The second Eduardo Schuldt-directed film, after 'Pirates in Callao', is after just viewing it the best of the four films of his seen (the others being 'Pirates in Callao', 'Fantastic Force', aka 'The Illusionauts', and 'The Dolphin: Story of a Dreamer'). With this being said, 'Dragons: Destiny of Fire' is still not very good and could have been much better.
'Dragons: Destiny of Fire' actually starts off very promisingly. The opening sequence is pretty epic while boasting the best visuals (actually in this scene pretty accomplished, one can see where most of the budget went) and particularly stirring music. One really wishes that the rest of the film was like that. The music has a lot of moments where it's stirring, whimsical and lush, there are some parts that are not that dynamic with what's going on (nowhere near as much as 'The Dolphin: Story of a Dreamer' though) but for low-budget animation, this was far from cheap-sounding music.
Some of the action has the right amount of thrills and things do pick up in the finale somewhat, awkward it may be but it's lively too and has a lot of good intent.
On the other hand, most of the animation, apart from the opening and some good attention to detail for the dragon underworld, is not great. The low budget does come through loud and clear and it was like a lot of time and money went into the opening and then they ran out of budget and realised the clock was ticking from that point on, because the animation and overall film quality declines drastically after the first five minutes. Cheap video games from the 90s look better and more refined, most of the colouring is flat and dull, the characters are plastic and look stiff and unnatural within their surroundings, the backgrounds are static and sparse in detail and the attention to detail is at best sloppy.
With 'Dragons: Destiny of Fire', the writing suffers from childish and barely amusing at best comedy and overused and patronising moralising and makes the mistake of over-utilising them both. The family lessons and values are cliché-ridden and their repetition strains beyond breaking point. The story never ignites fire and is erratically paced, the over-familiarity and blandness of the storytelling makes things feel very ho-hum and then from trying to cram too much in the story is very jumpy and rushed structurally.
Characters don't have enough to them to make one care for them, with an anti-thesis-of-likable protagonist who doesn't ever grow, annoying comedy relief and conflicts that lack any kind of urgency. The voice acting is ill-fitting for the characters and the worst of the actors are pretty amateurish.
In conclusion, doesn't have enough fire. 4/10 Bethany Cox
