newly ancient

Dragons and popular cliché engaged in an epic struggle for dominance of Eragon. The story began with a supposedly 17-year-old boy who looked 26 finding an egg in the wilderness which soon hatches into a cute dragon. Is it just me or are dragons not supposed to elicit coos of love from half the audience? Well, that problem is easily solved as the dragon becomes a giant beast within seconds (don’t ask me how). This duo then meets a strange old man and travels around the country for no apparent reason. All the time they are observed by evil creatures of immeasurable power who for some reason decide to attack innocent taxpayers instead of these rogue rebels. Somehow, this unlikely trio rescues an oval-eared elf from a highly protected fortress in the middle of nowhere. Along the way, they pick up a decidedly evil-looking companion and bring him directly to a secret, rebel stronghold deep in some far-too-short mountains. Once they are there, they are escorted around a rotting, wooden city by gold suited guards. Then along comes a huge host of monsters and men who are easily defeated by a single dragon. Eragon then kills a shade in an amazingly timed and accurate acrobatic move which Olympic gymnasts would have trouble completing, let alone a huge dragon. Overall, the movie does a poor job of following the book by adding useless parts, removing some of the greatest scenes, and creating a highly unbelievable setting.

In the movie Eragon, a mediocre piece of high fantasy was transformed into a poorly presented mainstream movie. Besides the dialogue being overly dramatic, the setting was totally unbelievable. From machine made leather vests to gold suits in a tumbledown city, the filmmakers failed to grasp the essence of the story and create a believable setting. From the very beginning, I did not like the way they portrayed the dragon, Saphira. She is supposed to be a menacing giant, not a cute creature. Even when newly born, she is supposed to be pathetic – not cute. At some parts, I wondered if they even read the book at all. For instance, Darat is supposed to be a bustling city filled with people and surrounded by high fortifications. In the movie it was portrayed as a spooky ghost-town. The rebel stronghold is also poorly constructed. It is supposed to be a glorious marble city filled with gems and such finery. Instead it is made to look like some refugee camp in Africa – besides the fact that all the soldiers wear suits of gold. The cinematic presentation of Eragon was poor and diverged greatly from the book.

Eragon borrows strongly upon classic themes of high fantasy. It is very similar to The Lord of the Rings but with less vivid settings and characters. The character of Eragon is the classic protagonist. He is a white, egocentric, orphaned teen. If we were to go by the ideas of high fantasy, every teenage orphan in the world would be doing great things rather than sitting on the street, smoking. Christopher Paolini expertly cooked up a protagonist by following the recipe exactly. With a healthy portion of courage, a cup of tragedy, a few cubes of stubbornness, and a sprinkling of idiocy, he created a character that readers can alternately laugh at and admire. Of course, the filmmakers being the horrible chefs they are, they took this semi-believable character and dumped on idiocy, pop culture, and a machine made vest. Eragon fulfills the classic definition of a high fantasy protagonist perfectly but Eragon creates a weird hybrid between modern 20-somethings and 13th century knights.