Dungeons & Dragons turned 40 years old in January of this year (2014). In recognition, we are rebranding our site for one week to Now Very Beholder… and focusing just on the films that star or in some way revolve around D&D.
140 Character Movie Review – #140RVW
Everyone involved in this predictable & possibly insulting documentary need to make a saving throw. Filmmakers message is really unclear…
Spoiler-free Movie Review of The Dungeon Masters:
Our last Now Very Beholder review (for Zero Charisma) discussed the potential dangers of making a film about a particular group or interest – it’s very easy to get caught up in the effort to be funny and go for the cheap burns. There’s a fine line between portraying a group a little irreverently and making fun of them. In the case of The Dungeon Masters that line is behind them.
The Dungeon Masters follows three hardcore gamers in what seems to be an effort to point out how sad and pathetic their lives are. I’m hoping that wasn’t the goal, that they were really trying to illustrate how struggles in gaming do not necessarily correlate to troubles in life, but it really does seem to be just embarrassing unsuspecting people.
Well, here’s the synopsis from Antidote Films, one of the production companies: “An evil drow-elf is displaced by Hurricane Katrina. A sanitation worker lures friends into a Sphere of Annihilation. A failed supervillain starts a cable access show involving ninjas, puppets, and a cooking segment. These are the characters, real and imagined, of The Dungeon Masters: Against the backdrop of crumbling middle-class America, two men and one woman devote their lives to Dungeons and Dragons, the storied role-playing game, and its various descendants. As their baroque fantasies clash with mundane real lives, the characters find it increasingly difficult to allay their fear, loneliness, and disappointment with the game’s imaginary triumphs. Soon the true heroic act of each character’s real life emerges, and the film follows each as he or she summons the courage to face it. Along the way, The Dungeon Masters reimagines the tropes of classic heroic cinema, creating an intimate portrait of minor struggles and triumphs writ large.” I must tell you that the film only barely resembles that bit of marketing.
The tone of the doc wavers, from the beginning soundbites and snippets about the popularity of the game through to the chronicling of one of the subjects ninja cable access show. It’s really unclear if the picture is meant to be celebratory or sympathetic or played for the “stop and point at the weirdos” angle. Indeed, the mission of the film is completely lost on me. Eighty-seven minutes isn’t really a long time for a documentary, but it is if you don’t know what they’re going for.
Regardless, the inclusion of only three individuals necessarily means that a lot of pressure is put on them to represent all gamers and that’s hard to do. It’s certainly no slander to suggest that these gamers are on the extreme end of things, and relying solely on those stories paints a very incomplete picture.
Part of the problem surely lies in the production. The documentary was initially envisioned as a history of the game, but when the director met the three individuals who make up the majority of the film it seems to have developed a bad case of mission creep. All of a sudden it had turned into a character study of 3 people, where the game is only part of the story, and it goes out of focus with no real linear theme.
I don’t want to be too hard on the filmmakers, because I may be misreading their intent. I really don’t think this is supposed to be a hatchet job, but I do think that it comes off as an insulting picture more akin to reality television than documentary. If you think I’m being unfair, ask yourself this: do you imagine that the three people featured in this film were pleased at how they came off and proud to show the final product to friends and family? Me neither…
Poster:
Trailer:
Bechdel Test & The Representation Test Score: n/a
| Main Cast | |
| Rating | Not Rated |
| Release Date | 2008 |
| Director | Keven McAlester |
| Genres | Documentary, Drama |
| Plot | An evil drow-elf is displaced by Hurricane Katrina. A sanitation worker lures friends into a Sphere of Annihilation… |
| Poster |  |
| Runtime | 87 |
| Tagline | This is how they roll. |
| Writers | |
| Year | 2008 |
