Reign of Fire (2002)
Review by Dindrane
Film:
DVD:

Written by Gregg Chabot, Kevin Peterka, and Matt Greenberg
Directed by Rob Bowman
Starring Matthew McConaughey, Christian Bale, Gerard Butler, Izabella Scorupco, Scott Moutter
Cinematography by Adrian Biddle

Features:

• “Breathing Life Into the Terror” featurette
  
• “If You Can’t Stand the Heat” pyrotechnics featurette
  
• Conversations with the director
  
• Trailers
  

Rating: PG-13

Anamorphic: Yes

My Advice: Rent it.

Reign of Fire is set in the near future, beginning with 12-year-old Quinn and his mother, the chief of a London Underground crew. When the tunneling uncovers the first dragon, Quinn’s mother is killed, and the world is set on a course for destruction. Soon, there are literally thousands of dragons all across the world, swarming like locusts, and since they eat ash, they have burned and destroyed almost everything above ground. Quinn, now 32 (and played by Bale), leads a small group of humans eking out a survival based in an English castle. Soon, a motley band of American militia appears, led by the enigmatic and haunted Van Zan (McConaughey), and including the beautiful Alex (Scorupco), who happens to pilot an Apache helicopter. Van Zan has a plan to take down the dragons forever, but will it be successful? And what will be the cost?

The acting is quite good, unexpectedly good for an action flick. You will love to hate McConaughey as the bastard American militia leader Van Zan, and Christian Bale as Quinn is simply phenomenal. There is real spark between these two, and they way their characters dance and fence is fascinating and very true. The secondary cast is similarly solid, especially Gerard Butler as Creedy, the second in command to Quinn. I could only wish that pilot Alex (former model and Bond Girl Scorupco) had more purpose in the plot than being the love interest for Quinn, though I will say that the relationship between Alex and Quinn is understated; for once, a silly female doesn’t choose to bear her heaving breasts to the Handsome Hero in the middle of a battle. Because the film is not non-stop action, you have to have a cast capable of thought. Luckily, they did.

I didn’t know how I was going to feel about this film, as I am a fan of dragons in general and didn’t want to see yet another film where they were slavering bad guys. The mythology of the dragons, however, is rather creative and handled well enough that I just pretended they were mere dinosaurs and got over it. I’m not quite sure why the dragons here eat ash--that strikes me as odd--but the film also has an explanation for how they breathe fire, how they breed, and more, and what strikes me as particularly interesting, these revelations come out in the natural course of the film and character interaction. There is no obvious Exposition Moment where all these things are revealed in some stilted, false way.

Another very nicely done point is the cinematography early in the film. The twenty years between Quinn as 12 and Quinn as 32 are done with a voiceover, as the character is writing down his wisdom in a journal. This is overcut with scenes of world-wide destruction, newspaper/magazine headlines, and other things that illustrate what the narrator is saying. The effect is a bit dizzying, but clearly shows what the characters are facing and that the world is nothing like we know it today. We also get a bit of the backstory and set-up without having to contrive some reason for the characters to reveal it in casual conversation.

There are a few particularly nice moments in the film that separate it from traditional, brainless action movie; for example, there is a scene where Quinn and Creedy are telling a bedtime story to the castle’s children, the White Knight vs. the Black Knight, in a scene essentially stolen from The Empire Strikes Back, but the way it’s done is humorous and clever.

So what’s the problem with this film? You know, I’m tempted to say the director, even though he did so many other things very well. The filming is wonderful, but the cuts are done so drastically and heavy-handedly that a few scenes here and there seem to be pregnant with meaning--and yet don’t make a whole lot of sense. For example, early in the film, a couple of fire-proofed ATVs full of humans are fighting off a dragon in a field of food. For some reason, everyone is screaming at Quinn for no apparent reason and grabbing onto him, and Quinn throws the truck into reverse, smashing into the ATV behind him, drives backwards for a short distance, then forward again and races away. Why? We don’t know. This one inexplicable scene is a minor issue, but there are three or four other similar instances where viewers are left wondering if they’ve missed something. There are also a couple of plot elements that are left a bit dangling or too-hastily tied up, such as the egg Quinn finds. Basically, this movie seriously seemed to need at least another half hour to tell its story, and at a mere 102 minutes as is, they could have left less on the cutting room floor. I found myself over and over wishing for a novel version to fill in the blanks.

The extras are quite nice. There is a making-of featurette, and another featurette on the pyrotechnics. Both are interesting and will captivate general fans of the film or tech-savvy viewers. There are also a brace of interviews with the director, where he talks about what it was like to make the film and why he made some of the choices he did. None of this will alleviate any reservations viewers may have about the film, but it’s good to get his side of the story and interesting to boot.

In short, if you’re in the mood for a pretty action film with some creativity and beauty, then check this one out. There’s plenty to think about here, and you will actually like and care about most of the characters. There are a few holes or at least vagaries about the plot (Why are the food fields so far from the keep? And why haven’t they built tunnels to reach them? And why not take the fire-proof ATV to harvest the food, while wearing their firesuits? Are dragons immune to SAMs, or what?), but the balance of the film is solid enough, and the acting is just so good, that you will want to see this anyway, at least once. Give the post-apocalyptic medievalism a chance.