‘A Minecraft Movie’ Review: Jack Black’s Craft Can’t Save This Video Game Adaptation's Hollow-Blocked Banality
A corporate affair as lifeless as working in a mine shaft.
‘A Minecraft Movie’ Review: Jack Black’s Craft Can’t Save This Video Game Adaptation's Hollow-Blocked Banality
A Minecraft Movie was inevitable, given how many family-friendly franchises (Mario, Sonic, Pokémon) have hit the big screen in the past few years. Even though I have never been interested in the cubic open-world RPG since it launched in 2011, when I was 13, I always understood and appreciated its appeal. I was just too busy playing Super Smash Bros. flash games. For a unique fantasy game with limitless creativity, it’s incredibly disappointing to see its Jared Hess-helmed (Napoleon Dynamite, Nacho Libre) adaptation confine itself to a lazy isekai (or, in this case, Tron) like every other Hollywood video game adaptation. Even its gleeful silliness and the rampant homoeroticism between Jason Momoa and Jack Black can't save it.
Photo Credit: Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
MPA Rating: PG ( violence/action, language, suggestive/rude humor and some scary images.)
Runtime: 1 Hour and 40 Minutes
Production Companies: egendary Entertainment, Vertigo Entertainment, Mojang Studios, Domain Entertainment, On the Roam
Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures
Director: Jared Hess
Writers: Chris Bowman, Hubbel Palmer, Neil Widener, Gavin James, Chris Galletta
Cast: Jason Momoa, Jack Black, Danielle Brooks, Emma Myers, Sebastian Eugene Hansen, Jennifer Coolidge, Jemaine Clement, Rachel House
Release Date: April 4, 2025
After their mother’s death, Natalie (Emma Myers) and her imaginative younger brother Henry (Sebastian Hansen) move to a small Midwestern town. They meet Dawn (Danielle Brooks), a real estate agent and wannabe zoologist who helps them settle in, and Garrett "The Garbage Man" Garrison (Jason Momoa), a washed-up egotistical '80s gamer who opened an arcade in town. Henry initially refuses Garrett’s mentorship, but reconsiders when one of his inventions goes wrong at school and he needs Garrett’s help. While Natalie and Dawn worry over Henry's absence, Garrett and Henry stumble upon the Ender Pearl, an artifact containing clues leading to riches untold. It leads our four heroes to an old mine shaft, where it activates, transporting them to a cubic wonderland called the Overworld. There, they meet Steve (Jack Black), an expert craftsman who has lived in the Overworld since his youth. With Steve's leadership, the motley crew of misfits must avoid the deadly pig witch Malgosha (Rachel House) and her dangerous army and find a way back to the real world.
A Minecraft Movie’s Set-Up is its Strongest Aspect
A Minecraft Movie’s first twenty minutes are genuinely enjoyable. It was a legitimately promising comedy long before its ensemble entered the Overworld. Jared Hess does a decent job establishing A Minecraft Movie’s consistently silly tone and introducing its set of likable and (mostly) interesting characters, flexing his inner John Hughes. I took a liking towards the siblings, Natalie and Henry, whose portrayals stray from the strained grieving-siblings trope one might expect. (I kept thinking of the God-awful Playmobil movie with Anya Taylor-Joy.) I was impressed with Emma Myers and Sebastian Hansen’s sibling dynamic, as their characters are genuinely mindful and caring towards each other, as opposed to the classic annoying younger brother and the temperamental older sister dynamic.
Meanwhile, Jason Momoa actively steals the show as “Garbage Man”, who I can best describe as a Jared Hess-type (loser who thinks highly of himself) with a rocker persona. He possesses a surprising comic ability, and his careless idiocy and confident delivery often made me laugh out loud. Even when the film takes a severe dip in quality the moment they enter the Overworld, Momoa mostly brings the funny single-handedly, and sometimes it is elevated by his somewhat queerbaiting screen chemistry with Jack Black. The pissing contest bro-off between Garrett and Steve instantly turns into a series of homoerotic gags and intimate interactions, with Steve even calling Garbage Man "Gar Gar".
No Girls Allowed
Minecraft isn't a game I would associate with boys, but the movie finds a way to make it a dude affair. Come the midpoint, the movie finds a way for Henry and Natalie to separate, leaving Brooks and Myers to wait in the wings and do nothing while Hansen, Black, and Momoa get to have all the fun. You can tell the movie was rewritten to High Heaven, and presumably a draft that focuses on the siblings' arc was scrapped in favor of a lazy adventure romp. In a world where the most recent Sonic the Hedgehog told a compelling tale about grief with resounding success, there's no reason for A Minecraft Movie not to take narrative — dare I say, creative — risks. It's even more frustrating when you consider how strong the sibling’s bond was at the beginning. But no, forget Natalie. Have Henry hang out with his two new adoptive gay dads.
There’s no reason for Danielle Brooks to be there, as she is given nothing to do, and certainly nothing that justifies having Dawn transported into the Overworld. They comment on how good she is with animals, which was promising in a world known for its animal life, but it never pays off. She's there for diversity points and reaction shots. That's it. On the one hand, Danielle, get that bag. On the other hand, no movie should waste a talented Academy Award nominee so egregiously.
A Creatively Bankrupt Celebration of Creativity
Whatever positive impression I had during those opening twenty minutes instantly washed away once the four characters entered the overly CG-ed Overworld. From there, A Minecraft Movie morphs into the umpteenth Hollywood isekai tale, overly reliant on exposition, bad blue-screen work with horrendous lighting, and fan service. All the strong character development from the first act, specifically Natalie and Henry, is completely abandoned so that Jack Black (at the height of his usual shtick) can mug at the camera and spout Minecraft exposition (his signature technique), and young Minecraft fans can shout and point at the screen during its fan service moments.
The script penned by its trio of writing teams — Chris Bowman & Hubbel Palmer, Neil Widener & Gavin James, and Chris Galletta — is a hodgepodge point-A-to-point-B family adventure that doesn't do justice to the distinctive and unique world of the game. It is only ever concerned with unimaginatively proceeding from one Minecraft-coated set piece to the next with ideas ranging from "what if Momoa and Black had to fight a chicken jockey” to “what if they escaped a tunnel full of creepers in a minecart”. Every set piece is just a rinse-and-repeat, but the wash and rinse cycles are labeled “scream” and “run”. It feels like someone had a week to play Minecraft and write a movie before it was put into production.
To add insult to injury, the writers force their characters to exclaim about creativity and imagination and how ideas cannot be limited. It's nice to hear, especially after a week of AI art discourse, yet the execution here is corporate to the point of hypocrisy. Like making a socialist Snow White movie with a "land back" message made by and starring Zionists, type of hypocrisy.
I can't help but feel cynical about A Minecraft Movie, especially compared to other Warner Bros. distributions like Barbie and The Lego Movie, which were both visually superior and imbued with soul and endless creativity. I can't even compliment Weta’s CGI work, as its cartoonish style combined with the poorly lit blue-screen and medium-shot-heavy live-action elements makes it look more like a commercial than a feature with a $150 million price tag.
Final Statement
Despite being occasionally humorous and entertaining, A Minecraft Movie is a corporate affair as soul-crushing as working in a mine shaft.
