Warchief review

Warchief is a fantasy film that more closely resembles getting lost in the forest for 10 hours instead of some adrenaline-rush adventure. It’s a boring slog that looks like it could have taken place in a spacious backyards overlooking a sprawling campground.

Ironically director/screenwriter Stuart Brennan (The Necromancer available now on Amazon) seems to be keenly aware he’s operating on an indie budget and presents Warchief accordingly. That means a heavy dose of close-up camera shots, claustrophobia-inducing action sequences and a general lack of progression of a massive quest.

Three warriors led by Captain Orion (Brennan) escort a mage (Michael Lambourne) to deliver a vital message to the key. Their path is a long, winding one filled with various perils including plague victims with weapons that can essentially turn their victims into fellow quasi-zombies. And there’s the matter of the murderous Warchief (Mark Paul Wake), who’s slaughtering anyone who stumbles onto his path.

That sounds intriguing, but Brennan presents the plot in as flat and dull a manner possible. Zombies and a massive warchief ready to signal his fellow beasts to start a war against humanity. That really should be exciting. There’s a built-in urgency with such a small escort crew rushing to deliver a message to the king before these various menaces hunt and strike them down.

Orion and his fellow soldiers, Griff (Rosanna Miles) and Arlo (Michael Kinsey), have some curiosity about the importance of this message, with the more outspoken Arlo really badgering the mage for some insight. The mage insists it’s for the king’s ears’ only, but Orion does raise a good point if the mage gets killed who would know the message to tell the king.

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Characters seemingly walking around a forest in circles isn’t the most exciting so Brenanan starts throwing in some flashbacks. It’s an effort to provide some backstories to the characters, but it’s more confusing than helpful.

While the story is lackluster, the performances are definitely not the norm for these smaller budget action films. Brennan and Miles in particular stand out providing legit gravitas to their characters’ backstory.

Fight choreography is uninspired. Brennan seems to lack confidence in just having the actors flailing their weapons around each other to any degree of skill. To cover for it, Brennan keeps the camera extremely tight typically only keeping one character on screen at a time during fight scenes.

These close-up shots are disorienting on their own, but the results of the wild swinging aren’t always clear. Characters will be up one moment and then on the ground, the victim of some poorly defined strike. An abundance of fog doesn’t help either. And there’s some noticeable editing gaffes that are too abrupt to be casually ignored.

A major problem with the fight scenes is Orion isn’t much of a hero. Somehow, he managed to climb the ranks to become a captain, but he’s more cowardly when presented with any kind of threat or challenge. In the midst of some battles, he hides or runs away while in others he simply drops his tiny knife. Maybe if he had a broadsword his fighting approach would be different?

Costumer Kirstie Lindsey does solid work constructing the attire for Orion and his crew. The armor has good detailing with patterns, texturing and crests over baggier clothing. With zombie plague victims running around, baggy clothing seems like it could be easier to get caught and grabbed, but at least it looks cool.

Warchief had a decent premise that quickly gets derailed by a boring, confusing story and mediocre action scenes. Even the most forgiving fans of the genre willing to give a lower-budget effort a shot should raise the white flag and skip this one.

Rating: 3 out of 10

Photo Credit: Lionsgate

Warchief will be available on digital and on demand on Sept. 17.

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