A Dragon's Tale: Rob Bowman’s inferno:. Review on Reign of Fire

The casting call of Rob Bowman’s flammable, mega-project, Reign of Fire plays like the unfortunate realization of the impotency and unprofitable realm of independent films, as stars Matthew McConaughey and Christian Bale are fresh off such fulfilling, indie projects. It’s not a total sell out, because the actors have appeared in mainstream films before, but being reduced to silliness such as this can be depressing especially after enlightening little films like All the Little Animals and Frailty. The monstrous behemoth that Reign of Fire is, and the natural immediate trailer reaction, doesn’t exactly embody the idiotic ambience that this gigantic hellion may have been perceived as embodying. From any level headed reaction this advocate of CGI and chaotic brainlessness would seem a knuckleheaded summer refuge for nincompoops reveling in its “bottom of the barrel” premise and story, and for a good portion, it does. But lurking in its heart, buried under tons of leather, scales, bullet shells and fire, there’s the unrelenting feeling of certain doom and its companion, melancholy. On its fiery cusps, though, this dragon tale is a malodorous retread of Waterworld and The Road Warrior, barely slithering by on its own terms.

Splitting into two opposable forces, Reign of Fire becomes an oafish maladroit as well as an entertaining, quasi-sci-fi actioner. Its disposable entertainment for undemanding viewers, bathing in its X-Files style of supernatural importance, that’s actually of very little importance. In the tradition of the aforementioned inspirers, Reign of Fire slashes and burns through futuristic precognition visions, and as near half-heartedly as so many have done before. Yet again our inevitable aftertime of definite chaos is skewed to represent the post-apocalyptic, stripped of any realism, while its surrealistic presence is heightened by a formidable foe or authority. Reign of Fire takes a grim walk down the road of enormous foe against man, a conjured but familiar being, too implausible to be taken truly seriously. Nevertheless this outlandish struggle is fairly well captured by Bowman and a usual, anti-intellectual sense of explanations/thrills.

Like the twisted, wasteland, futuristic productions before it, Reign of Fire supposes a most inane proposition for the future, as its main point is to serve as an action film. But interestingly enough, this film doesn’t enforce its idea as any daunting or outrageous formulation with a self-indulgent glory, only subtly exacts the notion as a grim but joyously nihilistic outlook. While Reign of Fire is far from a passion piece or anything resembling intellect, it welters in a dank saturation with a most interesting appeal. And still beneath any kind of sordid business Reign of Fire is, keeping within its constraints as a blundering PG-13 adventure, as its packaged ambiguity and indolence ensues.

As an eager pack of writing neophytes envision the future, the world is a depressed and roaming land of scattered tribes, composed of clichés, leather-clad and gun-toting alike, fearing any unfamiliar face. As the film opens in 2008 a young boy wanders through the mines of England, in search of his mother at work, but why the lad is allowed to enter such a place is a mystery. He discovers some sort of strange, reptilian-scale composition lining the cavern walls, out of which leaps a massive head spewing a stinging substance into his face. The boy realizes it’s a beast and makes a run for it, and it soon reveals itself with a flood of fire, to be a sort of mythical dragon long in hibernation. The dragon runs rampant over the cities and spawns other dragons, or perhaps they were merely awakened, and the world goes to a chaotic hell over the next decade.

The boy is now a man, called Quinn (the great Christian Bale), who leads his band of not-so-merry English men in an unending battle for survival under the widespread terror of the soaring and fire-dealing dragons. Enter a squad of American dragon hunters, led by bald-headed grizzly Van Zan (McConaughey), who arrive at Quinn’s compound in search of willing men to aid their cause of ending the dragon’s terrible reign. Quinn and Van Zan clash as hard-headed martinets usually do, but they soon discover that working together is the way to go in this apocalyptic battle.

Dripping with camp value to spare, Reign of Fire is the quintessence of summer blockbusters that actually contain some minute fun. It can’t begin to comprehend any of the logic, which it expels and welcomes at the same time, although this is firmly expected. Twisting its logic into vague and ambiguous forms, the film contains little sense, with an unsatisfying offering of insubstantial explanations concerning its bizarre actions and purposes of the dragons. The mere fact that the dragons possess a mouth pore which leaks of flammable secretions is the only explanation for their fire-producing capabilities, and the idea that they feed on ash is utterly ridiculous. Meanwhile their entire species seems to have spawned entirely from one male dragon as the rest are female whose eggs are fertilized by this domineering male, “like fish”. Thus, by exterminating this male the entire world will be rid of dragons, that is of course until the billions of current female ones are dead, but then again the film doesn’t really take that into account.

The complaints against this pea-brained juggernaut withstanding, Reign of Fire is not without its fun and undeniably amazing, virtuosic style. Apocryphal post-apocalyptic tales are naturally begotten by an absurdity but the premise is to merely serve as a canvas for enthralling and master visual work. And oh how Reign of Fire is an amorphous but vibrant scene of apocalyptic elements with an elegant composition of muscles, filth and brimstone. But ardently this beastly special effects zealot conforms to conventional elements, thrills and storytelling methods and causes the film a small lack of depth and enjoyment. Despite one’s original perception, the film isn’t really a dragon-infested thrill fest, as the dragon’s screen time is quite limited. Rather, it’s more of a simple study of a post-modern society, a little smarter and more serious than utterly laughable flops like Waterworld and The Postman. However, basking in this visceral, mundane inferno, and looking passed its simplicity, Reign of Fire can be a roaring and bloody fun time.