Image courtesy of www.impawards.com
Director :
Uwe Boll
Cast :
Jason Statham ………. Farmer
Leelee Sobieski ………. Muriella
John Rhys-Davies ………. Merick
Ron Perlman ………. Norick
Claire Forlani ………. Solana
Kristanna Loken ………. Elora
Matthew Lillard ………. Duke Fallow
Brian J. White ………. Commander Tarish
Mike Dopud ………. General Backler
Will Sanderson ………. Bastian
Tania Saulnier ………. Tawlyn
Ray Liotta ………. Gallian
Burt Reynolds ………. King Konreid
Gabrielle Rose ………. Delinda
Terence Kelly ………. Trumaine
Uwe Boll is an interesting director. Considering his ability to finance a film and attract top level talent on a regular basis, one would think Boll’s reputation would be one of a gifted foreign director able to produce his own films. The problem is that Boll has produced a series of films that have been both commercial and critical failures of spectacular proportions, but that’s not even the most interesting part. When called out by critics for his series of films Boll responded how any sane, rational human being would: he challenged them to amateur boxing matches. Boll, a former kick boxer, would easily dispatch his competition comprised of hand-picked opponents with little to no skill or training. But instead of finding material that is a bit more substantive than a video game, Boll seems to have focused on crafting a masterpiece out of a video game. His latest gem: In the Name of the King: a Dungeon Siege Tale.
Farmer (Jason Statham) has the type of perfect family life only available in the movies. He has a beautiful wife (Claire Forlani) and a son who love him dearly, as well as his own land. When the evil Krug kill his kid and kidnap his wife under the evil leadership of Gallian (Ray Liotta), intent on starting a war with the good King Konreid (Burt Reynolds). And one can see Boll’s intent with this film. Bearing little resemblance to the video game, his goal is to craft an epic fantasy film in the vein of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. He’s taking a relatively simple story about vengeance and family to craft over an epic story of man vs. krug (Boll’s version of an Orc). And while Boll hasn’t created the worst film of the year, Dungeon Siege will be perhaps one of them.
For a film with a reported production budget of $60 million, the one thing that stands out about the film is that it looks cheap. The sorts of effects and costuming one would presume a Saturday morning children’s show to have are present and abundant throughout. To call it a second rate version of the Rings films is a compliment in a way; the effects and most of the monsters are laughably bad. While the scenery and the setting is passable, everything else about the film looks fake and cheap.
And for a relatively first rate cast (in 1998), Boll manages to inspire some markedly bad performances. From the first moment Burt Reynolds is on screen, looking at the camera briefly to almost acknowledge that the film is bad and that he’s just mailing it in, the cast of stars feels like Boll rounded up anyone who needed a paycheck. 10 years ago this is a pretty sharp cast: Reynolds, Statham, Ron Perlman, Liotta, Matt Lillard and Claire Forlani were in films that saw the light of the day on a far regular basis, for the most part, as opposed to secondary roles and direct to DVD exposure that all (sans Statham) enjoy on a fairly regular basis. Everyone seems to be sleep-walking through the film, as if the film’s subtitle is “A Mortgage Payment Tale” as opposed to A Dungeon Siege Tale. For a serious, epic fantasy tale there’s so much unintentional comedy that it feels like a spoof of the genre.
It ruins a lot of the good things Boll does behind the camera. It’s not brilliant story-telling in any aspect, but it’s competent enough to keep the film moving forward with a consistent storyline. The film remains at least easy to follow despite its foray into the obnoxious. The battle sequences may lack a lot of blood and intensity but they are shot well; Boll’s strength is his ability to use visuals and not characters to tell his story. There are a lot of good shots throughout the film of scenery and to set up certain big moments as well. One wonders with the right script and a cast into the material if he has a Driving Miss Daisy in him.
For the most part, Uwe Boll has had a career that is a wonder of financing and flops. While Dungeon Siege will probably follow in the same footsteps that House of the Dead and Alone in the Dark, it’s the sort of film January is known for.
FINAL RATING (ON A SCALE OF 1-5 BUCKETS):
