DRAGONLANCE: DRAGONS OF AUTUMN TWILIGHT.
July 14th 2008 00:04
Category: Videos
Based on the original novel by Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman.
Director: Will Meugniot.
Written by: George Strayton.
Producers: Arthur I Cohen & Steve Stabler.
Starring: Lucy Lawless (Goldmoon), Kiefer Sutherland (Raistlin Majere), Michael Rosenbaum (Tanis Half Elven), Michelle Trachtenberg (Tika), Rino Romano (Caramon Majere), Marc Worden (Sturm Brightblade), Phil LaMaar (Riverwind/Gilthanas), Fred Tatasciore (Flint Fireforge) & Caroline Gelabert (Laurana).
Produced by: Paramount & Wizards of the Coast.
Released by: Paramount Home Entertainment.
Running Time: 91 minutes. Rating: PG.
Years ago back in the halcyon days of my youth, long before I had ever heard of the internet or things like manga and anime there was this tabletop role-playing game called Dungeons and Dragons which to my knowledge is still going around even in this day of high tech gizmos and wonders and the internet. Back then in this dim almost hazy past Dungeons & Dragons was produced by a company called TSR based out of some little place in Wisconsin called Lake Geneva and somehow they managed to bring out a New York Times bestselling trilogy of fantasy novels called the Dragonlance Chronicle, if memory serves me correctly. These novels were based on a series of adventure modules that TSR had produced for its Dungeons & Dragons game set on a world that, at the time, was completely new and strange to most Dungeons & Dragons gamers many of whom were used to running around in their own cobbled together fantasy realms of the World of Greyhawk which was the TSR produced setting for a wide variety of its previous game products.
I really enjoyed these novels and their setting, although at times I felt that the character of Tanis Half Elven was a bit of a drama queen in regards to his constant struggles over his mixed heritage and trying to work out whether he loved a female human mercenary or a beautiful Elven princess. Friends often agreed with me in my remarks that the Dragonlance Chronicles strayed into the daytime soap opera territory with this particular angle. Still despite this particular hick up Weis and Hickman did create a thoroughly enjoyable work, one that even now is still continuing on to this very day with the recent release of the Lost Chronicles and Margaret Weis’ own efforts; the Amber series of novels which are set in the same world as the Dragonlance stories.
So the other day as I was perusing what was on offer at the local video store and I happened to come across a movie version of the Dragonlance Chronicles there was no hesitation, swiftly it was rented from the young women behind the counter (along with a few other movies) and carried home to be watched. It’s interesting to note that the makers of this film opted to go the animated route, especially when you consider how well a truly epic fantasy film can be done what with the efforts of Peter Jackson and Wingnut Films blazing the way with the LOTR trilogy. What’s even stranger is the particular format that the makers have opted to use in producing this feature, but more of that later on down the track.
For those of you who are completely unfamiliar with the whole Dragonlance shtick, essentially it is the heroes journey writ large on the silver screen, a group of life long friends who all grew up in the same community are joined by two others and they embark upon a quest to save their world; Krynn, from the forces of darkness lead by the Queen of Evil Dragons, Takhisis. Now the drama opens on Krynn three hundred odd years after a major disaster known as the Cataclysm, when the gods cast a vast fiery mountain (read meteorite for the more ‘scientifically’ minded) onto the continent of Ansalon in response to the arrogance of mortal beings. Since that day when the fiery mountain struck the mighty city of Istar the gods have no longer bequeathed their gifts on mortals nor are their any of their priests still remaining in the world, all knowledge of their ways and rituals has been effectively lost.
In the minds of the peoples of Ansalon the gods had turned their back on them in their greatest hour of need and it seemed that this was something that would last for good. Enter the companions of the Last Inn situated in the community of Solace. Five years before the events of the film each member of the companions took an oath to journey in search of any sign of the true gods along with undertaking quest of various personal natures. Tanis Half Elven now walks down the road to his former home seeking to be reunited with his former comrades after his five years of wandering the lands in search of what seems like to be a futile cause. What he doesn’t realise is that the gods, in particular Takhisis, Queen of Evil Dragons, have already started manifesting in the world and as she has always done since time immemorial she is laying down the foundations for her eventual conquest of Krynn. Tanis and most of his cohorts still don’t cotton on to the fact that a fair few things that begin to happen to them are very much signs that the gods are alive, well and meddling in the affairs of the mortal realm in a big way. Still some people have to be slapped in the face with a wet fish before they’ll wake up to anything and this seems to be the case with Tanis and some of his friends.
In making this feature I don’t precisely understand exactly what Paramount and Wizards of the Coast were hoping to achieve, no doubt there was a monetary rationale but as far as production values go it was rather unusual, almost as if they were hoping to create a blockbuster from a sow’s ear so to speak. Sitting in my room watching the drama unfold I felt that the use of traditional cartoon style animation and computer graphics just didn’t mix; at all. In fact they just made everything seem rather stilted and contrived. Then there was the fact they tried to condense the drama of a three hundred plus pages novel into an hour and a half, for my thinking it just didn’t work and don’t get me started on the lame fight scenes. This really was a budget production and it shows, frankly if they wanted an animated Dragonlance maybe they should have sold the rights to Production IG or Studio Ghibli or any other major Japanese animation company; they would have got a better film for their money. In the end it was rather a shame really, after all the Dragonlance novels were enjoyable and entertaining works of fiction, this film just didn’t do them any justice on the silver screen.
In fact I’d have to go so far as to say that you’d be better off getting a hold of the original three novels and giving them a read, it would be more entertaining…
Director: Will Meugniot.
Written by: George Strayton.
Producers: Arthur I Cohen & Steve Stabler.
Starring: Lucy Lawless (Goldmoon), Kiefer Sutherland (Raistlin Majere), Michael Rosenbaum (Tanis Half Elven), Michelle Trachtenberg (Tika), Rino Romano (Caramon Majere), Marc Worden (Sturm Brightblade), Phil LaMaar (Riverwind/Gilthanas), Fred Tatasciore (Flint Fireforge) & Caroline Gelabert (Laurana).
Produced by: Paramount & Wizards of the Coast.
Released by: Paramount Home Entertainment.
Running Time: 91 minutes. Rating: PG.
Years ago back in the halcyon days of my youth, long before I had ever heard of the internet or things like manga and anime there was this tabletop role-playing game called Dungeons and Dragons which to my knowledge is still going around even in this day of high tech gizmos and wonders and the internet. Back then in this dim almost hazy past Dungeons & Dragons was produced by a company called TSR based out of some little place in Wisconsin called Lake Geneva and somehow they managed to bring out a New York Times bestselling trilogy of fantasy novels called the Dragonlance Chronicle, if memory serves me correctly. These novels were based on a series of adventure modules that TSR had produced for its Dungeons & Dragons game set on a world that, at the time, was completely new and strange to most Dungeons & Dragons gamers many of whom were used to running around in their own cobbled together fantasy realms of the World of Greyhawk which was the TSR produced setting for a wide variety of its previous game products.
I really enjoyed these novels and their setting, although at times I felt that the character of Tanis Half Elven was a bit of a drama queen in regards to his constant struggles over his mixed heritage and trying to work out whether he loved a female human mercenary or a beautiful Elven princess. Friends often agreed with me in my remarks that the Dragonlance Chronicles strayed into the daytime soap opera territory with this particular angle. Still despite this particular hick up Weis and Hickman did create a thoroughly enjoyable work, one that even now is still continuing on to this very day with the recent release of the Lost Chronicles and Margaret Weis’ own efforts; the Amber series of novels which are set in the same world as the Dragonlance stories.
For those of you who are completely unfamiliar with the whole Dragonlance shtick, essentially it is the heroes journey writ large on the silver screen, a group of life long friends who all grew up in the same community are joined by two others and they embark upon a quest to save their world; Krynn, from the forces of darkness lead by the Queen of Evil Dragons, Takhisis. Now the drama opens on Krynn three hundred odd years after a major disaster known as the Cataclysm, when the gods cast a vast fiery mountain (read meteorite for the more ‘scientifically’ minded) onto the continent of Ansalon in response to the arrogance of mortal beings. Since that day when the fiery mountain struck the mighty city of Istar the gods have no longer bequeathed their gifts on mortals nor are their any of their priests still remaining in the world, all knowledge of their ways and rituals has been effectively lost.
In the minds of the peoples of Ansalon the gods had turned their back on them in their greatest hour of need and it seemed that this was something that would last for good. Enter the companions of the Last Inn situated in the community of Solace. Five years before the events of the film each member of the companions took an oath to journey in search of any sign of the true gods along with undertaking quest of various personal natures. Tanis Half Elven now walks down the road to his former home seeking to be reunited with his former comrades after his five years of wandering the lands in search of what seems like to be a futile cause. What he doesn’t realise is that the gods, in particular Takhisis, Queen of Evil Dragons, have already started manifesting in the world and as she has always done since time immemorial she is laying down the foundations for her eventual conquest of Krynn. Tanis and most of his cohorts still don’t cotton on to the fact that a fair few things that begin to happen to them are very much signs that the gods are alive, well and meddling in the affairs of the mortal realm in a big way. Still some people have to be slapped in the face with a wet fish before they’ll wake up to anything and this seems to be the case with Tanis and some of his friends.
In making this feature I don’t precisely understand exactly what Paramount and Wizards of the Coast were hoping to achieve, no doubt there was a monetary rationale but as far as production values go it was rather unusual, almost as if they were hoping to create a blockbuster from a sow’s ear so to speak. Sitting in my room watching the drama unfold I felt that the use of traditional cartoon style animation and computer graphics just didn’t mix; at all. In fact they just made everything seem rather stilted and contrived. Then there was the fact they tried to condense the drama of a three hundred plus pages novel into an hour and a half, for my thinking it just didn’t work and don’t get me started on the lame fight scenes. This really was a budget production and it shows, frankly if they wanted an animated Dragonlance maybe they should have sold the rights to Production IG or Studio Ghibli or any other major Japanese animation company; they would have got a better film for their money. In the end it was rather a shame really, after all the Dragonlance novels were enjoyable and entertaining works of fiction, this film just didn’t do them any justice on the silver screen.
In fact I’d have to go so far as to say that you’d be better off getting a hold of the original three novels and giving them a read, it would be more entertaining…
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