Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be checking out a fantasy movie from 1983. That movie is "Krull".
Now, I remember seeing a little bit of this movie a few years ago on TV while I was on vacation, and I remember it looking very interesting. Now granted, I didn't really understand what the hell was going on, as I caught most of the latter act. And even then, I don't remember anything from it. So when I actually found a copy of it at one of my local video stores, I jumped on it for about $6. I'm hoping that it's gonna be worth it, eventually.
Now as for what I know about the movie, well, I do know that it's a fantasy movie, and I also know one of the stars of this movie is a much younger Liam Neeson. Now mind you, it's not exactly his earliest film, but it is still something that predates stuff like "Taken", for example. I haven't really seen a whole lot of films involving Liam Neeson, but I am aware of that series, at least.
So, I'm curious to find out how exactly Liam Neeson is gonna handle himself here in one of his earlier roles. I'm also curious to see whether or not this movie is actually gonna be any good. The only way I am gonna find out is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Krull".
13 minutes later
So these Slayers can shoot laser beams from their swords. That's sorta cool. I never would've known that, personally, but that is something worth noting.
13 minutes later
Is he seriously sticking his hand inside molting hot water in order to retrieve this Glaive weapon? And I should note that there was fire coming out from this water the moment that Prince Colwyn put his hand inside of it, and he's not feeling any sort of pain from it, nor are there any burn marks that I can see after he just pulled it out. Oh, and the Glaive is now shining through from it's molten debris, what do you know. Anyway, guys, I just found that whole sequence to be really odd, you know what I mean?
20 minutes later
I am gonna say this much, guys, the special effects in this movie are fantastic. I really wish I had more to say about it, but unfortunately, there's not much else I can go on right now. At the very least, it's keeping my interest going, so at least that's something.
13 minutes later
O...K, I genuinely had no idea what happened to the old guy after his doppelganger appeared a moment ago. I will say, at the very least, that I wasn't expecting that to happen to him.
11 minutes later
You know, guys, the acting here in this movie has been really good so far. The only one who has kinda sucked is the princess, Lyssa, the redhead trapped in the Black Fortress. For some reason, none of her dialogue sounds believable. I'm hoping, maybe, her acting will improve within the next 50 minutes or so this movie has left, but I'm not totally sure if it actually will or not.
20 minutes later
So these horses are traveling faster with fire coming out of their hooves while our heroes are fast traveling via a green screen. I will say that, while it does look cool, I have to wonder how much grass they're burning along the way? You'd think that someone might've thought about that, but I guess not. Still though, at least it looks cool.
The Review
Well, guys, that was "Krull". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off here...OK. So, where to begin here? I suppose I should reiterate that I did see a little bit of this movie some years ago. And at the time, I didn't really understand a lot of what was going on. I knew what parts I saw, but I didn't understand the context. It was around the point where Ynyr was climbing across the spiderweb is when my memories of this movie started to pop up. And now that I've seen the whole movie from start to finish, I can say that the movie was actually pretty good. It's not great, mind you, but I still found some enjoyment out of this movie.
So anyway, let's go ahead and start this review off here by first talking about the writing. Now, for those of you who might be reading this for the first time, a long time ago, I reviewed another fantasy movie called "Legend". It was a movie that tried to be so much more than what it was, but instead, it ended up being a very safe, by the numbers, fantasy film. Where it doesn't really do anything new or different with the genre that it's working with, and it had a lot of elements that you've seen in other fantasy stories at the time. And character wise, there wasn't really anything interesting about any of the characters in that movie with the one lone exception being Tim Curry's character, whom was also the main villain of the film. Otherwise, though, the movie really just decided to be a standard fantasy movie for the sake of being a standard fantasy movie of it's time.
Now with that said, that brings me to this movie. Because while this movie is another fantasy story that you've seen done before, what helps this one more revolves around a couple of things. For one, the pacing in this movie is mostly really solid. Despite the movie being close to 2 hours long, it mostly just speeds on by. Especially the first hour, because that flies by really quickly. The second hour also does go by pretty quickly as well, however, I do believe by the last 15 minutes or so, it does start to drag itself out a little bit. But even so, guys, this is probably one of the better paced movies I've seen in quite a while. It's still not the best paced movie, but compared to a few other movies I've seen for this series, that's actually saying quite a lot, really.
Now, the other thing that helps this movie is the characters. Because unlike "Legend", where you had only one likable character there, this one actually has a lot more characters here where they actually take a little more time in help making them likable. If I had to narrow it down, I would say Ynyr, Ergo, Torquill, and the Cyclops are the most likable characters of our group. I would also include our main character, Colwyn, however, he's more on the white meat babyface side of things, which makes him come across as being a little generic. However, despite him being a little generic, he is still at least likable. Now mind you, there are some characters who don't really get much of a spotlight in terms of whom you'll care about. Such as most of Torquill's bandits, which also includes Liam Neeson, as he does play one of the bandits. The princess, Lyssa, is quite easily the most forgettable character of the entire movie because she's not in the movie long enough for her to stand out. For the most part, she's trying to find her own way out of the Black Fortress, which doesn't really matter, because she never escapes it on her own.
If there is any minor problems I could pull from this movie, I would probably say it has to do with the Black Fortress's gimmick. You see, we're told around the beginning of the movie that the Black Fortress always moves to a different location each day. It's not sitting in one place. Which then leads into our heroes, who are trying to find someone who can help them locate where the Black Fortress is going to appear next so that they can get there and rescue princess. And my main question out of all this is why does the Black Fortress have to move itself to a different location? I'm not sure if there *was* a reason for it. The only thing that we're told by Ynyr is that the Black Fortress never goes back to it's original location after teleporting to a new location each day. It's never really explained why it does this, or what the reason is for this. My guess is that they don't want our heroes to find the fortress so easily so that they can never get to it. I understand it's not much of a reason, but it's at least better than the lack of reasoning this movie doesn't give out.
But still, despite that, the writing here is mostly pretty good. Our characters, like I said earlier, are mostly likable. Granted, you're not going to care about certain ones, like most of the bandits, but still, there is enough here to where you can find a likable character that you can care about. Which is more than what I could say about the cast of "Legend" because, well, they didn't really have a lot of likable protagonists that you could care about. This movie at least tries to make you care about the ones that you know are gonna be the focus on. And for the most part, it does a pretty decent job in making you care about them. Which is definitely a plus in my book.
Now because we have a pretty decent cast of likable characters, naturally, you would expect the acting to also be pretty good. Again, though, the only exception to all this is the actress playing our captive princess. Apart from her not having a lot of scenes in this movie, she's also pretty damn bland. Which also contributes to her terrible acting. Like I mentioned earlier, none of her dialogue sounded natural at all. She sounds very one notish and doesn't really have a whole lot to work here. I think if the script actually had more for her to work with, I think her performance in this film would've improved tenfold. Unfortunately, with what little she's given here, her performance does hinder here, which makes her the worst actress in the entire movie. The rest of the acting though is pretty solid, though, because they were given more material to work with. And even though Liam Neeson plays a very minor character here, he was still able to make it work despite the lack of screen time that he gets. Which is more than what I could say about our damsel in distress princess, but, then again, Liam Neeson can usually put on a good performance most of the time. So yeah, guys, the acting here, minus our princess, is generally pretty good.
Special effects in this movie are fantastic. At least, for the time when this movie came out. See, a lot of the effects in this movie are very reminiscent to what you would see in the first "Star Wars" movie. Now I didn't mention this beforehand, but this movie is technically more of a sci-fi fantasy film, rather than just a standard fantasy movie I described at the beginning of this review. In fact, those Slayers I mentioned way early on, they kinda look Darth Vader costumes, and they also carried swords that also acted as laser beams. In essence, they're basically Stormtroopers, only actually more competent, and they can land their targets. And also, the way they are killed is rather fucked up, too. But anyway, the costuming on those guys looked really cool. The suitwork involving our Beast, which you don't see much of and is also the main villain of the movie, looked pretty cool, too. It's just kind of a shame that he is incredibly forgetful. Still though, the costuming here is really good. The green screen effects, while a little obvious-looking at times, is still pretty good for what it is. Now if I were stupid enough to compare these effects to today's standards, I would say that they're kinda cheap and shitty. However, you would have to be a complete retard to compare the effects of 1983 to today's standards. And for 1983 standards, they're mostly great. And that also includes the makeup effects, too, what few there were anyway.
Camerawork here is really good. Lighting here is lit really well. The sound-mixing here is great. The music here is also very good, too. The score was composed by James Horner, and Horner's is usually really solid most of the time. And this movie is no exception. The music here fits the fantasy mood of the movie, and it does a good enough to make the movie stand out in it's own way.
So, with all that said, guys, when it comes down to it, can I recommend "Krull"? For the most part, yes. Especially if you're someone who's into fantasy movies. And if you want to watch something that has a little bit of sci-fi flare to it, then by all means, go ahead and check it out. It is definitely one of the better fantasy movies I have seen in a little while. Now does that mean that I'm going to add this movie to my ever growing DVD collection? Unfortunately, I don't think so. See, while I did enjoy this movie, I don't think it's gonna be worth watching a second time for me. It's fine for what it is, but considering the other fantasy films I already have on DVD, this is one that I'm probably one I'm not gonna be rewatching anytime soon because I would rather any of the other fantasy films like "The Last Unicorn", "The Flight of Dragons", or even Ralph Bakshi's attempt at "The Lord of the Rings". Granted, I know this may seem bias, because I'm picking animated films over a live-action movie. And it has nothing to do with the mediums. It's just, when compared to the stories in those movies over this one, I just don't see myself rewatching this film again over the others. But still, it is a pretty good movie. And if you find yourself watching this movie on multiple viewings, then hey, more power to you. It's just, for me, I don't see that happening for this film. So now, I'm gonna go and rewatch one of those movies I just mentioned. I'm probably just gonna start with "The Last Unicorn". Because that, to me, is still my favorite fantasy movie of all time. So I'm gonna start with that, and work my way up to the other films I already mentioned.
Anyway, guys, with that we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.
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