Movie Review: Jason Momoa shines in ‘A Minecraft Movie’

The latest IP to be mined into a Hollywood blockbuster is appropriately a video game that celebrates digging: "A Minecraft Movie."

Like "The Super Mario Bros. Movie" and "Jumanji" before it, "A Minecraft Movie" centers on four misfits who enter a mysterious portal that pulls them into a strange land, this time cubic, like Lego only on shrooms.

The Jared Hess-directed action-adventure artfully straddles the line between delighting preteen gamers and keeping their parents awake. It’s an often-bananas adaptation, with bizarre digressions into turquoise blouses and tater tot pizzas. It has Jennifer Coolidge being very Jennifer Coolidge. Need we say more?

If you've never heard of "Minecraft" - or its denizens like Creepers, Piglins, Villagers and Endermen - you are in big trouble. Consult with the closest 10-year-old immediately. (I have one and he noticed a sweet nod to the late YouTuber Technoblade, an Easter egg of sorts.)

The movie is faithful to the world of the game, while adding some things - orbs and crystals - to aid the plot. But if you come in cold and spot pandas and folks punching through earth, you’ll likely side with one human character who says: "This place makes no sense."

Our travelers - a sweet brother and sister (Emma Myers and Sebastian Eugene Hansen), their nutty real estate agent (Danielle Brooks) and a deeply dumb, washed-up pro video game player (Jason Momoa) - are guided by Jack Black, playing an expert crafter named Steve stranded in the world.

If it does anything, "A Minecraft Movie" marks the comedic coming of age of Momoa, who has shown glimpses of his chops in the "Aquaman" and "Fast X" movies. But when he's not on screen in this one, it leaves the movie slack, which is saying a lot when you have Black being his full-force, over-the-top Black.

"There's no 'i' in 'team' but there are two 'i's in 'winning,'" Momoa says as Garrett "The Garbage Man" Garrison, who is fond of fingerless gloves and a Barbie-pink leather jacket with a fringe. In another scene, he notes: "Paper doesn't grow on trees."

The screenplay written by Chris Bowman, Hubbel Palmer, Neil Widener, Gavin James and Chris Galletta is as loosey-goosey as you’d expect from five different voices, with a traditional Marvel-style battle at the end fueled by plenty of "Let’s do this!" declarations but with a surprisingly goofball first half.

Like countless films before it, "A Minecraft Movie" is all about the quest to go home, which in this case means navigating zombies, skeletons shooting fire-tipped arrows and a place called The Nether, a perpetually dark hell where horrible creatures mine for gold. For some reason, the ruler there, a piglike witch, has glowing eyes and a British accent.

The writers make some "America's Got Talent" jokes, Black has a few songs - including a bizarre "Steve's Lava Chicken" - and we spend an inordinate of time focused on Momoa's butt, but it all ends in a dance party. The movie has a "Dark Crystal"-meets-"Transformers" vibe, a too-subtle message about financial failure and something about friendship.

The filmmakers do have characters throw eggs - at these prices, is that smart? - but they don’t lean enough into the celebration of creativity this movie seemed to promise when it started.

Hollywood's embrace of gaming has been yielding hits such as HBO's "The Last of Us" and Amazon Prime Video's series adaptation of the Microsoft-owned "Fallout." More adaptations are on the horizon this year: "Until Dawn," "Mortal Kombat 2" and "Five Nights at Freddy's 2."

As for "A Minecraft Movie," the advice is this: Come for the Piglins, stay for Momoa, whom you will see spectacularly failing at being bilingual and jujutsu-ing opponents dressed like a member of Skid Row. It’s everything you ever needed.

"A Minecraft Movie," a Warner Bros. Pictures release that’s in theaters Friday, is rated PG for "violence/action, language, suggestive/rude humor and some scary images." Running time: 101 minutes. Two and a half stars out of four.