Being the weekend, the wife and I went to the movies and since nothing else was running in town we ended up going to D-War. Now this is a movie that has been panned by the critics and I was aware of the same, but still thought it would be bearable and not an ordeal which thankfully it was not, but even then the movie itself does not have anything going for it. The only thing worth mentioning albeit in passing are the FX/special effects, but the movie fails miserably on all other fronts starting with the story, however, youngsters and young teens might find it entertaining. D-War starts with a premise that could have been developed into a better movie, but right from the inordinate delays in releasing the movie and the bad press and also with its tag of the most expensive Korean movie ever, D-War it seems was doomed to fail even before it took off.
Coming to the story, well it’s about giant snakes and how one of them gets to become an immortal dragon once every few millennia. The millennium does arrive upon us or rather on a tiny Korean village 500 years ago and for a giant snake called Imoogi to become an immortal dragon it needs to devour a young girl born in the village with a tattoo of a dragon on her shoulder. There also appears out of nowhere another bad Imoogi who wants to devour the girl and become the all powerful Imoogi with immortality and he sets about his army on the tiny village to destroy it completely and get him the girl. All this while an old man who knows the Imoogi story has been training a young apprentice to become the girl’s bodyguard and make sure she gets devoured by the good Imoogi when the time arrives. Unfortunately for us, the young man and the girl are in love and they end up trying to cheat destiny, but what follows is both fall to their death in a suicide pact.
We move forward 500 years to L.A. when the girl is reborn as Sarah (Amanda Brooks) whose time it is to become snake food again at 19 and the boyfriend is reborn as Ethan (Jason Behr) a reporter who knows the legend as a kid since his old teacher too is reborn as Robert Forster and who wants his pupil to complete what he failed to do 500 years ago in the Korean village. As Amanda nears 19, the bad Imoogi is upon L.A. along with his army and they set about tearing apart L.A. with the army and the FBI in hot pursuit. One of the FBI guys believes in the Korean legend so we have the FBI trying to locate Sarah and the army is out saving the city from giant snakes and other exotic creatures. There is a fight sequence between army helicopters with missiles and fire throwing dragons, something no one has thought of before. Most of the movie takes place in this scenario with Ethan and Sarah running away, the bad Imoogi and his evil army chasing them, and the US Army and the FBI trying to save the city and locate Sarah at the same time. This time around too Ethan wants to save Sarah and run away with her since he again falls for her, but fortunately for us this time around Sarah is in her senses and opts to become snake fodder so that the good Imoogi can become a dragon. The final fight between the good Imoogi and the bad Imoogi should have been longer, more drawn out and laden with FX, but unfortunately it’s not and falls flat, something that you will find throughout the movie which ends up being the reason for its downfall. How does it all end? Well as expected good triumphs over evil and Sarah does not exactly become snake fodder, but rather her soul is taken by the good Imoogi and Sarah turns into an angel or an ethereal creature who promises Ethan she will wait for him and that they will be together forever whatever that means!!!
Korean director Hyung-rae Shim did have the right idea with D-War, but the execution fails on all fronts. It is really sad that with so much money on hand the entire team still managed to come up with something so uninspiring and lacking in soul and spirit. The special FX though would win points on some counts, but they alone do not make a movie, at least not yet.
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