Whose breath is worse? A fire-breathing dragon or Matthew McConaughy

Of all the disasters we imagine will bring on the apocalypse, man-eating dragons is by far the least cinematically explored. C’mon Hollywood: flesh-eating viruses and nuclear holocausts can’t be that much more bankable.

According to 2002 Reign of Fire, they probably are.

Quick Plot:

English miners awaken a long dormant race of fire-breathing dragons, a hibernating prehistoric gaggle who spend the next 20 years eating humans, burning their food sources, and driving drably dressed survivors underground where they must entertain themselves with live reenactments of The Empire Strike Back.

Wait, this is a negative future?

Having survived the initial attack, a grown post-Newsies, pre-John Connor Christian Bale plays Quinn, the leader of the apparently incredibly fertile survivors who are slowly growing tired of such meager portion sizes. Assisted by a still handsome and not yet greasy Gerard Butler, Quinn tries his darndest to keep surly English folks alive and their kids prepared to hide when the inevitable attacks happen. Ho-hum life gets a twist with the arrival of a bearded American (aka the star of the modern classic Tiptoes ) and his military cohorts, a gung-ho gang eager to destroy the entire species of fire-breathers by killing the only male.

Yes, only male. The world has been taken over by dragons--that of course we can all accept. But of all the millions of flying carnivores, only a single creature has sperm to offer? Sometimes one can only suspend disbelief so much.

Ah who am I kidding? Made at a strange time in cinema when nobody was really investing millions into dragon slaying, Reign of Fire is a bizarrely attempted blockbuster that despite its post-apocalyptic setting, is rather fun. The monsters look no better than what you see on your average SyFy original and the attacks are nowhere near the gruesome joy as something like Starship Troopers, but this is the kind of film that makes for an enjoyable drunken or errands-around-the-house riddled Sunday afternoon.

At the same time, there definitely is something missing from Reign of Fire, a kind of false grandeur that never quite rings victorious. Perhaps it has something to do with Quinn's oddly unheroic mama's boy of a hero or the anticlimactic final attack, but for all its incredible possibility to be the kind of Doll's House favorite best served with cheddar, Reign of Fire falls a little short.

High Points

Though I’d still prefer to watch his nude bongo performance on pot, Matthew McConaughy is a rather ridiculous joy to watch

Low Points

Do we blame this film and the influence of a grizzled McConaughy for creating the surly monster that is Growling Bale?

Some of the grown men relationship stuff feels dull and simultaneously underdeveloped and too prominent. We came to this film (or didn’t, as it was a box office dud) to watch McConaughbeard fight dragons. How many shouting matches do we need?

Lessons Learned

What’s a great way to show an apocalypse without spending more than $5 of a budget probably reserved for Matthew McConaughy’s sweat buckets? Photoshop and Time Magazine

Dear medieval or post-apocalyptic societies: just because you have one minor victory after decades of hardship does not give you the right to have a free-for-all party. If there’s one thing monsters like Grendel and dragons hate, it’s 

confidence

The only thing worse than a dragon is an American...particularly a McConaughbeard

Rent/Bury/Buy

Reign of Fire isn’t the flaming ball of cheese I was hoping to relish, but it’s enjoyable in its oddness and well worth a lazy viewing. As both a Netflix Instant Watch and constant TV airer, it’s easy to catch without investing any capital into. 

Horrible Non-Horror! Little People, Big Mess

Welcome, leprechauns, leprechaun hunters, corned beef enthusiasts and Irish hating readers. I have not one drip of emerald blood in my bones, so in honor of this day after the day after the Ides of March holiday, I've decided to celebrate the first of what I hope to be a regular (and by regular I mean random) new segment here at the Doll's House called Horrible Non-Horror! The exclamation point is included.


Basically, I watch a lot of movies that are not what you, your blind grandmother, deaf Dalmatian, or illiterate water bottle would consider quality entertainment. Even though some may not fall under the horror banner, they are indeed horrifically wonderful in ways that are just selfish of me to not share with you. Hence, Horrible Non-Horror!


Enough explanation of a self-explanatory title. On to today's special (and by special, I mean especially horrendous) feature, Tiptoes! (exclamation provided by me; I'm just really excited).

For most actors, the term “chameleon” is a compliment of the highest order, a power of transformation many charisma sweating superstars can’t even fathom. Bruce Willis may be subdued in The Sixth Sense, but he’s still John McClain (just with cleaner feet), while even someone with unusual bone structure like Hilary Swank can disappear into a role, whether she’s an awkwardly in love transexual in Boys Don’t Cry or a hot single mom on Beverly Hills, 90210.

So what do you get when you take one static, stubbly actor with the range of a beach volleyball and cast one of filmdom’s most unique and versatile actors as his limping twin dwarf brother?

The answer, of course, is 2003‘s Tiptoes, an epically awful, manically confused, and amazingly entertaining high profile flop with massive identity issues. 

Quick Plot: Matthew McConaughy plays Steven, a fireman instructor with a signature twang and dark family secret: he is the only over 5 footer in a family of dwarves. This could almost remain under wraps if it weren’t for two great excuses to plot a movie: a) the arrival of Steven’s twin brother Rolfe (Gary Oldman in what the trailer calls “the performance of a lifetime; whose lifetime it refers to is not specified) and b) the surprise pregnancy of Steven’s artist girlfriend Carol (Kate Beckinsale, constantly bewildered).

For most of his life, Steven has been rather ambivilant about his height and family’s lack thereof. We know this because Carol later questions the ambivilant Steven about his ambivalence while using the word ‘ambivalent’ about 19 times. His ambivalence is further emphasized when he inexpilcably brings a few tall ladies to a little person’s pool party, as if to imply an impending affair that is never referenced again.

In case you couldn’t guess from the intro, trailer, premise, or fact that you may never have heard of this movie, Tiptoes really not very good. At all. Directed by Freeway’s Matthew Bright, this bizarre direct-to-DVD enigma tries its little hands at a love story, slapstick comedy, human drama, and message movie while making a mess of just about everything and anyone that came near the film set. I’m at a loss for where to even begin, so in no particular order, here’s a list of what makes Tiptoes the first entry in my new series of Horrible Non-Horror!:

• Characters have what seem to be relationship-ending fights, only to inexplicably appear together and happy two scenes later.

• Peter Dinklage, playing a French Marxist, comes off as a really terrible actor

• The film’s best scene is a round table What To Expect When You’re Expecting A Little Person how-to wherein Beckinsale’s character asks the president of the Dwarf Society “If I do have this baby and turns out to be little, what does this mean for me?”

• The opening credits list each A-list actor before the title, probably because the editor was so amazed that such a collection of celebrities appear in this film

• The film finds the opportunity to feature big-on-little sex with none other than David Alan Grier doing some (thankfully) fully clothed thrusting

• Patricia Arquette plays a “free spirit” hitchhiker and somehow makes Juliette Lewis’ Mallory Knox look stable

• Every character that is not a little person or major celebrity has a thick Eastern European accent

• In a major confrontation, Kate Beckinsale heads to fireman training grounds in pajama pants, wedge heels, a tanktop, and winter hat

• After the birth of the little man, McConaughy taunts his wife by begging her to admit that “He’s a dwarf!” over and over again, which means we get this scene:

Which is actually a wonderful thing

What went wrong? Aside from the fact that this movie was written, one itching issue is the casting of Gary Oldman--no 10’ tall Tom Noonan but an average height fella--as a dwarf, which seems akin to modern blackface or Jonathon Pryce taping back his skin to play a Vietnamese pimp in Miss Saigon. Despite the fact that there’s marriage and a baby plus aftermath, it never feels like anything actually happens in the film. Beckinsale speaks as though she’s slowly emerging from light anesthesia, McConaughy’s character is written as a frustratingly bipolar jerk, and poor Peter Dinklage has no better line than “I am French!” 

Lessons Learned

Food is free because God wants us to eat

When attending a party hosted by little people, try to avoid sporting a gigantic updo that adds about 6” to your already towering height

For a smooth drink, mix some French cough syrup with cognac

Becoming a truck driver will turn a man evil

Winning Line

“You had a circle jerk with little people? I would’ve loved to see this!”

Wouldn’t we all Carol, wouldn’t we all.

Conclusion:

If you, like me, enjoy earnestly awful cinema like fine wine, then scoop Tiptoes from your local library and enjoy the strangely saccharine ride. Sadly, the DVD offers no behind-the-scenes insight or director commentary, but the very inclusion of the hysterically random trailer and fact that clear subtitles let you actually absorb all the horrendous dialogue is, in itself, something to thank the mini gods of movies for.  


Don't believe me? Enjoy the trailer and come back when you agree that when the going get tough, it's only the size of your heart that counts.