mikemdp This "Lord of the rings" rip-off by mockbuster master The Asylum is a lot better than it deserves to be.Daniel Bonjour, obviously cast because he looks a lot like Frodo, plays Arkadi, a youthful adventurer who must collect a number of jewels which, when placed into an amulet that looks like it was bought at Claire's Boutique for $10.95, will for unexplained reasons give him the power to save the world from the evil of a wizard named Kirill, played by Not Ron Perlman.He's aided in his quest by two warriors: Katya, whose porn star makeup and lip gloss perfectly match her porn star acting talents, and Maxim, played by ungracefully aging Marc "Beastmaster" Singer, whom the director unwisely required to act like the child of an unholy union between Yoda and Popeye.Between the opening scenes of Not Frodo peeping at a hottie villager taking her clothes off for no good reason (Note: you don't even get a peek; don't even bother pausing or backtracking the DVD like I did) and the anticlimactic final battle between Not Frodo and Not Ron Perlman, there's in fact a charming little fantasy story going on, with some pretty location shooting and nice b-roll over mountain vistas and lush forests.The dragons are actually pretty neat looking, even though all they really do is fly around and shake their heads back and forth.All in all, "Dragonquest" comes off as a bunch of renfaire friends who got together and made their own fantasy movie, with some bargain basement CGI spliced in. On that level, it's a pleasant enough bit of fun.Don't pay full price for it; that would just be foolish. But I've seen it on Amazon for about three bucks new, paired on the same DVD with the equally workmanlike Asylum effort "Merlin: War of the Dragons." That's how to buy your bad movies, folks. Get 'em cheap, watch 'em once, sell 'em for a profit at your next garage sale."Dragonquest" isn't worth anything more than that, and doesn't aspire to be.

mergatroid-1 I enjoyed the few things I've seen Mark Singer in, unfortunately this was not one of them. He looks like he's trying to portray Popeye or something. His grizzled old warrior look just doesn't cut it.The fight scenes in this movie are the worst I have ever seen. The main female character uses two sticks as her main weapon. Too bad no one ever trained her how to use them. Whenever she fights it looks sooooo bad I want to cry. She usually ends up having them taken away from her anyway, which makes sense considering how bad she is at using them.The absolute best part that has anything to do with fighting is just before Mark Singer's character goes in to save the "kid", he pulls a few practice moves with his sword that look awesome. Most likely he remembered those moves from Beast Master because it's obvious whoever was choreographing the fights had no clue. It's also obvious the actors (and I use the term loosely) had little opportunity to practice.There are a few scenes where the movie tries to be epic with large battles, but fails miserably because the computer effects were so bad. The company that made these effects should just stop now while they're ahead, and perhaps those people working there should gain employment in the wonderful world of fast foods because their computer skills suck.The only effect even close to passable is the dragon itself. That's because in the few scenes it is in, they either take up the whole screen with it so you cannot compare it to the background, or it's flying around so fast again you cannot really compare it to anything else in the scene.This company did not have the funds to pull off a movie like this, and would have been better off to make a movie that did not require sophisticated effects because ALL of the effects in this movie FAIL.I should also mention how cliché' the story is, but you can read the other reviews for that.I'm really sorry Mark. I've enjoyed you in other productions, but this one just smells too bad.

the_gwaga_gmonk In short: Cliché story, zero character development, horrible acting, abysmal special effects, cheesy script, bad choreography, bad everything, everything, EVERYTHING.Okay, onto the specifics: First, the story. A poor farm boy (apparently orphaned) is thrown into a quest to find a set of magical stones to help defeat a big bad dragon and overthrow an evil wizard. Along the way he meets Arse-Kicking Action Girl and Wizened Old Mentor. Wizened Old Mentor ends up dying, Maybe Orphaned Farm Boy and Arse-Kicking Action Girl hook up (for no apparent reason). If it seems like there's less than zero originality there, it's because that's exactly what the film is like. Clichés can work if done right - this does not.Character development. By the end of the film, we still know absolutely nothing about the main character, or his two sidekicks. Hell, we barely know anything about the villain. And that's not even beginning on the random characters that just sort of appear for a scene or two then vanish without a trace, of which there are many.And then we get to the acting. I couldn't tell if the actor playing Maxim (Wizened Old Mentor) was intentionally trying to portray the character's eccentric-ness or something, but the amount of overacting was shocking, making me laugh even during the most dramatic of moments. And it wasn't limited to him, either. No one seemed to fit their role well, save a select few.The special effects are, quite simply, the worst I've ever seen in a movie, EVER. They make the old Godzilla movies look like Lord of the Rings. Every time the dragon appeared, I couldn't help but hear it say "I'm definitely NOT CGI". And during the war between two armies near the beginning (which, curiously, is never mentioned again...hmmm...)...this isn't even Photoshop, it's MSPaint.As a massive fan of anything dragon-related, it's been so long since I've seen a decent dragon movie. The last one I can remember was DragonHeart, released way back in 1997 (and it says something about this 2009 film when a movie twelve years ago was able to craft a realistic looking dragon who I could believe was actually up there on set with the actors, whereas this can't even make a convincing spear-through-body effect). As such, I so badly wanted to like this, I really wanted it to be something special. As it is though, it's so bad it's terrible. One to avoid at all costs.

Chris Mackey (guestar57) DRAGONQUEST Theasylum.cc"Remember Ralph Bakshi's WIZARDS ? Finally someone got near Anne McCaffrey's Dragon series of books …"The character or pedigree of Dragonquest may be suspect,But this is a fun ride on a flame-engorged dragon or one of ice !The cast is pretty terrific, Marc Singer ( Who the script was probably written for as writers were kids back when 'Beastmaster' was the 'shite),Is great as a character wizard and reminded me of 'Vaughn Bode' imp from CHEECH WIZARD.Brian Thompson,As the evil wizard and lord over Flaming Dragon( Don't Go There !) Is truly menacing and my wife thought very 'Darth Sidious aka Palpatine'from Star Wars films.Jason Connery, Was hardly on screen and seemed not committed to his role of down-trodden king.The Dragon CGI is impressive and very character-driven, Obviously a plus to goings of of the traveling trio.