And more to its credit, the action sets this film apart. Reign of Fire is a well-paced film a product of excellent editing and a tight, salient script. Should he stay out and continue to live vicariously, or should he risk the lives of his people and support Van Zan's dragon-elimination plan? For Quinn, the warning lights go off, and it's Proceed With Caution. Van Zan has successfully killed a dragon, and he has a plan to take out more, but they'll need Quinn's people to help get the plan into action. And Quinn meets a real American Psycho: Denton Van Zan (played by Matthew McConaughey), or just Van Zan – first names aren't entirely necessary in the codex of action films – and a level-headed (and beguiling) helicopter pilot, Alexandra (played by Izabella Scorupco). One day, out of the blue, a band of Americans show up, with tanks, helicopters and whatnot in tow. And the question of risk arrives at their heavily-armored doorstep. Humans don't, unless those who are left are willing to take a risk. (It's ironic how, in this future, the original use of such a fortress comes back into play.) Survival is possible, but prosperity? That's unlikely. And here, in Northern England, Quinn and Co.'s last line of defense is an old mountain-side castle, which they've retrofitted for battle, or really, defense. For the most part, the world has been decimated by the marauding dragons. ![]() These CGI beasts are rendered to flesh and blood, and deliver a deluge of fire and smoke.Set about two dozen years in the future, Reign of Fire introduces us to Quinn (played by American Psycho's Christian Bale) and the ramshackle clan of survivors he has resigned to protect. But the filmmakers, led by director Rob Bowman ( The X-Files), take the audience away from the thumpy, shrieking first impression and dish a flock of dragons more stark and menacingly rancid than we've seen before, in examinable extended shots. My initial impression was the filmmakers would go with quick glimpses of the dragons, flashing them on the screen with jacked-up sound effects shaking the theater, just at the sight of one. Any species, when its back (or wing) is against the wall is prone lash out. And the second, I suppose again, was to imbue the beast, or beasts (unlike the preceding dragon films, Reign of Fire possesses flocks of fire-breathers), with black hearts and a singular need for survival. ![]() The first trick, I suppose, was to banish the thoughts of Dragonheart and Dragonslayer. The creative team behind Reign of Fire sure did connect on the subject of How to Create Convincingly Fearful Dragons.
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