Dragonslayer (1981)
A King has made a pact with a dragon where he sacrfices virgins to it, and the dragon leaves his kingdom alone. An old wizard, and his keen young apprentice volunteer to kill the dragon and attempt to save the next virgin in line - the Kings own daughter.
Peter MacNicol ... Galen
Caitlin Clarke ... Valerian
Ralph Richardson ... Ulrich
John Hallam ... Tyrian
Peter Eyre ... Casiodorus Rex
Albert Salmi ... Greil
Sydney Bromley ... Hodge
Chloe Salaman ... Princess Elspeth
Emrys James ... Valerian's Father
Roger Kemp ... Horsrik
Ian McDiarmid ... Brother Jacopus
Ken Shorter ... Henchman
Jason White ... Henchman
Yolanda Palfrey ... Victim
Douglas Cooper ... Urlander
Director: Matthew Robbins
Runtime: 108 mins
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082288/
Codecs:
Video : 613 MB, 816 Kbps, 25.0 fps, 624*256 (2.43:1), XVID = XVID Mpeg-4,
Audio : 87 MB, 115 Kbps, 48000 Hz, 2 channels, 0x55 = Lame MP3, CBR,
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This movie benefits from an interesting plot, a wonderful female character played by Caitlin Clarke, and good plot twists. I'm not a big fan of the male lead; his looks are a little average and uninteresting to me. The only other drawback are the ugly hats characters wear in this film. However, what makes this movie unique are its visuals, which through creativity and hard work, outshines many fantasy movies of the 90's and early 2000's.
This film proves that it doesn't need 21st century technology to make a beautiful and visually complex piece. As I watched the dragon, it was easy to tell that it was not real; it had flaws in its appearance and its movements were not perfect. But that did not detract at all from the film, because what made the dragon impressive was the artistic elements of its design; its many layers of thin, translucent membrane, its finely chiseled and formed teeth, and the almost charcoal-like, tough scales on its hide. In many modern fantasy movies, the creatures and dragons are uninspired, dull, and drab, despite the computer engineering behind them. In the 80's, directors had to be creative to produce their desired effect, and this creativity went a long way in producing visuals that both wowed audiences with their appearance and the thought of the work that went into making them.
"Dragonslayer" wastes little time, giving a good showcase for a mostly British cast and offering some mild scares and thrills. It's a competently made production with some good sets and a fair amount of atmosphere. Special effects are decent but not spectacular. This was a co-production between Paramount Pictures and the Walt Disney company, so it isn't overtly adult-oriented, but take note it IS rated PG, not G. I guess it could scare some younger children. Overall, I found that I rather enjoyed it, although I didn't find it particularly memorable.
Look for Ian McDiarmid in one of his earliest film roles as "Brother Jacobus", who doesn't last long.
While by no means a great film, suffering as it does from wooden acting and some pretty annoying music, Dragonslayer is somewhat better than the rest of the early 80's sword and sorcery films and for fans of the fantasy genre is worth watching for several reasons.
Firstly, the look of the film is very close to the Lord of the Rings trilogy - a dirt-under-the-fingernails, earthy realism combining costume and set design which looks like it could have existed in the sixth century with sweeping shots of the Welsh and Scottish locations where the film was shot. Curly haired Peter MacNicol even looks like a Hobbit! This is all a world away from the muscular heroes, scantily clad damsels in distress and fake looking weapons and armour in most fantasy films of the time, and interestingly foreshadows the look of Peter Jackson's trilogy. As an example of this, if you can find it, check out the mocked up trailer for a supposed Peter Jackson production of The Hobbit which has been floating around on the net - it's interesting to note how well the shots from Dragonslayer used in the trailer fit in with the footage from The Fellowship of the Ring.
(As an aside, the other film which Dragonslayer reminded me of was, bizarrely, Monty Python and the Holy Grail - the title sequence and plinky plonky music could almost have been lifted directly from Holy Grail, and the shots at the end with Ralph Richardson standing on top of the mountain are almost laughably close to the Tim the Enchanter scenes, probably due to very similar locations being used in both films, both being shot on the Isle of Skye in Scotland.)
Secondly, the film explores some interesting themes, principally the spread of Christianity in sixth century Britain and the consequent decline of the old pagan ways, represented by magic, and for that matter, dragons. The fact that to destroy Vermithrax the source of magic in the film must also be destroyed is quite a clever metaphor for the changes of the times the film is set in. This is very similar to some of the underlying themes in Arthurian legend, so fans of Excalibur may want to check out Dragonslayer for this reason.
Lastly, an honorable mention must go to Phil Tippets wonderful, stop motion dragon effects, which still look great today - again, they don't look at all out of place on The Hobbit trailer. It's easy to see why ILM was nominated for a special effects oscar in 1982 for Dragonslayer. Anyone bored with modern CGI should check this out - I can't help but wish that ILM had gone back to these kind of effects for at least some of the special effects shots in the Star Wars prequels.
Ultimately, Dragonslayer was a brave attempt to do a realistic fantasy movie, being set as it is in the real world and concentrating on character development for long periods of the film (the dragon hardly features in the first hour). However, it doesn't quite succeed, mainly due to wooden acting, the wonderful John Hallam excepted, and somewhat unengaging direction. Also, the ridiculously jaunty music at the end is completely at odds with the tone of the rest of the movie. Still worth checking out for fans of fantasy films though.
* To create the dragon fire, the FX team used a pair of military-style flamethrowers.
* The entire movie was filmed in natural light.
* The dragon in the movie actually has a name, called by its full name by the sorcerer Ulrich, and by its first name by King Casiodorus Rex and by Galen: Vermithrax Pejorative.
* First film to use go-motion, a variant of stop-motion animation in which parts of the model (in this case, the dragon) were mechanized and the movement programmed by computer. During shooting, the computer moves the model while the camera is shooting, resulting in motion blur, which makes the animation more convincing.
NiegodziweLicho