness makes the film, at the very least, tolerable, too little is done to make up for a movie that has too many “fill in the blank”-like ways of putting itself together.
Once again, director Jared Hess (Napoleon Dynamite, Nacho Libre) and I prove to have a difference of opinion when it comes to comedy, as I just don’t seem to ever find myself enjoying the work he puts out (though his Oscar-nominated animated short, Ninety-Five Senses is admittedly pretty solid). There’s a cast in place that I like and a property that I may not be all too familiar with, but it presents the idea of creativity being able to run wild. And yet, A Minecraft Movie feels so bereft of cleverness. The film trudges along with Black doing as much as he can to carry it all, but I would have been fine sending this effort to the Nether and seeing what other gaming properties have to offer, which remains a tricky road to travel.
A Minecraft Movie opens in theaters and IMAX on April 4, 2025.
