How To Train Your Dragon

Dreamworks doesn't have a very good reputation with moviegoers right now, and I only understand part of that. I skipped Monsters Vs. Aliens, with good reason I think, but the first two Shrek movies where a romping good time and Kung Fu Panda was fun seasoned with the right amounts of comedy, sweetness, and old-fashioned ass kicking. So I wasn't as skeptical going in to How To Train Your Dragon as some people may have been, and I feel like my open-mindedness was justly rewarded.

Every part of this movie is good. Dreamworks has definitely stepped up their game in terms of animation, and Dragon is visually their best work by miles. Sweeping skies and pounding waves make up the backdrop of this Viking story, with a few idyllic forest scenes and a waterfall tucked away for emphasis. One of Dreamworks' flaws in the past has been over-filling their scenes, so that you get overwhelmed by the amount of STUFF in the frame (that isn't rendered nearly as well as, oh, Pixar) but here wide spaces are used to dramatic effect. Watching the little black dragon sweep through a backdrop of mounded clouds is breath-taking.

Speaking of that little black dragon, Toothless and his lizardy friends are the absolute show stealers here. Jay Baruchel's Hiccup doesn't compete with them for the attention they command; instead, he seems to spend most of the time presenting them for appreciation. Toothless, his sleek, black adopted friend, is somewhere between a housecat, a leopard, and a really big snake - he's intelligent, and fierce, but inclined to roll in the grass to scratch an itch, or prepare a pounce from a rocky ledge. I was fascinated by the other varieties of dragon that are also in play; a two-headed beast, a long and pointy one that sets itself on fire, a stubby fat one that resembles a junebug. They're unique, and exceptional, and they're not pretty - these dragons are not romanticized, and I appreciated that.

The Vikings are, for the most part, not nearly as interesting, but they fill their story roles well. The voice cast helps enormously with that: Baruchel is funny, self-deprecating, with perfect vocal inflection for the max amount of comedic timing possible. Gerard Butler is gruff and awkward (and doesn't hide his Scottish accent, THANK GOD) and the perfect duo with Craig Ferguson, who plays a blacksmith missing several limbs. The Vikings are funny but never clownish, which went a long way to keeping the tension in necessary places; even though, intellectually, I KNEW everything would turn out ok in the end, the film kept enough gravity that I was at the edge of my seat as it neared its climax.

Even if you don't like fantasy, even if animation isn't your thing, see this one. It's touching, poignant, silly, and will cause you to gasp in excitement. (As a side note, I did not see it in 3D and I didn't feel like I was missing anything.)