Starry ‘Dungeons & Dragons’ film brings fantasy game to big screen

Justice Smith, Hugh Grant, Chris Pine, Michelle Rodriguez, Rege-Jean Page, Sophia Lillis and Daisy Head attend the ‘Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves’ UK Premiere at Cineworld Leicester Square on March 23, 2023 in London, England
| Photo Credit: JOE MAHER

The fantasy world of “Dungeons & Dragons” came to a rainy London’s Leicester Square on Thursday as actors Chris Pine, Rege-Jean Page and Michelle Rodriguez premiered their new film imagining of the popular role-playing game.

“Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves” hits cinemas from next week hoping to entice a new generation of fans with the game which first came out in 1974.

In the film, Pine’s character Edgin brings together a band of adventurers for a mission to retrieve a powerful relic.

“I didn’t really know anything about it but my nephew is… a D&D player…I watched he and his pals play and was really blown over by how much joy there was in it and how much improvisation, it was just like an imagination gym basically,” Pine told Reuters on the red carpet.

“Hopefully what people get out of our film is that it’s a fun world with interesting characters that requires creativity and imagination and it’s just a wonderful way to spend time.”

Packed with striking visual effects and stunning backdrops, the film is not just for fans of the game, its directors Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley say.

“There’s so much in this game, there’s so much potential that the movie just really skims the surface of all the potential,” Goldstein said.

“You don’t have to be a fan of the game to enjoy this movie. It really just taps into that spirit (of creativity and imagination) that’s so great about it,” Daley added.

Rodriguez, who plays Holga, used to play the game herself.

“When (directors) John and Jonathan introduced me to the script, it all came back to me,” she said.

“It made me understand why (Dungeons & Dragons) has been around for 50 years.”

Page, who plays Xenk, said he played his first Dungeons & Dragons game just before starting filming.

“I wasn’t a player but I had actually watched people play Dungeons & Dragons, which is quite possibly even more involved,” he said.

“And so I had a little bit of familiarity with the world but my first game was with this cast.”

The Paramount Pictures film also stars Hugh Grant, Justice Smith, Daisy Head and Sophia Lillis.