Went for the Memes, Stayed for Jennifer Coolidge – “Minecraft” Movie Review

(Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Mediapass)

Kerry Kadel | Editor-in-Chief

Minor spoilers ahead!

I was introduced to Minecraft by my cousins when I was younger, and it was unlike any video game I ever played. It had an end goal, but the bigger aspect of the game was allowing players to create their own world, to build whatever they wanted and journey across a digital world defeating zombies, skeleton archers, spiders, and more. You can play with friends on gaming consoles or on the gaming app for phones across servers, and there’s always something new for you and all your friends to do. It’s a game with calming music and high stakes of losing your inventory when you die, always with the hope that you can respawn and go back to avenge your lost items. 

After an introduction of how Steve stumbles upon the world of Minecraft, called the Overworld in the film, the story follows two siblings, Henry and Natalie after losing their mother and moving to a small town in Idaho known for their famous potato chip manufacturing company. Henry is a middle-school age boy who has big ideas of inventing tools and gadgets that are outside the box of thinking. 

I expected a lot of childish humor, but I didn’t expect the influence that Jason Momoa had on the film. While starring as a washed-up, financially unstable professional gamer, Momoa also produced the film, allowing him to have full control over the creative process from start to finish. Everyone who’s played Minecraft knows that there is one main character known as Steve, however, Momoa’s character Garett “The Garbageman” Garrison seems to push himself into the spotlight along with Jack Black’s portrayal of Steve. 

Jack Black is known for his eccentric personality and how he incorporates it in every character he plays, either voice acting or live-action. His various line deliveries in the film have become memes circulating around social media, with videos showing audiences cheering when spoken by Black in the film. 

Danielle Brook also stars in the film as Dawn, a woman of many side hustles in order to make money, notably a house realtor who helps Natalie and Henry move into their new home. During the film it seems to me that Dawn and Natalie are tossed aside to give more room of screentime to Henry, Garett and Steve. However, the two female leads mention the movie’s message in a scene while nonchalantly fighting monsters after they have been split up from the other main characters: that being an adult isn’t fun and childish creativity doesn’t have to end. Over the course of the film, besides scenes lacking precious moments between characters for emotional purposes, it’s a wild ride of showcasing the world of Minecraft with Jack Black bouncing around the screen and having less than one minute songs–yes, Jack Black sings in this film. 

The film is a delight for kids, with some jokes having adults laugh, however I’d say this comes from the comedic subplot with Jennifer Coolidge, starring as Henry’s Vice Principal of his new school, falling in love with a Minecraft villager after she hits him with her Jeep Grand Cherokee. Her character is newly divorced and erratic about finding true love, and if anyone knows anything about Minecraft villagers, it’s that they do not talk like humans and can only say one word that sounds a lot like “huh.” In the film, they are terrifying, with big bald square heads, long rectangular noses and huge bushy unibrows. Compared to how they look in the game, I’d rather choose the video game version. The animals also look terrible, having turned into semi-realistic versions of how they appear in the game, but honestly, you get used to it after a while. The few creatures from the video game that I thought looked normal compared to the film’s rendering were the iron golems, spiders, ghasts and pigmen. 

Before the end credit scene, I already had the feeling that the studio would make another movie, no matter how bad the movie did in the box office, and this scene sets up the sequel to introduce a character also involved in the game: Alex, the female counterpart that players can also stand in as. 

I don’t recommend this movie for a sit-in experience, it’s more like a wait-until-it’s-streaming plan for movie night with friends to make fun of during it. Did I beg my boyfriend to come see it with me? Yes. Will we be seeing the sequel, because I know that they’re going to make one away? Yes.