WoW Moviewatch: Mercy of the Sea
by Natalie Mootz 
Oct 16th 2008 at 12:00PM
Mercy of the Sea, Runner Up in the Action/Adventure category of the BlizzCon 2008 movie contest, is a long film, clocking in at over 23 minutes. The clip embedded above is only the first act of three acts total. You can watch the entire film by streaming it, downloading it, or watching the three YouTube clips in order. Sleeping Dogs Productions, headed by J. Joshua Diltz, which also created Rise of the Living Dead and The Island, now brings us the tale of High Priestess Elunari as she tries to rescue her kidnapped child from her power-hungry husband, the Arch Druid. Of the BlizzCon-entered movies I've watched this year, this one is my least favorite.
While it is an undoubtedly polished production -- the voice talents, music, and sound design stand out in particular -- the story struggled to keep my interest, sometimes from plain confusion. The backstory takes up the first 3-1/2 minutes of the film and is told without animation, via what is essentially a slide show. It moves very slowly and provides little that we don't understand from context later. (As such, I would recommend axing the narrated backstory altogether.)
Then, ironically, much of the action in the main portion of the film was difficult for me to follow. The battle scenes were too cluttered with closeups and blur-effects to make much sense to me. Most times I couldn't even tell what spells were being cast or who was fighting whom. I never figured out how the Priestess escaped, who died overall, or why the "core" meltdown occurred. Nor was I able to follow the action well enough to figure out how the Arch Druid caught up to the Priestess at the end of the film, much less why either of them were still alive after their fiery collision. Without adding spoilers, I also can't figure out how the ending events occurred either. There were too many quick cuts, too many out-of-context closeups, too much deus ex machina, too much backstory and not enough battle context for me to enjoy the film.
Tomorrow we'll take a look at Fruit of Elune by Myndflame to wrap up our BlizzCon movie contest coverage.
[Via WarcraftMovies]
If you have any suggestions for WoW Moviewatch, you can mail them to us at machinima AT wowinsider DOT com.
Filed under: Druid, Priest, Machinima, WoW Moviewatch, BlizzCon
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
gridwerk Oct 16th 2008 12:09PM
like watching convoluted cartoon network anime. I couldnt get past the first three minutes. How this won anything is interesting.
zappo Oct 16th 2008 12:22PM
Sounds a lot like my impressions of FFIV: Advent Children.
Lemons Oct 16th 2008 8:16PM
Gah! My eyes! could that movie be any brighter???
Keyra Oct 17th 2008 12:39AM
You may wish to check your video settings. I thought it was a little dark, myself. (shrug)
Keyra Oct 17th 2008 12:44AM
Very, very nicely done! My only critique would be thus:
Overuse of soft focus made it seem a bit too much like the old Robotech anime, and the volume could have been a little louder (of course the volume may have been YouTube's fault). And why is it that the voicing animations of night elf females always make it look like they're about to start giggling uncontrollably? (Not that the author could have done anything about that.)
Other than this, very nice concept, great audio mixing and nicely put together! Definitely one for my "saved videos" file!
Keyra Oct 17th 2008 9:45PM
Nope, it wasn't YouTube's fault. I downloaded the full movie and the volume was set VERY low. I had to turn my speakers up 3/4 of the way.
Even with that, though, the mixing was very well done. The music was never overpowering and everyone could be heard and (most importantly) understood perfectly.
The movie itself became rather warped and twisted near the end, sort of a like an awesome dream that you're having, but the longer it goes on, the more weird and strange it becomes :-)