Monday, April 12, 2010

This "Dragon" Truly Takes Flight

Dragpm Scales seemed to be particularly appropriate for a review of a movie about dragons--even though the lead dragon wasn't green!  Today's explanation is short and sweet so on with the review!
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Is How To Train Your Dragon the best animated movie ever made?  Not quite: Beauty And The Beast and Up! both have better stories.  Still, "Dragon" is right up there: yeah, you can pretty mcuh figure out how the movie is going to go from the opening narration.  Hiccup (voiced by Jay Baruchel) doesn't fit in with the other Vikings in his village.  He's skinny, weak and uncoordinated and a real embarassment to his father Stoick (voice of Gerrard Butler--who actually gets to use his own accent for once).  Hiccup is a thinker rather than a brawler and when a device he builds actually brings down one of the dragons that plagues his village, he begins a quest to understand the creatures that plague his homeland.  Does he succeed and win the love of village hottie (voiced by America Ferrera) and gain the respect and love of his fatehr?  I'll bet you already know.
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How To Train Your Dragon is spectacularly rendered.  The combination of realistic and fantastic work together in perfect harmony.  The dragon flights and fight sequences are the best I've seen in ANY movie--animated or live action.  Robyn and I saw it in 2D but wished we'd spent the extra cash to see the 3D version.  (Of course a friend of mine told me the 3D FX were added after the fact so it might not have added that much: still, we both liked the movie well enough we may go check it our in 3D).  The voice casting was excellent although I did wonder why so many of the Actors had Scots accents instead of Scandanavian.  Still, that quibble is minor and it didn't detract from my enjoyment of the movie as a whole.
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Robyn and I liked How To Train Your Dragon so much we're actually considering going to see it a second time--something we haven't done since the Star Trek reboot.  The film has something for the entire family: parents and children can find something to enjoy here.  I'm sure you'll fidn it well worth the trip to the theater.  Yes, the script lacked originality but so what?  The movie still worked and was a top-notch effort.
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FINAL GRADE: A

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