Feb

26

“Reign of Fire”: Crash and Burn

February 26, 2007 |

One of the problems with being a bit of an insomniac is that one winds up late at night, watching extraordinary crap like Reign of Fire. TBS, Spike, Encore’s Action channel… they’re great resources for this stuff. The dragons that once wiped out the dinosaurs emerge from underground mines to feed on… whatever’s handy, mostly humanity. Reign of FireEventually, humanity fights back, of course, led by the American military coming to Britain’s rescue against invaders, as they’ve done before.

The high point, if you can dangle disbelief at the end of a bungee cord for a few minutes, is a scene where “ArchAngel” Marine HALO-divers suicide-battle a dragon in mid-air. One poor sucker has to jump out first, without a ‘chute; when the dragon tries to catch the bait in its mouth, the others jump in from above with a net, to snare it, drive it to the ground and kill it. Full-contact fighting between skydivers, dragons, helicopters, a man on horseback, and a tank with a harpoon gun. It’s actually pretty cool, if you can keep from thinking about it.

Christian Bale and Matthew McConaughey are the most recognizeable faces in this. Izabella Scorupco adds a bit of she-warrior sizzle, but the real stars are the dragons, who look great– and who never have to deal with the career damage that goes with a flick like this on your CV.

In honor of the whole “fire” and dragon-slaying theme, I hereby dub this cheese Pepper Jack.


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