InformationRap
This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.
Neive Bellamy
Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.
Aubrey Hackett
While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.
Maleeha Vincent
It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.
Danielle31
Someone bought me this DVD for Xmas about four years ago, and I never opened it or watched it until recently. Let's say I severely regretted doing so. I honestly should have chucked it unopened in the garbage bin after I came to this website and checked the reviews. Too bad I can't turn back time, like an hour and a half of it approximately.I hate to bash movies, but this one is begging for it. I have watched quite a few low budget movies, some of them being fantasy/sci-fi. The low production values are usually a little bit of a distraction, but a strong script and good acting can pick up the slack in other areas of the movie at least enough for me to enjoy it. That is SO not the case here.There are a few good things about the movie and I'll list them first so I won't seem 'biased'. 1. Whoever did the make-up did a fairly decent job. 2. Max is a cute kid 3. Fetch is hot and I love his accent and 4. The princess is very pretty. That's about it. Everything else was just god awful, the worse thing being the sound. It doesn't line up with the voices, the sound goes in and out, there are strange noises in the background, etc. The sound effects are also extremely cheesy. Basically it's a hot tranny mess all up in the sound department.The next worst thing is the special effects. I wouldn't call them 'special' by any means. I actually thought this was a much older movie because the effects make it look extremely dated. Whoever imposed the 'sparkles' on the film had a computer that was about 20 years old. Anybody, even my mother-in-law (who can't use a computer to save her life) who owns a recent computer, can make better special effects than what are shown in this movie. I kid you not.Next is the acting. Actually, I wouldn't call it that--I'd call it 'reading off of a poster board in the background'. This isn't the worst movie I've seen (though it makes the top 5) but in terms of acting ability, it is the only film I've ever seen where not one person in the film can talk like a real live human being. I swear they all sound like robots (which would have probably have made it a cooler movie).The plot--oh, I don't know--I have seen lamer plots, but this one is pretty bad. There is absolutely nothing original about it. It freely rips off ideas from much better movies--like Harry Potter, Lord of The Rings, Star Wars, etc., but it most resembles The Neverending Story. It pains me to think of the wreck they made of my favorite childhood movie. I'll never be able to watch it in the same way again.All in all, this movie is really horrible and I beg you not to see it. Though, actually, I thought of another thing that was good about it. 5. It gives amateur filmmakers hope, because I can't think of anyone who could make a movie and do a worse job. Anybody, even someone who's never directed, acted or even seen a movie before could make a far superior film and have thousands upon thousands of DVD's created and placed in the bargain bin at Wal-Marts all over the country. I don't know how to act or direct but it might be worth it for me to make a low budget Merchant-Ivory type film. At least I know how to write a decent script and my computer is only a year old instead of 20. Just those two things would make my movie infinitely better than this one, and your amateur movie, no matter the genre or plot, would be an improvement on this one also.
elvenemo
I have seen this movie and while if your expecting Lord of the Rings quality or Harry Potter you will be sadly disappointed. But if you take it as it is, expecting a very low budget movie, it's not that bad. Sure the plot is a little shaky at times, but it's a fun little romp for fans of fantasy who don't have a large choice of movies. I have certainly seen worse.And it does have many good qualities. The make up and prosthetics are really quite good for a movie with so low a budget. And it is a movie that has a good message for kids: that you have to believe in yourself.With that said I would not recommend this movie for those of you who easily are disappointed in movies. I wouldn't even recommend it for the casual review. But if you a fan of fantasy and have an afternoon or a child to entertain, why not watch it. There are a lot more movie's out there that don't even try to have a heart. It least this one does. But I guess whether or not it succeeds as entertainment is still up to the viewer.
jay_042
Like just about everyone who got this flick, I found it in the Wal-Mart bargain bin, stuck near the bottom with to several copies Howard the Duck. I'm a sucker for a cheap bad movie, so I got it on a whim. I was expecting cheese, I got some really smelly Limburger.Opening with the two low rent Rennisance Festival Fugitive Elves (with lots of shots of their sneakers cleverly disguised in gunny sacks) running through the forest. Ugly Axe Guy is in pursuit, and throws a long handled battle axe into the back of the RFFE carrying a scroll. RFFE number two picks up the scroll and runs once again. Ugly Axe Guy decides to deal with Number Two with his flail, throwing it with the grace and technical skill of a William Shatner fight scene.Shatner naturally comes to mind when I see this movie. When Ugly Axe Guy pulls his axe out of the back of the dead Elf, We see that the highly abused elves in this scene happen to have GREEN BLOOD. So, does that mean we're on Vulcan? Elf Number Two is now crawling, apparently he couldn't get his leg untangled from the flail that is loosely wrapped about his foot. He shambles to a conveniently placed door (in the middle of an otherwise uninhabited forest according to the numerous tracking shots in the opening) quickly, Elf Number Two tosses the scroll through the door as Evil Axe Guy brings his might axe down and mercifully leaves the movie for the next 45 minutes.Then we see the scroll "magically" appearing in a flurry of cheap digital sparkles at the feet of an old gardener who looks sorta like old Obi Wan Kenobi. He picks up the scroll and starts reading, and a young girl's voice-over tells about the ongoing struggle with the UnSeelies in the BlueBell forest and how things look bleak and grim at the moment and how it would be a good time to bring that savior here and all. All the while the scene is cut with pointless closeups of a mouse and a hawk. You expect the hawk is going to swoop down and eat the mouse, and seeing how the mouse starts talking and won't shut up later in the movie, I so desperately wished that was the case. The voice over ends with "Help us, you're our only hope" at which point Sorta Kenobi looks up to the sky and we fade out.Then things quit making sense....Seeing how the past few paragraphs represent the first five minutes of this flick, I can tell you it just goes downhill from this point. From the introduction of the villain Dagda (he looks sorta like Tim Curry as Darkness from "Legend" but acts like Tim Curry as Frankenfurter from "Rocky Horror Picture Show") to the big showdown between good and evil (evil being armed with foam rubber hammers) this movie is nothing but a slow, agonizing, descent into cinematic masochism. If it wasn't for the presence of multiple friends to help riff on this movie, there is no way I could sit through it. After showing this, I've had friends refuse to never again let me pick movies for us to watch. This movie is pain, watch it at your discretion.
rexdog9
Don't pass this up if you've got A) kindergarten-aged kids and/or B) aspirations to someday grab a camera and enter the world of film-making. This film will satisfy on both counts. On the one hand, it's a solid G-rated film that won't bore the crap out of you, and on the other hand it won't bore the crap out of you because the production values are so low. Bad edits, cheesy sound effects, poor syncing, bad acting, bad special effects, bad direction, this film has it all, planting hope in the breast of any armchair director. And my kids couldn't care less. The film is solid enough to capture their imagination and moves through a story line. What is interesting about this film is its flashes of integrity. Dagda's (Ken Mitzkovitch) vocal performance will make its way into your water cooler chat. His makeup is superb, and so are many of the other characters' makeup. Villains are villainous and heroes are virtuous. Lighting is good throughout. I was continually reminded that someone was taking this thing seriously as it was being made, which sadly is not the case with much of the crap being turned out by directors who are much more connected than is Mr. Summerfield. This is what low-budget indie starter films are for. I look for him to get better and better.