ERAGON (two disc Special edition)

DVD Review by David Blackwell

DETAILS: 104 minutes, audio commentary, deleted/extended scenes, featurettes, storyboards, trailers, and more

VIDEO: 2.35:1 (Anamorphic Widescreen)

AUDIO: English 5.1 Dolby Surround, English 5.1 DTS, French 2.0, Spanish 2.0 DS

Subtitles: English, Spanish

STUDIO: 20th Century Fox/ Fox 2000

RELEASE DATE: 3-20-2007

PLOT (taken from Amazon.com description): Orphaned farm boy Eragon (Ed Speleers) destiny is sealed forever when a mystic stone chooses him for its keeper, this is no ordinary stone, this is the last surviving egg of the dragon race. Eragon is now the new Dragon Rider, the boy who will be savior to the repressed peoples of the Kingdom ruled by the wicked King Galbatorix (John Malkovich) and his evil wizard Durza (Robert Carlyle). Running, hiding and battling across the lands with his mentor Brom (Jeremy Irons) and the gracious dragon Saphira (voiced by Rachel Weisz), together, with the beautiful Princess Arya (Sienna Guillory), this Band of Brothers learn more about themselves, their responsibilities and their destinies.

ANALYSIS: ERAGON comes off like a Cliff Notes versions of THE LORD OF THE RINGS in a generic kind of way. It is an entertaining film, but sometimes the dialogue does lack something- coming off as simplistic. The beautiful scenry of Hungary leads to pleny of fantastic cinematography. The cast does pull off their roles well (I do love Jeremy irons and Robetr Carlyle in this), but I wish ERAGON was a half hour longer and more fleshed out. Due to poor US box office returns, I wonder if THE ELDEST (the second in the trilogy) will ever be adapted into a film.

SPECIAL FEATURES;

On the feature audio commentary, Director Stefen Fangmeier talks about the production and the story of ERAGON on disc 1.

Disc 2 has a map structure where you click on certain locations of Alagaesia to access different parts of the extras.

CARVAHALL

Inside The Inheritance Trilogy: The Magic of Eragon

Eldest- The First Two Chapters

DARET

The Inhabitants of Alagaesia- the director talks about the characters and the actors that play them.  Lots of images and pre-production art.

THE SPINE

Vision of Eragon: Original artwork Gallery/ Original Animatic sequence (with optional director audio commentary)

TERIM

Pronunication Guide

Original and Lost Storyboards- the lost storyboards are sequences that were dropped and never filmed.

GIL'EAD

7 Extended and Deleted scenes (with optional director audio commentary).  The director said he cut some for pacing, but I would have liked to see some left in because they had to the texture of the story that was a little missing.

HADARAC DESERT

Saphira's Animation Guide (with director audio commentary)

URU'BAEN

Eldest- Christopher Paolini Interview- skip it if you haven'rt read the second novel because the author gives many spoilers.

BEOR MOUNTAINS

Teaser and Theatrical Trailers/ Creating teh Video Game/ Fox trailers for Planet of The Apes, MGM DVDs, and Kingdom Of Heaven

FARTHEN DUR

19 Special Efffects featurettes about how they created the special effects in the film.

FINAL ANALYSIS: ERAGON is a generic fantasy film that is good for 90 minutes of entertainment only to be forgotten soon after. The extras make the SE worth owing if you liked the film and are a fan of the books.

this review is (c)3-20-2007 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission (except for excerpts and a link to the review). Look for additional content at http://enterlinemedia.livejournal.com and send all comments to lord_pragmagtic@hotmail.com