The Witcher: Nightmare Of The Wolf (2021) Dir: Han Kwang-il
- Ridley Coote
- 23 hours ago
- 2 min read
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Interestingly enough, what motivated me to watch this was the release of a new animated film from the same franchise. I figured I should watch this one first, and then move onto the newer one. Even if they aren't related, I usually prefer to go in release date order. That said, this animated adventure had been on my watchlist for a while, so I won't act like I wasn't at least a little interested in watching this Han Kwang-il directed film before that.
Studio Mir's animation style was really quite beautiful. I loved how the animators were able to bring such an epic, yet dark, fantasy world to life. The magical elements looked terrific, and the explicit gore was surprisingly intense and effective. In addition, I felt that the film's world-building was very solid, and allowed for easy audience immersion.
I did have a few issues with the film, however - most of these surrounding the writing. I found the characters almost entirely forgettable, especially those in a supporting capacity. Furthermore, neither they, or the story, felt particularly original or interesting. There were some individually strong scenes, but the overarching events were little dull.
Theo James provided the voice for a fairly standard anti-hero protagonist. In all honesty, it felt like I was watching a substandard 'Castlevania' character. With that said, I can't say that his voice acting itself was particularly bad, but it certainly didn't impress me all that much either. I wanted him to make his character feel more unique.
The supporting cast all gave performances as forgettable as their characters. Of the three worth mentioning, I thought that Graham McTavish provided the most notable voice acting, while Mary McDonnell and Lara Pulver failed to leave a significant impression upon me. Either way, none of the above names inspired me particularly - they were fine, but nothing more than that.
Overall, this was an entertaining, though troubled, animated fantasy film, which looked absolutely great, but had very little to it underneath that. It felt more like an extra-long television episode than an actual feature film. I wonder if the story would have worked better as part of an animated limited series, rather than a film.
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