Movie Review by Nigel A. Messenger
Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Christian Bale, Izabella Scorupco, Gerard Butler
Director: Rob Bowman
Dragons have destroyed civilisation and what they didn’t wipe out the military flattened with nuclear weapons trying to kill the dragons. Dragons? Yes that’s right – fire-breathing, flying dragons, the mythical type! Their eggs were found underground, they hatched, they bred, they torched everything.
Quinn (Christian Bale) is the leader of a surviving settlement who live in a ruined castle trying to get by. Denton Van Zan (Matthew McConaughey) arrives one day with is pseudo-military group, which includes some tanks and a helicopter plus a gorgeous female pilot Alex, played by Izabella Scorupco. Denton Van Zan is a dragon slayer and after an unsuccessful raid on the chief dragon’s lair in London, Quinn joins him in a final showdown with the beast, a male, all the rest are females, so kill the only male and you wipe the species out – pity the military didn’t think of that before they nuked the world.
Does all this sound slightly unbelievable? It might be, but it’s very well filmed with generally good acting from most of the cast so it’s not quite laughable…except in parts. Matthew McConaughey is wooden and looks as if he’s in pain trying not to yell, which may not be too surprising as a lot of the script wouldn’t have been out of place in an episode of the TELETUBBIES. The thing is this film sits right on the edge of being a decent fantasy horror movie and a complete turkey. It just trips itself up time and time again. The storyline has tons of holes in it and the script needs to be sharpened up…a lot.
On the other hand the dragon effects are amazing but even this can’t save the movie. It’s fill of cliches, corny dialogue and giant leaps of faith for the audience.
This could have really been a good horror picture but it just doesn’t deliver on too many levels.
This really only deserves 
but I’m giving it 2 because it tries so hard, the dragon effects are excellent and Izabella Scorupco is hotter than the dragon’s breath.
