Movie Review
Dragon Wars: D-War
Posted by Kevin Carr (kevin@filmschoolrejects.com) on September 14, 2007
Before paying my theater admission and checking out D-War: Dragon Wars on the big screen, I had heard some unsettling rumors. The one that rattled me the most was that writer/director Hyung-rae Shim has been called the Uwe Boll of South Korea.
That bothered me because I have to admit the trailer to D-War: Dragon Wars looked pretty doggoned cool. After enjoying a resurgence of traditional monster movies like The Host, I was afraid that the slick looking action sequences from the Internet trailer were going to be humdrum on the silver screen.
I’m happy to say that after finally seeing the film in the theater that Hyung-rae Shim is far from a South Korean Uwe Boll. Boll’s films always have pretty decent production value, and are populated with surprisingly respectable actors (have you seen the cast for his upcoming In the Name of the King, which includes Claire Forlani, Ray Liotta and Leelee Sobieski). However, Boll’s movies also have some of the most incoherent scripts and worst pay-the-rent acting I’ve ever seen.
D-War isn’t a great feat in writing, or acting for that matter. The story is actually somewhat convoluted. It begins with a brief narration about how dragons come to be. Then we shift to modern-day Los Angeles where some giant creature caused untold destruction (although no one has reported what did it). Then we flash back to Korea in 1507 for a history lesson about ancient warriors trying to make a giant evil serpent a magical dragon.
All of this exposition is really unnecessary and clogs up the beginning of the film. All you really need to know is that this cult has a chance to make their giant evil serpent a dragon by having him ingest a special “chosen one†woman that is born every 500 years. Her guardian has been reincarnated as a reporter who helps this woman evade the serpent as they search for the good serpent who is meant to be the dragon.
The bottom line is that once you sweep the story out of the way, this film is filled with a nice dosage of pretty cool dragon battles.
Like this summer’s Transformers, this isn’t a film to watch for the plot, acting or character development. Where Transformers delivered on giant robots blowing crap up, D-War delivers on dragon battles. The visual effects aren’t nearly as impressive as they were in Transformers, but then again, D-War was made on a fraction of the budget.
With a relatively long running time (around 110 minutes), D-War drags a bit, especially when there are no dragons. The dialogue is excruciating. I’ve heard better lines in crummy middle school plays. And the plot is convoluted and messy, with ridiculous scenes and very little realism to support the wretched character development.
But the dragons are pretty cool. And there’s plenty of them. Fortunately for the film, at least half of its running time features dragons battle other dragons, dragons battling a woefully inept military in downtown Los Angeles or dragons chasing our protagonists. These are the highlights, strictly for the “gee whiz†value.
And while the effects aren’t perfect, they’re not bad for the big screen on such a low budget. In the end, D-War is one of those films that I would swerve into on the SciFi Channel late one night and stay up until the wee hours of the morning to watch without feeling guilty at all.
The Upside: Cool-ass dragon battles with decent visual effects.
The Downside: Some of the worst dialogue you’ll hear all year.
On the Side: I took my 4-year-old son to see it. He liked the creatures and the battles, but he got bored with the rest.
Read more articles by Kevin Carr
5 Comments
September 15th, 2007 at 12:21 am
Kevin, WTF? man. This thing is a complete joke. It makes no sense at all. You’d have to be high to enjoy something like this.
September 15th, 2007 at 7:43 pm
The Myths of the Dragon & Ryong-the Eastern dragon
The Dragons in the Beowulf or the ring of the Nibelungs look like the amplified shape of the Comodo-the gigantic lizard. On the other hand, the Ryong(龍), the Oriental dragon, has the synthetic images of the characteristic parts from the 12 other animals. For example, the face of the Ryoung can be imagined by something of the synthetic result out of the horn of a deer, the eyelids of a tiger, the nose of a pig, the tongue of a snake etc.
The most conspicious difference between the Dragon and the Ryong lies in the stomach; the one has the very large stomach, the other the slender one. I wonder What is in the gigantic stomach of the Dragon? It might be the ambition and the pioneering attitude of the Occidental peoples. On the other hand, the slender one of the Ryong has the highest and transcendent spirits of the Orientalism. As you see the synthetic shape from other 12 animals, He has the harmonious mind toward the others, and has the state of spirit from the temperance of desire and the overcome of the egos.
The Western Dragon may stand for the desire for material, power, fame and so on. So the dragon needs a big stomach-the ideal model to the extremely possessive desire of the inner part of mind. As a result, he usually lives in the dark caves or swamps. At this point, I wonder why does he live in such gloomy places like those? I think the Stoicism of the Middle Ages rendered to look down upon the desire for the material as humane. The Ryong(龍) stands for the spiritual state of what the Orient people want to be, non-possession, transcendence from worldly values. So he lives in the higher and higher blue sky and he is away from the earthly world.
Imoogie
The dragons in the western legend are not the main characters and they are doomed to be killed by the epic heroes like Beowulf or Siegfried, whereas the Ryongs in the Eastern legend are the almighty characters and the Saints who are rejoicing leisurely in the blue sky and occasionally appear in the human world to punish the evils that disorder the world. The good Imoogie in the ‘Dragon War’, are supposed to upgrade to the Ryong(龍) and has such a title role to punish the evil Braqui-the bad Imoogie.
Director Shim Hyung Rae, who is called the Korean Chalie Chaplin, has focused especially on the Korean Imoogie legend. There are a variety of versions of Imoogie legends in Korea. Mostly the legend goes as follows; a big snake about 500 year old has got to have some kind of personality or spirit and he is believed to become a Ryong-the eastern dragon. To be a Ryong, he needs 500 years of discipline and penance and eventually he needs Yeuju-the crystalloid of spirit and his long discipline. If he tries to be Ryong without them, he will surely be chastised by the wrath of The God. The Buraqi in Dragon War is the character of the bad Imoogie who wants to be a Ryong without the permission of The God. The more you come to know about the Korean Imoogie legend, the more delicately you can enjoy this film, Dragon War.
Director Shim & Young-Gu Art are making a new legend of the Asian film history by succeeding in emboding the legendary creatures into the magnificent characters on the screen with the help of the gorgeous computer graphics. If you miss this film, I’m sure you will regret for good.
– Written by Culture columnist Kim, Hui Young From bignews@bignews.co.kr
(Note) 龍 in blank is pronounced ‘Ryong’-the eastern dragon, in Chinese Letter
IF u can use a Chinese-English dictionary, U can understand what I mean.
龍顔 - the Chinese Letter means the Face of the monarch
龍布-the Chinese Letter means the costums of the monarch
September 15th, 2007 at 8:09 pm
It’s far from a bullshit monster story; a very old and old myth like that of the northern Scandnavian- the tales of God Odin- the heroes of Tors.
The Film- D-war has nothing to do with Godzilla except for quite a little similarity of genre.
Actually, Dargon War is not a Monstrous creature Film but a Fantasy Film. As a matter of fact, the Eastern Dragon-Ryoung- is a divine creature, not monstrous one!! The D-war film is based not on the just simple story, but on the long long legend. You might not know the legend, it’s true there are a variety of versions of the Imoogie legends in Korea.
In the Asian countries the ‘Ryong’-the eastern dragon- sometimes means the King. For example, they call the king’s face as the face of Ryong, the throne as the chair of the Ryong, the clothes of the King as the Ryong’s customes, etc.
September 16th, 2007 at 12:47 am
Nate,
I sat through “The Brave One,” “Good Luck Chuck” and “Mr. Woodcock” this past week. I was prepared to hate “Dragon Wars,” and while the script and acting was absolute crap, I found the dragon fighting to be a refreshing piece of escapeism.
Who knows… if I were high, maybe I would have given it an A. ;-)
K
December 4th, 2007 at 6:00 pm
Pity its not shown in my area.