Charles Merritt suggests that Christian parents will have to dig a little to find a faith conversation about creativity from the rubble of A Minecraft Movie
Film: A Minecraft Movie
Age rating: PG
Runtime: 130 minutes
See this if you liked: The Super Mario Bros Movie
Overview: When a boy finds himself in a town, he stumbles across a portal to a strange world made of blocks which he must save from destruction by a sorceress pig.
Disclaimer: I have only played/observed Minecraft for a few minutes max, so I have no real connection to the videogame.
What I liked: Honestly? Nothing…
What I didn’t like:
Ooooo boy! Where to start?!
I feel truly awful knowing that parents across the world will be dragged to see this film by their kids. I’m sorry. They might enjoy it. You probably won’t.
I feel like we have another Super Mario Bros Movie on our hands here (read my thoughts on that here), which means I’ll write a bad review and this film will make a billion dollars at the box office…
Like the Super Mario film, this is also hyper fast paced. There’s no breathing room for any character development. Any character development is exchanged in a single sentence and then it’s onto the next thing.
I’ll be honest, although the film tries to set up character arcs at the beginning of the movie (which may be the slowest bit once you get through the 10 minutes of Steve’s origin story), almost all of it is forgotten by the time they enter the Overworld.
I want to say that it felt like it was written by a child but I work with children and I know for a fact that most kids could have written a better film than this. It was dull, unfunny and rushed.
Read more:
Snow White – A kingdom of love, not fear
Captain America: Brave New World – Can people change (beyond turning into a Hulk…)?
For a film all about imagination, the film has very little. The action sequences are eye-rollingly stupid, and not in a fun way. The best, maybe, was Jason Mamoa using buckets as Nunchucks but even then, it got repetitive and tired pretty quickly.
Jack Black is, well, Jack Black. Don’t get me wrong, I like Jack Black but this isn’t Jumanji Jack Black where he’s playing a character, this is Jack Black being Jack Black whilst calling himself Steve.
The supporting cast are fine. They have so little to work with and it’s sad because there are some great actors in this.
As I was driving back from seeing this movie I was reminded how much Snow White has stuck with me, even though it wasn’t the best film, at least it had something to say and actually had moments which made me smile (read my review for that here).
Sadly, I’ll do my best to forget this movie. If I’m honest, I already have.
it’s true, it’s a lot easier to make a mess than to fix one. Just look at the world
Faith Thoughts:
Erm. This is going to be a struggle but let’s explore what the movie was telling you it was about (without actually being about it at all).
Creativity.
Steve remarks at one point in the film ‘It’s easy to destroy than to create’.
And it’s true, it’s a lot easier to make a mess than to fix one. Just look at the world.
I wonder whether you feel as though you are a creative being. You might think back to your latest attempt at drawing something in Pictionary and shake your head.
But I believe that all of us are creative. I know it, because we’re all made in the image of God and he’s the most creative being of all.
Creativity is not just about arts and craft (trust me, despite doing children’s work for a number of years, crafts are not my thing), there’s writing, acting, dancing, architecture, welding, pottery and, maybe the most underappreciated of them all, problem solving.
Problem solving requires a huge amount of creativity. Being able to see a solution to a problem and make it a reality is no small feat. And most of us do it every day without thinking about it.
What’s one thing that you wish could change in your life? In your home? In your community? In the world?
Pray to God for inspiration and creativity to see a way to fix that problem. Who else could you team up with to build something better? Don’t worry if you don’t have all the pieces you need, sometimes that forces us to be even more creative. Use the things you have and do the things you can and who knows what might happen…
