Eragon is formulaic but fun, a sort of 'Lord of the Rings meets Star Wars'-- yet it could have been a great deal better, and its comparative lack of success is actually more revealing about what makes good films work than many far better films.
Any film, regardless of its genre, is trying to get the audience to see things on its (the film's) own terms. The best films succeed in doing this, getting us to believe, or at least accept, things which may, taken objectively, be quite nonsensical: consider, for example, Casablanca, with its bogus letters of transit which cannot be canceled, or Gone With the Wind, with its ludicrous portrayal of the antebellum South. Fantasy films need to work doubly hard in this regard, as few in their audience are likely to believe in dragons or magic.
So how is this conviction achieved? In large part, it is reached because everybody involved in the film takes it seriously. They may not believe the goings-on, but they act, whether on or off screen, as if they do. Assuming a certain level of technical competence in the production, the film becomes believable because we never catch anybody out of character (and sometimes even technical flaws can't sink a really good performer; think of Bela Lugosi's ability to rise above his often wretched material on the strength of utterly committed performances). This doesn't mean that a film which everyone takes seriously is flawless, but rather that we accept the flaws and dismiss them, or make allowances, because the surrounding material is so well presented.
Now turn to Eragon. Technically the film is superb; the dragon is consistently believable, and the sets and costumes have a gritty air which makes them quite plausible. But after that the film suddenly becomes very uneven, and not for budgetary reasons. A central problem is that the performances are all over the map. Jeremy Irons is understated but solid, because his quietness reflects his character's past, whereas Edward Speleers, the putative hero, never overcomes his own understatedness to really convince us he's a great hero (he's a bit like Mark Hamill in Star Wars in this regard). Robert Carlyle, as Durza the main villain, almost steals the show, especially since John Malkovich, the ostensible center of power, might as well have been sleeping as he read his lines. Rachel Weisz, the voice of the dragon, is excellent; Sienna Guillory, as the Princess Leia figure, is adequate. In other words, there appears to have been no attempt on the part of director Stefen Fangmeier to create a consistent level of performance or interaction, thus allowing it to appear that each member of the cast was largely on their own.
This problem is exacerbated by the screenplay, which seems rather a series of linked episodes than a coherent whole. It may be argued that this is because Peter Buchman chose to take the novel seriously-- but this means that he did not take the film itself seriously as a film; a film is not, and cannot be, a novel, and simply trying to cram in as many plot details from the book as possible will never do justice either to the book or to the possibilities of cinema. It is also quite derivative-- but since very few stories are truly original, this need not have been the problem it becomes.
But the worst problem is purely the director's fault. Much of Eragon looks like material drawn directly from previous fantasy films, and after a while we begin to get the feeling that this is simply an exercise in cadging a few dollars from an audience taken for granted. Nowhere is this more evident than in the end; after a considerable amount of time during which Peter Doyle's score (itself already rather derivative) has been doing its best to evoke a sense of magic and mystery and power we reach the credits, ready for a lengthy symphonic summation of what we've seen and heard. But no-- what we get instead is an utterly trivial pop tune, of no significance, no resonance, and no value. It's as if the director simply stopped caring after the last day of shooting, and it erases most of what little otherworldliness the film had managed to create.
Imagine Eragon, even with the script exactly as it is, with performances as consistent, and as good, as those in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. Would it have been as good as the latter? No-- but it would have been much better than it is. Imagine Eragon with a score as consistent, and as consistently used, as John Williams's for Star Wars. Would it have been as good as the latter? No-- but it would have been better than it is. Imagine Eragon with the courage to take the extra half hour or 45 minutes to develop its characters in the manner of Lord of the Rings. Would it have been as good as the latter? No-- but it would have been much better than it is. Now imagine Eragon with all of these consistent improvements.
In short, Eragon had the potential, only slightly beyond its own boundaries, to be a vastly better film. That it was not is disappointing, but it's also very informative to those who care about what actually makes a film good, or even great, instead of formulaic but fun.
Any film, regardless of its genre, is trying to get the audience to see things on its (the film's) own terms. The best films succeed in doing this, getting us to believe, or at least accept, things which may, taken objectively, be quite nonsensical: consider, for example, Casablanca, with its bogus letters of transit which cannot be canceled, or Gone With the Wind, with its ludicrous portrayal of the antebellum South. Fantasy films need to work doubly hard in this regard, as few in their audience are likely to believe in dragons or magic.
So how is this conviction achieved? In large part, it is reached because everybody involved in the film takes it seriously. They may not believe the goings-on, but they act, whether on or off screen, as if they do. Assuming a certain level of technical competence in the production, the film becomes believable because we never catch anybody out of character (and sometimes even technical flaws can't sink a really good performer; think of Bela Lugosi's ability to rise above his often wretched material on the strength of utterly committed performances). This doesn't mean that a film which everyone takes seriously is flawless, but rather that we accept the flaws and dismiss them, or make allowances, because the surrounding material is so well presented.
Now turn to Eragon. Technically the film is superb; the dragon is consistently believable, and the sets and costumes have a gritty air which makes them quite plausible. But after that the film suddenly becomes very uneven, and not for budgetary reasons. A central problem is that the performances are all over the map. Jeremy Irons is understated but solid, because his quietness reflects his character's past, whereas Edward Speleers, the putative hero, never overcomes his own understatedness to really convince us he's a great hero (he's a bit like Mark Hamill in Star Wars in this regard). Robert Carlyle, as Durza the main villain, almost steals the show, especially since John Malkovich, the ostensible center of power, might as well have been sleeping as he read his lines. Rachel Weisz, the voice of the dragon, is excellent; Sienna Guillory, as the Princess Leia figure, is adequate. In other words, there appears to have been no attempt on the part of director Stefen Fangmeier to create a consistent level of performance or interaction, thus allowing it to appear that each member of the cast was largely on their own.
This problem is exacerbated by the screenplay, which seems rather a series of linked episodes than a coherent whole. It may be argued that this is because Peter Buchman chose to take the novel seriously-- but this means that he did not take the film itself seriously as a film; a film is not, and cannot be, a novel, and simply trying to cram in as many plot details from the book as possible will never do justice either to the book or to the possibilities of cinema. It is also quite derivative-- but since very few stories are truly original, this need not have been the problem it becomes.
But the worst problem is purely the director's fault. Much of Eragon looks like material drawn directly from previous fantasy films, and after a while we begin to get the feeling that this is simply an exercise in cadging a few dollars from an audience taken for granted. Nowhere is this more evident than in the end; after a considerable amount of time during which Peter Doyle's score (itself already rather derivative) has been doing its best to evoke a sense of magic and mystery and power we reach the credits, ready for a lengthy symphonic summation of what we've seen and heard. But no-- what we get instead is an utterly trivial pop tune, of no significance, no resonance, and no value. It's as if the director simply stopped caring after the last day of shooting, and it erases most of what little otherworldliness the film had managed to create.
Imagine Eragon, even with the script exactly as it is, with performances as consistent, and as good, as those in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. Would it have been as good as the latter? No-- but it would have been much better than it is. Imagine Eragon with a score as consistent, and as consistently used, as John Williams's for Star Wars. Would it have been as good as the latter? No-- but it would have been better than it is. Imagine Eragon with the courage to take the extra half hour or 45 minutes to develop its characters in the manner of Lord of the Rings. Would it have been as good as the latter? No-- but it would have been much better than it is. Now imagine Eragon with all of these consistent improvements.
In short, Eragon had the potential, only slightly beyond its own boundaries, to be a vastly better film. That it was not is disappointing, but it's also very informative to those who care about what actually makes a film good, or even great, instead of formulaic but fun.
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