At their worst, Uwe Boll's films have the potential to make you want to give up on movies forever. This examiner has tried to suppress the memory of seeing 'House of the Dead' to no avail. He also has made bad films that aren't quite completely incompetent, though still bad ('Bloodrayne') and that are so self-consciously offensive, it's hard to know what to make of it ('Postal'). Where does 'In The Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale' rank?
Upon finding his young son murdered and his wife abducted by creatures called Krug, a farmer known as...wait for it...Farmer (Jason Statham) is upset. He wants revenge and to find his wife Solana (Claire Forlani). The man who was practically a father for the once-orphaned Farmer, Norrick (Ron Perlman) joins him in this quest along with his brother-in-law Bastian (Will Sanderson).
It turns out that an ambitious wizard named Gallian (Ray Liotta) is controlling the Krug. He has designs on overthrowing King Konreid (Burt Reynolds). The king's nephew, Fallow (Matthew Lillard) is assisting the evil wizard to speed his own ascension to the throne. Nevermind the fact that it's clearly understood Gallian wants the crown himself and that there isn't an especially clear reason why Fallow would be helping him. Of course, it's also probably a little hazy why the evil wizard would randomly be causing havoc around the kingdom.
Other major players are the king's loyal sorcerer (or 'magus' as they insist upon being known here) Merick (John Rhys-Davies) and his daughter Muriella (Leelee Sobieski). She has a good heart, but becomes tangled in some complicated matters.
Will good overcome evil? Do you really care? You have read this far, so you probably do, to an extent. Let's continue.
Where 'House of the Dead' went so far as to pointlessly jam video game images into the film, this takes minimal inspiration from the source material. The film starts out looking like it has the potential to be average. There are a lot of familiar faces half-heartedly playing medieval characters, sure, but it doesn't start off as badly as you might be expecting. Then the men in the rubber suits show up. Just as the action begins we see the kind of garbage that awaits us. This only takes fifteen minutes to happen.
Compared to a lot of basic cable original films, this is on par with most of them. This has been called out by many critics for being stylistically inspired by 'Lord of the Rings.' The success of that franchise casts a long shadow over most of these fantasy quest tales. The talent and resources those films wield make everything suffer by comparison, so it's not very fair to hold this to that standard.
The distracting thing about it is the amount of high-profile actors that are in this. Sy Fy original films are usually populated with young unknowns and one B+ actor to lend some credibility. Statham is one of the biggest action starts out there, Burt Reynolds is a film legend and Perlman has been in some amazing films. Liotta was in 'Goodfellas' for Pete's sake! How does Boll attract such talent? It seems as though enough money can convince some people to not read the script. Lillard, in particular, shouldn't be proud of this one. Most of the players look extremely uncomfortable and ill-cast with Statham and especially Rhys-Davies as the exceptions. They could have had the Gallian character wear something other than a stupid black trench coat. At least try for some period detail and consistent accents.
When a film is completely ineptly executed, there can be a level of enjoyment from that as well. Sadly, the film has a few things going for it. One or two relatively decent performances and a little more restraint from Boll than in his early work goes a long way to undo some of the damage that the weak dialog, static-looking sets, overlong run time and mostly weak special effects. Considering that this was Boll's first (and likely last) big budget film, he didn't really seem to make effective use of the $60 million or so at his disposal. At least there are some nifty teleportation scenes.
Instead of realistic or at the very least fun, the fight sequences seem to be lifted from an episode of 'The Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers'. One funny scene (perhaps intended to be cool) is where a Krug allows itself to be set on fire and launched via catapult toward humans before it gets up and fights while still ablaze. It doesn't make much sense, but it is memorable. Speaking of memorable, men on horses and orc-like creatures are acceptable, but why are there ninjas in this?
The climactic battle can't decide whether it wants to be an intermittently impressive large-scale fight in the rain or a pseudo 'Matrix' knock-off. It's both which is the kind of compromise that leaves everyone unhappy. They say the best ones do.
Special features include: a useless and distant behind the scenes featurette, deleted/extended scenes and a trailer.
Because of his arrogance and lack of talent, Uwe Boll may never make what can universally be considered a 'good' movie. The victories with him are in finding works of his that are 'less bad.' From a technical aspect, 'In The Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale' is a minor improvement over some of his past fiascos, but that doesn't mean it's worth anyone's time.
Rated PG-13 127 minutes 2008
'In The Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale' is available to rent/purchase in Allentown, the Leigh Valley and beyond.
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