Movie Review – Dragonslayer

Dragonslayer (1981)
Written by Hal Barwood and Matthew Robbins
Directed by Matthew Robbins

Genre films have always existed in cinema, but it wasn’t until the breakout surprise success of Star Wars that these spectacles gained increased budgets and audiences. Dragonslayer was the second collaboration between Disney & Paramount Pictures. Their first was the Robert Altman-directed Popeye, a film that did not end up how the companies had hoped but which has found a robust cult following in the decades that ensued. The special effects are handled by Industrial Light and Magic, which marks the first use of these special effects outside of a Lucasfilm production. Derek Vanlit, the cinematographer responsible for 1979’s Alien, is behind the camera here, adding rich texture to the screen. The result was a film that was a fun fairy tale/adventure but failed to find an audience, likely because it was up against Raiders of the Lost Ark that summer.

In 6th-century England, an expedition led by Valerian (Caitlin Clarke) searches for Ulrich (Ralph Richardson), the last sorcerer in the land. His help is needed to combat Vermithrax Pejorative, a 400-year-old dragon who terrorizes the kingdom of Urland. To keep the dragon at bay, the king offers virgin girls selected by lottery twice a year. Ulrich knows his time is ending, and he attempts to prepare his apprentice Galen (Peter MacNichol) to take up his mantle. Tragedy strikes and the young man ends up being the one who is expected to push back this monster. What ensues is a classic fairy tale that benefits from recent developments in special effects.

Dragonslayer isn’t anything extremely original. The screenwriters drew on everything from The Sorcerer’s Apprentice sequence in Fantasia and the classic story of St. George and the Dragon. They made a concerted effort to eschew the movie tropes of fantasy and try to adhere to something closer to what life would have looked like in this period. There are no knights in shining armor, castles, or royal courts. The film is very grounded in the time following the collapse of the Roman Empire’s rule in Britain. It’s clear a lot of the budget went into the complex puppets that make up the dragon, so when our hero confronts the beast, those scenes hold a lot of weight. Dragonslayer is high fantasy, which is exactly how fans of that genre would want it.

In an era where so much of what we see on screen are people wearing motion capture dots walking around vast green-painted warehouses, it feels refreshing to see actors standing in physical spaces and interacting with a tangible dragon puppet. Of course, we have moments where the seams show, but that doesn’t diminish how much fun this movie is. A lot of time is dedicated to establishing tone and atmosphere, which pays off in droves when we see the dragon for the first time. Emphasizing how difficult survival is in these times, even without a dragon, makes the monster’s presence much more suffocating.

Peter MacNichol is such an interesting choice for the lead actor. He won an award for his role in the Crimes of the Heart stage production, which got him cast for the adaptation of Sophie’s Choice. That film wouldn’t be released until 1982, so his feature debut was Dragonslayer. It is interesting to see his filmography and consistent film work, though with some multi-year gaps. The theater appears to have been MacNichol’s calling while he carved out a memorable career as one of the great character actors. Who could forget Janosz from Ghostbusters II, one of the only bright spots in an otherwise dreadful movie?

Beyond Vermithrax, there aren’t any other villains in the story. Some humans think the plan to kill the dragon is going to doom them all, thus they push back against Galen. The residents of Urland have lived through Vermithrax’s rage when he is angered. They don’t see going all-in on a young man who was just handed the title of sorcerer by his dying master. It’s revealed that wealthier community members have been paying bribes to keep their daughters out of the lottery. A priest leads a doomed contingent to try and repair the harm Galen has caused. These little plots are interesting to explore to see how a fairy tale trope could dramatically shape one community. 

Tyrian, the closest the film has to an actual human villain, is a highly sympathetic figure the more we learn about him. He wants to keep things as they are because they are working. The dragon doesn’t attack them, so he’s happy to keep paying the cost. His view of magic comes from a life of seeing charlatans get people’s hopes up, take their resources, and leave them with nothing. His first encounter with Ulrich leads to this dialogue: “They never do tests. Not many real deeds either. Oh, conversation with your grandmother’s shade in a darkened room, the odd love potion or two, but comes a doubter, why, then it’s the wrong day, the planets are not in line, the entrails are not favorable, “we don’t do tests”!” How could you not empathize with the guy?

Dragonslayer is still a film limited by the technology of its time, but it compensates for this with a talented cast and a true vision that gives texture to the world. There are few adaptations of spinner-rack pulp fantasy that capture the tone of those books as well. John Boorman’s Excalibur was released the same year, and I would much rather rewatch Dragonslayer than that other film any day. Boorman’s vision is bold but leans more into the grandeur and myth. Dragonslayer finds a beautiful middle ground between fantasy & realism, which makes it shine for me.