The Witcher: First Hunt (2016) User Reviews

Okay for a fan film, but overall not enough, not even for this running time

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 27 May 2019]

"The Witcher: First Hunt" is an American English-language live action short film from 2016. This one runs for slightly over seven minutes and was written and directed by Christopher Nunez. It is a fan movie, but this can only excuse for so much I suppose. If I had to rate it as such compared to other low-budget fan movies, I'd probably give it two stars more, but by general standards it is just a **/*****. I won't say much about the cast, you can check the list for yourself and there are no known actors really included here. However, the film's slight popularity comes of course from the fact that it is connected to The Witcher, which is I believe a very successful video game? I am not too big on video games anymore these days. And honestly, there are really many positive aspects here. Costumes look fine, sets looks fine, make-up looks fine, special effects look fine. For under $5,000, it is not unimpressive. That much is safe. Another positive aspect is also actually the film's biggest weakness that kept me from giving it a higher rating: the fight sequences. These do look good admittedly, but the issue here is that there is really nothing else beyond that. The film is with the exception of the first 1.5-2 minutes (that include an unexpcted comic book style introduction) a fight sequence and nothing else. I know it is tough to come up with depth when it comes to the characters and their actions, let alone get emotion and something truly memorable in this short time, but it has been done before and it has been done better many times in the past compared to the outcome here. Quite a shame as I certainly see the potential for more here. Maybe Nunez should have left the writing to somebody more experienced. But nonetheless I believe he can have a good career in the industry in the next years, maybe even decades, if he decides to keep going and hopefully as he is still pretty young I suppose he can also improve on his penning. Overall, I give this short film here a thumbs-down and would only recommend it to the very biggest Witcher fans, even if I must admit I was tempted to give it a positive recommendation before the second half just went too far south in terms of quality. Watch something else instead!