How to Train Your Dragon (DVD/Blu-Ray) -- Dir. Dean DeBlois, Chris Sanders. Starring Jay Baruchel, Gerard Butler, Craig Ferguson.
One of the better animated films of the past decade, but contains little practical advice on dragon training.
How to Train Your Dragon is set in a Viking settlement in a mystical land: mystical because the adults all speak with Scottish accents while the children all speak with American accents, and also because it's under constant attack by dragons. Our hero, a boy by the name of Hiccup who doesn't fit into the village's warrior culture, accidentally befriends one of the dragons he has been raised to hate.
Directors Dean DeBlois and Chris Sanders last collaborated on Disney's Lilo & Stitch, which touched on a lot of the same themes. HtTYD is kind of like what L&S would have been if Stitch had kept his annoying little mouth shut.
This DreamWorks production doesn't hit the emotional highs and lows of the typical Pixar film, but it's nevertheless an example of a cohesive, well-structured story that stays entertaining from beginning to end. Most "grown up" films could learn a lot.
The cast of characters is colorful without being grating. Lo and behold, the female lead even has a personality. And Hiccup's catlike pet dragon successfully endears itself to the viewer without the use of words, thanks to some quality computer animation.
HtTYD is mature enough to put characters in opposition to the protagonist without turning them into villains. For the most part, this is a story about a boy at odds with the mores of a society that means well.
That does eventually change late in the film, when we get a more simplistic, identifiable enemy. It could be called a flaw in the movie, but I suppose some concessions have to be made for kid-friendly storytelling.
Note that kids will likely come out of the film wanting a pet dragon of their own. Be prepared to remind them that this is a big responsibility.
Rated PG for less-violent-than-usual Vikings.
4 out of 5
Leaves of Grass (DVD/Blu-Ray) -- Dir. Tim Blake Nelson. Starring Edward Norton, Keri Russell, Tim Blake Nelson.
A 105-minute excuse to show off Edward Norton's versatility.
Norton plays twin brothers from Oklahoma. One ditched his accent and escaped his swamp-water upbringing to become a respected Ivy League professor; the other, who we'll call "Billy-Bob Norton,"
stayed at home as a small-time redneck drug dealer. Billy-Bob tricks his brother into returning home to impersonate him in a drug-related scheme.
Despite its premise, comedy elements in Leaves of Grass are minimal. This is more of a drama that doesn't always take itself seriously.
What humor there is relies on the usual southern stereotypes, but it's nice to see that Billy-Bob Norton is more complex than the usual redneck caricature. He's as sharp as his brother, but chooses a less conventional career path.
But when a character tells Intellectual Norton "You're not as smart as you think you are," she might have been addressing the movie as a whole. Writer/director/co-star Tim Blake Nelson packs his original script with poetry and philosophy references that prove he knows his way around a university curriculum, but don't hide the movie's failings. The story stalls during its first half and flails around hopelessly in the second, never adequately resolving its plot threads or getting across any kind of point.
Most of the value of Leaves of Grass comes from watching Edward Norton ably play dual roles, but that's hardly anything new.
Susan Sarandon and Richard Dreyfuss have small parts, if you're into that sort of thing.
Rated R for violence against Edward Nortons.
3 out of 5
