Fire & Ice (2008) Reviews

• Better Than the Average Sci-Fi Offering

  befred82008-10-19

  Right now eight people have rated this movie at 8.8. Believe me, it's nowhere near that good. I'm suspecting that, the others having seen a lot of dreck on the Sci-Fi Channel, are actually floored by mere competence. What F&I has going for it is a coherent plot, good sets, decent photography and likable characters. What's going against it is a formula script and adequate-to-poor special effects. The dragons do their job, if not always imaginatively but the really laughable creatures are some orc-type walking bushes called the Forest People. Fortunately their two appears are brief. Also too brief is John Rhys-Davies performance as the hero's mentor, predictably the best in the film. The reluctant hero (Tom Wisdom) and plucky heroine (Amy Acker) are adequate and easy to watch. The rest of the performances are by-the-numbers, though none outstandingly bad. The best way to enjoy this movie would be to skip to the last half-hour, specifically to the final hero-versus-dragon battle. When that's over, you can turn it off.

• Fire and Ice - It could have been a LOT better...

  nona_lexxa152009-03-18

  I was looking forward for this movie. It had a quite good promo... The night the movie was aired I took my high hopes and sat in front of the TV. After 10 minutes I realized that it was an average or even below average movie, lot worse than other Sci-Fi or fantasy movies I was accustomed. The movie had good actors, both Romanians and Americans, but the acting was bad, the graphic was bad and the dragons were UGLY, they looked like some sea animals only things that differed the "dragons" from the sea animals were the ice on their skin and the fact that they breathe fire. Fire and Ice had a lot of mistakes... To take only one for example: after someone was killed with a sword, the same sword was cleaned, no trace of blood! The villains were stabbed, but they did not bleed!!! Like some freaking aliens!!! I guess this movie was intended for children under 12 years, or else I cannot explain a lot of things... What I said until now was " the negative points" but even though the movie had a lot of mistakes I have to rate it 8 because it was a bold decision making this type of movie in a country that doesn't appreciate the Fantasy genre. Also the producers showed that they know how to choose a good plot, but they will have to learn how to make a better movie. It was indeed a below average movie in an international context, but for Romania it was a step forward. Finally they proved that Media Pro can make more movies, for different genres, not only soap-operas. I am quite proud that the Romanians took this step and even though they still have a lot to learn, I hope that some day they will make better movies, with less mistakes. I recommend Fire and Ice to any other Romanian, sick tired with all those gypsy movies, and even to other people who wants to know how this movie looks from the perspective of a country without experience in making this type of movies. Please note: do not be harsh with Media Pro, it is their first movie made from the areas of Sci-Fi/fantasy.

• It could have been average, but it has ridiculous production values

  siderite2009-01-06

  Imagine a standard story about the evil terror of the land, the good king, the bad king, the corrupted king adviser, the good princess and the valiant knight. Any number of scripts and movies could have provided inspiration for this. But no, they wanted to do it the MediaPro way. That is, BTW, a Romanian production company. The result is some nicely drawn dragons, although completely disconnected. If they weren't "the terror", I would have guessed they came from another movie altogether. Then the script is completely boring and there are some absolutely horrible action scenes and acting. Arnold Vosloo plays well, I think he is one of the good actors around, too bad he is not cast in decent roles. Why did he accept this role? Did he need money so badly? Or are people in casting just oblivious to acting talent and he plays what he can get? Same goes for John Rhys-Davies. He plays his usual "Professor" type and has the decency to die when the part got just too ridiculous. His acting wasn't good either, although I have to admit, any actor would have been hard pressed to feel motivated in a movie such as this. The Romanian actors were decent enough, except Cabral Ibacka and Loredana Groza, who are Romanian TV celebs, not actors, and it painfully shows. I liked the evil king, too, not because the part was interesting or the acting great, but because I remember the actor living in my neighbourhood :) Bottom line: avoid this. But do look for the extended 5 minute or more trailer. It looks great and has more production and direction values than 10 Fire&Ice movies. Maybe they will extend it to a complete feature film some day :)

• Potential exceeds execution by a wide margin

  neil-4762010-01-11

  This was a cheapie DVD from the supermarket checkout bin. It stars Amy Acker (Fred from Angel), Arnold Vosloo (Imhotep from the Mummy movies), John Rhys-Davies (from any fantasy movie which will stand still long enough for him to get into costume and nip in front of the camera), a chap called Tim Wisdom who I've never heard of before and never expect to hear of again given his achievements in this movie, and a couple of dozen people whose names end in -escu (which also applies to most of the crew). Intrepid princess Amy Acker gets stuck into finding a way of defending the kingdom from a fire-breathing dragon. Which involves setting an ice-breathing dragon onto it. Which, as it turns out, isn't actually that great an idea. Thing is, there's actually some potential here. Acker is OK, Vosloo is always fun, Rhys-Davies does his usual thing (Brian Blessed-lite), and the assorted -escus manage to be in the right place at the right time. More importantly, it looks good. The cinematographer plainly knows what he's up to, and the film is very attractively photographed. And despite a less than generous budget, the CGI dragons (clearly based on stingrays) are, for the most part, well animated and well integrated into the background plates, far more so than is usually the case for this sort of movie. But everything is massively let down by the script. Every plot development is either signalled well in advance or else is hugely predictable. There are constant exhortations to the princess to stay where she is, remain out of danger etc., and she takes no notice of any of them. By about the 10th time she has ignored all advice and rushed into peril, they even make a story point out of it. The -escus all swordfight by rushing at their opponent brandishing their swords over their head - clearly they all had the same swordfighting teacher, and he was crap. And regrettably the showdown scrap between the dragons is also crap - well animated, but nothing actually happens. And it doesn't happen A LOT. In fact you wonder whether it's ever going to stop not happening. And then factor in endless riding across the same hill, field, and bit of forest.... In the end, though it's the script which lets it down.

• Painfully bad

  Jason_the_psycho2010-01-01

  The movie is so bad that I didn't even bother to finish it. The story is simple. We have this kingdom called Carpia or something. People living there used to be happy and all that stuff until a fire dragon strikes simply because it felt like destroying things. After all, that's what dragons do. The burn stuff and kill stuff. So the tomboy princess of the kingdom decides to be a hero and tries to reach an ex-knight who is known for being someone who knows ways to defeat a dragon. Unknown to her though, this ex-knight happens to be dead. However, he has a son so everything's OK. So the tomboy princess reaches this guy and asks him to get rid of the dragon, which he kindly refuses at first. He eventually agrees when she offered to pay him. I guess it's probably because: "Cash rules everything around me, C.R.E.A.M., get the money, dollar dollar bill ya'll" - Wu Tang Clan Meanwhile, the king is being persuaded to give in to the terms offered by the evil ruler of another kingdom in order to keep the dragon away. Seriously, if any of you who actually plan to watch this expect this to be as good as any fantasy-related blockbuster movie, then there's a problem with you. But this movie is flat out bad. Yes, even by TV movie standards. TV movies are known for having cheesy and amateur script writing as well as B- acting, but that doesn't necessarily mean they are always bad. On occasion, they are fun to watch. XIII is a great example. This movie however, has a really terrible script. While most things in the plot do add up, the characters are incredibly weak (A dragon slayer who cares only about money but later becomes a hero? I'm damned). No matter what they do, you just can't help but think that's just stupid (Charging in while the guards are changing shifts isn't an advantage). And given the fact that this is supposed to be set in the medieval times, there shouldn't be any projectors present at the time. Of course, given that this movie has a horrendous script, it's difficult to expect any good acting to be seen. It's actually surprising to see Arnold Vosloo in this flick, as you know, he had always been a good actor and was very consistent. Most of the actors/actresses are bad in this one, especially Amy Acker. I have to admit I'm kind of a Amy Acker fan. Still, I have to say that she's horrible in this one. If you can't perform well due to a bad script, at least get the accent right. In this case, her accent is just flat out unbearable. You can clearly hear the American accent in every line she says. Seriously, a Chinese like me can play out an English/Irish accent better than her, and it's not even like I'm good at playing accents. Amy Acker is just annoying the this flick. Maybe whoever in this film participated for a paid vacation? That's the best explanation I could come up with. The soundtrack and the CGI stands out in a positive way, not because they're extremely good, but because the other aspects didn't quite work out. That's why it's surprising to see watchable CGI and a somewhat original soundtrack which was actually close to bringing up the tone in the movie. To be honest, had this movie live up to its potential, it wouldn't score more than 6 or 7 out of 10. The whole movie was a bad idea to begin with anyway. This is also why I'm surprised to see a theatrical release in Romania, as this disaster wouldn't even qualify for a straight-to-DVD release. TV movies doesn't necessarily mean bad movies. While they are actually stereotyped as cheesy, that doesn't mean it's a bad thing. I enjoy cheesy movies and lines. I enjoy corny love-hate relationships and all that. You don't need a huge budget to make something great, you just need the heart and determination. You can clearly see that all of those who were somehow related to the production of this movie don't have the heart to make a good movie. And one more thing, Sci Fi should stick to science fiction.