A Minecraft Movie Review: "Jack Black's irrepressible star turn helps elevate this video game adaptation"

Eyebrows, monobrowed or otherwise, were indubitably raised when plans for a Minecraft film were announced back in 2014. How exactly could Mojang’s phenomenally successful sandbox game, with its open-ended gameplay and conspicuous dearth of plot, be turned into a movie that would a) make sense, b) make money and c) satisfy its fans?

With the sour taste of Borderlands still sitting in their mouths, gamers had every right to feel sceptical about another live-action take on a title beloved by billions. It is with some relief, then, to discover that A Minecraft Movie not only doesn’t suck but is also rather fun, its exuberant colour palette and playfully irreverent vibe turning what could have been a cynical exercise in brand proliferation into a goofily knockabout caper for both the young and the young at heart.

An eclectic group

Its smartest move by far is to enlist the talents of Jack Black, a man who – having starred in two Jumanji sequels, voiced Bowser in The Super Mario Bros. Movie and played Claptrap the robot in the aforementioned Borderlands – is certainly no stranger to films with a gaming element.

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He is ideally suited, then, to the role of Minecraft's primary avatar Steve, a doorknob seller by trade who yearns for a life of underground exploring. A glowing cube he finds in an abandoned mine opens a portal to a secret world of candy-coloured possibility that grants him unlimited power to construct whatever takes his fancy in a matter of seconds. It is not long, however, before he has fallen foul of an evil, porcine witch with designs on this 'Overworld' that can only be thwarted by him hiding an item she covets in his Idahoan hometown of Chuglass.

That much is covered in a scene-setting prologue to the film's actual storyline, one that sees four more misfits join Steve in the unpredictable Minecraft alt-verse. Two of them – youthful Natalie (Emma Myers) and her younger brother Henry (Sebastian Hansen) – are orphans newly arrived in Chuglass, while the third, Danielle Brooks' Dawn, is an animal-loving realtor they encounter there. The fourth, meanwhile, is Garrett 'The Garbage Man' Garrison (Jason Momoa), a former champion gamer whose '80s glory days as a master of 'Hunk City Rampage' are now but a dim and distant memory.

Director Jared Hess and his five screenwriters spend rather too much time in truth on setting up these characters and the humdrum burg they reside in. Yet the pace picks up considerably once they are zapped into the Overworld and find themselves face to face with its cuboid inhabitants, an array of curiosities that range from pink sheep and pandas to skeletons, spiders and zombies. "We’re not in Idaho anymore," observes the flummoxed Garrett. "I think it’s Wyoming!"

With Steve's aid, though, they are able to negotiate their new surroundings and the laws that regulate them, with Henry proving particularly adept as a crafter of buildings and weaponry.

Plenty of action – and box-ticking

From the stealthy Creepers that explode without warning to the square-skulled Piglins that serve the villainous Malgosha (Rachel House), there is a certain amount of box-ticking to be suffered in a movie that may be puzzling for those who do not know their Endermen from their Evokers. There is also a lot of dialogue of the "What in the hell?" and the "You’ve got to be kidding me!" variety, suggesting perhaps that not every one of those writers was exactly pulling their weight.

As Steve and his new friends plot a course from Midport Village to Woodland Mansion via the diamond-filled Redstone Mountains, though, there's plenty of action en route, from an airborne pursuit involving hot-air balloons to a mine-cart chase that pleasingly recalls Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom. And while Brooks' Dawn and Myers' Natalie are not distinct enough to make much of a lasting impression, it’s appealing to watch Momoa extend his range as a macho blowhard whose cocksure swagger masks a chasm of insecurity.

A Minecraft Movie's chief failings are on a visual level. Little attempt is made to physicalise the Overworld's blocky structures and topiary, while the use of greenscreen is so pervasive that it’s almost a running joke. There is no sense the human and CGI characters are occupying the same space, making every interaction between them seem stilted and forced.

It is a challenge that even outfoxes Jennifer Coolidge in her role as Marlene, a high school vice-principal who, in a bizarre comic subplot, finds herself on a dinner date with a Midport villager who has wandered into her dimension. Thank goodness, then, that this story thread eventually gives rise to one of the film's most welcome surprises, not to mention an amusing blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo from one of the game's Swedish co-creators.

Hess's previous successes include 2004's Napoleon Dynamite, and there is a whiff of that pic's deadpan absurdity in some of this one's more outlandish and quirkier moments. Having worked with Black before on 2006's wrestling romp Nacho Libre, meanwhile, he also draws out one of the star's more energetic and committed performances – one he’ll doubtless reprise if the sequel teased by the film’s mid-credits sting ends up becoming a reality.

A Minecraft Movie is out in UK and US cinemas on April 4.

For more, check out our guides to all of the upcoming video game movies and the 2025 movie release dates to add to your calendar.