Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves

For good or bad this is a Marvel movie.

It stars Chris Pine as a rogueish balladeer with a heart of gold and a tragic backstory. He gathers a team of quirky heroes: a chaotic good wizard, a neutral good warrior, a lawful good paladin, and a neutral good druid.

Together they must save his daughter from Hugh Grant’s Lawful Evil con man (and Pine’s former partner) and then an entire town from a Chaotic Evil wizard.

There is a decent amount of true emotion in it and plenty of action and quips. Fun, fast, get in and get out with a little fighting, almost no romance, a dungeon, a fat dragon and a (spoiler) mostly happy ending.

There were, I’m sure, plenty of in-jokes to make the D&D faithful happy but there was also enough here for an outsider, like myself, to have a good time with it.

Chris Pine and Michelle Rodriguez play versions of the same character we have seen them play in a half-dozen action comedy movies over the last decade or so. This is not a bad thing. It’s … comfortable.

Also, I’m looking forward to this phase of Hugh Grant’s career where he just plays weasels. He’s a natural.

I think this was an above-average take on material that can be impossible to fit into the frame. Not only does it remind me of a Marvel movie but I suddenly recall Pirates of the Caribbean. We all walked in asking ourselves, “A Theme Park Ride? How are they going to make that work?”

And then most everyone left happy and satisfied.