Overall verdict: 8/10
What if Warcraft became a cop drama?
The Good: Amazing production design, excellent cast, unique urban fantasy setting, good action, great cast chemistry, interesting villains
The Bad: uninspired music, simplistic storyline, a lot of backstory goes unexplained
***********Review***********
BRIGHT is a movie that deserves a big screen theatrical debut. It’s got a great premise and delivers it through David Ayer’s signature gritty realism playing on racial politics, social segregation, gang culture and polar opposite individuals coming together for a common good despite their differences. All this set to a familiar yet unfamiliar urban fantasy Los Angeles where elves live the high snobbish life, orc gangs run the streets, and humanity is right in the middle with all races just trying to get along despite seething tensions.
Where some reviewers saw the whole orc/human/elf segregation as a story of racial prejudice that was being too on the nose, I merely saw the fantasy setting as the medium and not the message. David Ayer isn’t using the fantasy races to bring an anti racism message. Instead he is making a statement that with all the magic, all this fantastic stuff happening right out of fairy tales, the resulting society will be no different than how our society is in real life. Cruel, violent, prone to all the social failings that we see everyday.
Into this setting comes policeman Ward who is basically Will Smith playing Will Smith in a cop uniform. Smart mouthed, cocky, and just trying to get by day to day, Ward is suddenly saddled with officer Jakobi, an orc, as part of the department’s initiative to hire more minorities. A foiled shooting by an orc gangster and his subsequent escape despite Jakobi giving chase places him squarely under suspicion of aiding an escaped felon. Despite half the police force distrusting the orc officer, Ward sticks by his guns and continues his patrols with Jakobi at his side despite his own personal misgivings.
The unlikely duo get caught up in a clandestine plot by a cult to resurrect a dark lord that almost plunged the world into chaos millenia ago. A former elf cultist named Tikka (not at all related to Chicken or Masala) has escaped with the magic wand capable of granting its wielder anything they so desired as long as they were a “Bright”: a one in a million being with a unique ability to wield a wand and not be obliterated by the magic. Twists, turns, betrayals and hijinks ensue, taking Ward and Jakobi deep into the fantasy criminal underworld and face to face with forces well beyond their police paygrade.
BRIGHT balances the main plot with the world building setting up the rules of this unique universe without too much exposition. The acting is excellent with the characters of both Ward and Jakobi being easy to relate to. Jakobi, played by Joel Edgerton (Star Wars: Attack of the Clones) is especially endearing in his idealistic dedication to upholding the law and doing the right thing despite the overt prejudice against him.
Minor nitpicks would be the the run of the mill action movie music by David Sardy (Ghost Rider Spirit of Vengeance), and the haphazard way the action is shot and edited. Other than that, BRIGHT boasts excellent performances, production values and equally excellent makeup in bringing this realistic fantasy world to life. I for one would love to see a sequel or at least a spinoff taking place in the same world.
***********Review***********
Entertainment: A-
Story: B
Acting: A
Characters: B+
Music: D
Replay value: B+
"Brains": C
