The story is about young paladin Grayson (Jack Derges) whose
father was kidnapped by servants of the evil Nhagruul the Foul, a wicked
sorcerer who 2000 years ago was defeated and his remains turned into a tome of
pure evil that was split into three parts and scattered across the globe. In
order to find his father and stop the heretics from reassembling the book,
Grayson goes against his nature and joins a party of chaotic warriors and magic
users in the hopes they will lead him to his destination.
I have no love for the other films in this series, but I
have played a few games of D&D in
my time so I know what’s up. Regardless of how much a fan of the game director
Courtney Solomon was, his directorial debut, the first movie, was just pure
torture. The second movie, Wrath of the
Dragon God (see my review here) was a made for SyFy flick and actually felt
like you were watching a tabletop game play out in front of you. It wasn’t good
but it was definitely better than its predecessor. The Book of Vile Darkness is a mix of the two. It sucks a whole lot,
but there are cool moments that remind you how awesome the actual source
material can be when filtered through a great Dungeon Master.
Director Gerry Lively, who also directed the second film,
took a large step backwards with this sequel. It’s plainly obvious that the
budget is less than any of the other films in the series and that forced him to
cut a lot of corners. The actors are pretty terrible, the sets and costumes are
cheap looking (especially Akordia’s fake ass glue on facial piercings), the
props look like shit and the scope is pretty small for something that’s built
up as much as it is during the rad animated opening scene. You can tell he’s
trying to overcome these obstacles, but he fails most of the time.
The script is mostly to blame. Screenwriter Brian Rudnick
gives the events a gameplay type of feel, but fails to make the characters
anything but one dimensional. Sure it’s kind of cool to see a paladin go
against his training and allow all these horrible atrocities to occur right in
front of him. At one point he becomes worse than the people in his party. The
issue is that he flips on a dime not unlike Anakin Skywalker in Revenge of the Sith. There’s no build-up
to it. It just happens. The main plot about the book being reassembled by
Nhagruul’s acolytes is tossed aside after the opening credits and is only brought
back up during the last ten minutes. And the ending… WTF?! I’ve seen some
anticlimactic finales but this one has to be in the top 5.
Lead actor Jack Derges, who is Nicholas Hoult’s
doppelganger, is trying his hardest to sell his character’s switch to the dark
side, but he just comes off as a bi-polar whiny douche. He changes sides again
just as quickly in the end and it’s an awkward moment. His co-stars Eleanor
Gecks (Akordia the Psion), Habib Nasib Nader (Vimak the Barbarian), Lex Daniel
(Seith the Rogue) and Barry Aird (Bezz the Sorcerer) are decent in varying
degrees with Aird being the best of the bunch. He sells his character’s cool
powers better than anyone else can in the cast.
And what is the one thing all Dungeons & Dragons games contain? Battles. All the fights in
this flick are a freaking joke. Everyone is pulling their punches, whiffing,
obviously sticking their sword under their opponent’s armpit, hitting the
ground past a fallen foe and faking some strange looking martial arts moves.
They’re choreographed worse than a fight in an episode of classic Star Trek! Another laughable aspect are
the weapons Vimek carries - a supposedly metal axe and a spear. They look like
painted foam and when he rubs the axe blade against the spear tip it sounds
like wood on wood. Seriously?!
There’s just too much stupid shit going on here to be
completely enjoyable. There are some cool parts (the battle with the red
dragon, Bezz making people explode and his cool eyeball trick), the special
effects look pretty damned good (that living dead girl was animated so well, as
were the dragon and the citadel in the sky) and the basic premise was
interesting. And then there’s all the crud I mentioned earlier, along with some
stupefying stuff like Akordia’s cell phone tiara, the convenient ending and
random occurrences (Grayson, upon finding out his father has been kidnapped,
decides to look up the town’s prostitute for some advice).
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I think a reboot is a fine idea. Out of three attempts one
has been kind of okay. I just hope they find some talented people to make the
franchise viable again. The reason the game is still so popular after nearly 40
years is that the only limiting factor to the world and experiences within are
the players’ imaginations, and imagination is something all of these flicks
have been missing. Let’s pray to the film gods that Warner Bros. chooses their
adventuring party wisely.
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