Nerdly » ‘Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves’ Review

30th Mar2023

‘Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves’ Review

by Matthew Turner

Stars: Chris Pine, Michelle Rodriguez, Hugh Grant, Regé-Jean Page, Justice Smith, Sophia Lillis, Chloe Coleman, Daisy Head, Jason Wong | Written by Jonathan Goldstein, John Francis Daley, Michael Gilio | Directed by Jonathan Goldstein, John Francis Daley

Chris Pine and Michelle Rodriguez headline this fantasy action adventure thriller based on the titular Role Playing Game. Co-directed by Game Night duo Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley, Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves ticks all the right blockbuster boxes and could find its way to a successful franchise, with a prevailing role of a D-20.

Set in the Middle Ages of what might as well be called Fantasyland, the story begins with best buddies Edgin the thief (Pine) and Holga the barbarian (Rodriguez) escaping from prison in highly entertaining fashion, while simultaneously filling us in on some backstory as they’re recanting their deeds for the parole board. We learn that Edgin’s wife was murdered and that his beloved young daughter Kira (Chloe Coleman) is now in the care of Edgin’s former friend and colleague Forge Fitzwilliam (Hugh Grant).

However, in Edgin’s absence, power-hungry Forge has turned Kira against her father, and has allied himself with a powerful Red Wizard (Daisy Head), in order to rule over a walled city. Believing that if he can bring his wife back to life, he can put everything back to normal, Edgin sets off on a quest to find a mystical Tablet of Reawakening, accompanied by ever-loyal Holga and two new recruits: shape-shifting druid Doric (Sophia Lillis) and Simon the sorcerer (Justice Smith), a former ally with crippling confidence issues.

The filmmakers are probably hoping audiences forgot the previous Dungeons & Dragons movie (2000’s Dungeons & Dragons), which was widely panned and died a death at the box office. At any rate, they’re not calling this film a reboot, which means, at the very least, that nobody considered the 2000 movie worth rebooting.

The script – by the co-directors and Michael Gilio – does an impressive job of making the film completely accessible to newcomers, while also filling it full of references (creatures, objects, that sort of thing) for die-hard Dungeons & Dragons fans. On a similar note, Goldstein and Daley strike exactly the right tone throughout, not too serious, but not too comedic either, so the source material is accorded a measure of respect throughout.

In addition, the filmmakers create a general feel for the film that is best described as reassuringly derivative. If it reminds you of the Marvel movies, for example, then that is very much deliberate, as the film definitely has one eye on the tried-and-trusted Marvel formula of action, character humour and emotion.

That’s not to say that Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves doesn’t have its fair share of inventive moments, including an engagingly staged – and magic-assisted – heist sequence and a thrilling set-piece involving a shifting maze, some creatures with tentacles and some gelatinous cubes. However, the action does tend to default to the usual CGI overload and the tired fantasy cliché of people firing bolts of energy at each other with no apparent effect.

The cast are superb and there’s strong chemistry between the characters, particularly Pine and Rodriguez, who pull off an effortless – and entirely platonic – rapport that’s surprisingly touching. Smith and Lillis are equally good, while a splendidly cast Hugh Grant is clearly enjoying himself as the villain, getting to deliver killer lines like “I don’t want to see you die…which is why I’m going to leave the room.”

However, audiences turning up to see Bridgerton‘s Regé-Jean Page (as super-earnest paladin Xenk, another of Edgin’s allies) are likely to be disappointed, because despite his prominence on the poster and in the film’s advertising, he’s only in a small handful of scenes. Still, at least he makes the most of his brief appearance, getting in some good laughs while looking impossibly handsome.

Elsewhere, Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves is something of a mixed bag. It’s fair to say, for example, that not all of the jokes land, and some of them fall painfully flat. There are a few notable exceptions though, most notably a terrific extended gag that involves bringing corpses back to life and asking them five questions before they expire again.

It’s also fair to say that the CGI is adequate, but not always what it could be, to the point where the action on screen sometimes lacks a sense of threat and menace as a result. This is particularly evident when the group are meant to be fleeing an amusingly overweight dragon and the only sense of tension lies in whether or not someone’s going to trip over in the green screen room.

On top of that, at two hours and fourteen minutes, the film occasionally threatens to overstay its welcome, though at least the filmmakers keep things maintain a decent pace throughout, aided by the fact that the quest is constantly on the move.

In short, this is an entertaining fantasy adventure that does exactly what’s required. It’s not going to set the world alight, but there’s more than enough here to kick-start the evidently hoped for Dungeons & Dragons franchise, and the actors alone make it worth seeing.