Comment by Magic Marmalade:
Still a wonderful, charming and magical family movie, with a great plot, fantastic, evocative score.
The essential plot centres around a knight, in who's charge is a young prince, son of a medieval tyrant king... The king is killed in the opening scenes by the local oppressed peasantry when they rise up against him. This leaves the young Prince - Einon - king, but he is also mortally wounded in the battle, so his mother, accompanied by the knight, take him to a dragon, to get healed, by taking half the dragon's heart, also in the hope that the purity of the dragon heart will purify the young Einon's soul, and make him a more merciful and benevolent king for the people than his father was.
... Alas, it doesn't work out that way, and the knight, blind to Einon's fundamentally bad nature, blames the dragon for corrupting his young charge, and vows to hunt him down and kill him.
It pitches the tale well in a pseudo-medieval "historical"/ mythical Celtic world, and captures the sense of wonder people now have for that period, even though it is a pretty generalised confection... Inspired by that time, rather than trying to replicate it in any sort of historically accurate way... And it does so through excellent locations selection, and broad mix of English and American casting, great cinematography, a light yet evocative Celtic adventure score, and an early CGI dragon which, although a little dated in it's effectiveness, still holds up well enough to convey a sense of character.
A couple of inspired casting choices too round this out, in the shape of the distinctive Sean Connery as the dragon, and Julie Christie as Einon's trapped and rueful mother, and friend of the dragon (she really brings a note of gravitas to proceedings).
But overall, it's a very warm, joyous, swashbuckling adventure yarn made of the best bits of everything from stories of times if yore, and it was a pleasant, and unexpected surprise at time if release, and still holds a place in my heart, principally by virtue of it's aspiring to virtue, if the old fashioned, knightly kind.
If you've not seen it yet, but like, say: The Princess Bride, or some of the old eighties children's fantasy movies, you'll love this too.
