Reign of Fire
Directed by Rob Bowman
Starring Matthew McConaughey, Christian Bale, Izabella Scorupco, Gerard Butler and Randall Carlton
Rated PG-13 for intense action violence

When the original Godzilla came out, the monster really looked convincing. Same for the giant fury arm that reached into Fay Wray's room in King Kong. Hell, even the ridiculous claymation scene towards the end of Terminator probably scared somebody the first time they saw it. So, if anything can be learned from history, it's that it would be foolish to be assume that the best special effects of any particular time will remain impressive and convincing for all time. However, keeping in mind the guys who said phlogiston was the best answer chemistry would offer or that Kraft macaroni and cheese couldn't possibly get any cheesier, I submit that the dragons in Reign of Fire are as good as movie dragons could ever possibly be. They have texture, they fly, they breath realistic fire, they have holes in their wings and they crash. They're amazing. Now, I have to admit that I have no idea what an actual dragon would look like, but, after seeing this film, anything that doesn't look like the beasts from Reign of Fire would have to be called something else.

By chance these amazing CGI creatures happen to be situated in a film starring Matthew McConaughey and Christian Bale, who kind of looks like a wimpy, British Matthew McConaughey. The story is reasonably interesting, putting forth the idea that dragons are real creatures that have existed almost as long as the earth, they've just been slumbering underground over the past whatever thousand years. Sometime in the near future they come to life and mess everything up, burning things and killing people etc. What remains is a sort
of global Mad Max/T2 wasteland, except with dragons flying around every eight or ten minutes. The world put up on the screen is a dark and barren one, with a blueish gray tint pervasive throughout the film. It seems almost like a perpetual dusk. The style is successful in effecting the proper apocalyptic mood, but as in other films that attempt this sort of look (Sleepy Hollow jumps to mind) the effectiveness and beauty turn to monotony after forty minutes or so. The cinematography is acceptably sharp but again a consistency/redundancy becomes apparent pretty early on. Same goes for the direction.

What the film does succeed in doing, however, is creating a world in which its magnificent dragons can appear at home. They look excellent against the dark skies and black mountains produced by the computers. The cast succeeds in emitting a feeling that contributes to the reality of the dragons and the real life art direction allows for enough unity to keep the visual aspect of the film-world feeling real and complete. Despite all this, however, the film fails in evoking any real emotion from the spectator. While the physical
representations of the dragon-ruled earth are excellent, what is missing is any sense of suspense or potential variability. It is clear what will go on at each step of the story. The result is not only a predictable ending, but also a lack of realness along the way. It's disappointing to see a film go so out of its way to evoke a convincing visual world but fail to take the time to come up with a decent narrative one as well.

Fans of McConaughey will be pleased to see him show a little versatility, non fans will be pleased to hear his work here is a sharp turn away from the obnoxious southern wise ass thing he did in Ed TV, A Time to Kill and whatever else he's been in. Bale is ok, but a bit too unlikely as an action hero and the female lead. Izabella Scorupco, isn't any good. Director Rod Bowman gets a decent mark for letting the dragons be dragons and not noticeably messing the framing or cutting up too badly. On the whole what you have is a nice, mostly empty, spectacle that makes for decent entertainment and shows the possibilities inherent in new special effects technology. Unfortunately, a lot of these possibilities are made apparent by their absence from the film.

Rating 51%