Anton van Beek and Allan Bryce take a critical look at some of the very latest cinema, 4K UHD, Blu-ray and streaming releases...

DUNGEONS & DRAGONS: HONOUR AMONG THIEVES

(2023) 
4K UHD Out now. Paramount. Cert: 12

★ ★ ★ ★

This extremely enjoyable fantasy romp stars Chris Pine as Edgin Darvis, a former bard who turns to a life of crime to support his young daughter Kira (Chloe Coleman) after his wife is killed by an evil wizard. When the attempted theft of a magical ‘Tablet of Reawakening’ goes wrong, Edgin and his barbarian buddy Holga Kilgore (Michelle Rodriguez) are captured and imprisoned, but not before making fellow thief Forge Fitzwilliam (Hugh Grant) swear that he will look after Kira until he returns. After two years behind bars, Edgin and Holga make their escape and return home, only to discover that Forge has become Lord of the city of Neverwinter and has spent the intervening years turning Kira against her father. Determined to get both his daughter and the Tablet of Reawakening back, Edgin sets about assembling a team of unlikely adventurers -including half-elf sorcerer Simon (Justice Smith) and shape-changing druid Doric (Sophia Lillis) -to pull off the ultimate heist.

It’s taken five decades, but at long last Dungeons & Dragons fans finally have a film that does the popular role-playing game proud. Banishing all memories of the terrible 2000 turkey starring Justin Whalin and Jeremy Irons, Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves bares all the hallmarks of being by people who know and love the table-top game -in this case, writer/ director duo Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley, the brains behind the entertaining 2018 comedy Game Night. We’re not just talking about references an in-jokes regarding franchise lore here, either -although there is plenty of that. It’s how they treat the material; the light-hearted approach never taking away from the characters or story. The whole thing has the amiable feel of a goodnatured night spent sat around a table, rolling D20s and playing through another D&D campaign.

Sadly, despite the film’s charming mix of action and laughs, Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves failed to roll a critical hit and flopped at the box office. Here’s hoping it does a lot better on disc, so we can enjoy further bigscreen adventures with this team of magical misfits.

Extras: ★ ★ ★ ★

Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves arrives on 4K UHD with a solid set of behind-thescenes featurettes, three of which are exclusive to the format. From Dice to Dragons: Honoring the Lore (11mins) examines the process of adapting the game for the screen; Rogues Gallery: The Heroes of Dungeons & Dragons (11mins) and the 4K-exclusive Fantastic Foes (seven-mins) deal with the cast and their characters; The Bestiary (ninemins) and Forging the Forgotten Realms, both also exclusive to the UHD, cover the film’s fantastical creatures and production design; and Broadswords, Battleaxes & Badass Brawls (nine-mins) deals with props and fight choreography. 
The disc also includes a gag reel (seven mins) and six deleted/extended scenes (11mins).

AvB

JOHN WICK: CHAPTER 4

(2023) 
4K UHD Out now. Lionsgate. Cert: 15

★ ★ ★ ★

Back on his feet after his near-death experience at the end of the previous sequel, former hitman John Wick (Keanu Reeves) is quick to strike back against the international council of crime lords known as the High Table. They do not take it well, sending Marquis Vincent Bisset de Gramont (Bill Skarsgård) to punish Wick and his former allies -starting with the destruction of the New York Continental, followed by forcing a former friend of Wick’s, the blind assassin Caine (Donnie Yen), out of retirement to hunt down his old acquaintance.

Meanwhile, between scraps, the globetrotting Wick discovers a way to finally free himself from the his obligations to the High Table. He simply has to convince his old crime family to take him back, enabling Wick to invoke an old High Table tradition and challenge the Marquis to a duel to the death.

Clocking in at close to three-hours, this fourth (and final?) Instalment in the John Wick series is not only the longest, but quite possibly the best. Racing relentlessly from its beaten and bruised start to its breathtaking finish, John Wick: Chapter 4 never once outstays its welcome, serving up a series of extended, exquisitely choreographed fight scenes that rival the best that contemporary Hong Kong cinema has to offer. It’s been a fascinating experience to follow this franchise from its near-DTV origin to this, the absolute epitome of gun-totting cinematic action.