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Directed by: Stefen Fangmeier Starring: Jeremy Irons, Edward Speleers Well, there is so much I could say here. But I think I can narrow it down to this - Eragon the book rocks. Eragon the movie sucks big floppy donkey dick. Sweet merciful CRAP it was bad. It is awkwardly edited, horribly directed, entirely contrived and hackneyed. It's so lame, that even the visual effects can't save it. Things are revealed that shouldn't be yet, major characters are completely left out or horribly miscast, the pace is rushed and it smacks of amateurism. It was painful to watch. Being that this is a dragon movie, you'd think they would put more into the CGI effects, but they're just *OK*.. nothing to write home about. But they weren't horrible either so I gave the movie it's due and gave it 1 star here for this reason. Jeremy Irons portrayal of Brom did nothing to help this movie. I kept waiting for him to reach offscreen and grab an Oscar a'la the Mask as if it were all a joke. This movie is also perhaps the worst use of John Malkovich ever. Other than spouting a few barely menacing lines he does nothing here. Durza? A bad Christopher Walken impression. So.. save yourself the $9 bucks and watch the trailer. RATING: 1 PROS: It ended CONS: Everything from the opening to the credits ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/eragon/ TheMaskedMarauder fucked around with this message at 05:02 on Dec 16, 2006 |
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Dec 16, 2006 04:54
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I took my brother to see this. He is 10. He thought it was bad. THAT'S A REALLY, REALLY HARD THING TO ACCOMPLISH. I was not a big fan of Narnia, I thought it was too childish, but at least it wasn't just plain bad like this movie. I don't want to repeat everything Marauder said but the movie was missing so much information from the book that it just didnt flow. In the books I took the Shade (Durza) to be more like a red nazgul, not a short dude with white face makeup. Poor form Malkovich. RATING: 1 PROS: There is a slight possibility the second one will be more like the book and therefore decent to good. CONS: Was so bad I felt motivated to post on an internet forum about it.
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Dec 16, 2006 07:57
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This will be filled with spoilers, because I'm going to explain exactly why this movie was bad. Don't read this if you haven't read the book and want to. (And you should.) Firstly, I understand that cuts have to be made to fit a novel into a ~2 hour movie. Everything was OK up until he tried to get Saphira to fly. Then everything went to pot. Growing to full size in a matter of minutes? Eh. And then 'HAY LETS GO SEE THE VARDEN'. Which is the exact opposite of what Brom did in the book. It just grated the way they butchered so many good plot points in order to pander to a lot of kids' short attention spans. Especially the distance from Carvahall to the Beors - I week's riding? It's supposed to be much farther than that. Synopsis of spoiler - Echoing what others have said - they really did just rip too much out of it, and mended the holes rather badly. I will add one good point - I think for the most part the Casting was spot on. Brom was good, Eragon was OK, Arya was great, the voice of Saphira was great. Some of the other smaller cast members were excellent too - Sloan the butcher was spot on. However, Angela, what the gently caress? Way too young. And Murtagh was a bit iffy too. Now, I'll mention something else - I don't see how there can be a sequel. I'll explain - THEY KILLED THE loving RA'ZAC. Half of the second book is about the Ra'zac, and Rorans quest to find and kill them. THis also closely involves Joed, who they totally ignored. Also missing are Elva, the girl Eragon blessed, who plays a part in the second story, the tension between Arya and Eragon, and Orik the dwarf. I don't see how they can save Eldest from the gently caress-ups they've made in this movie, without destroying it even further. Overall, I was pretty disappointed with how it came out. If I hadn't read the books before seeing it, I might have liked it, but I'm glad I purposefully went out and got them before seeing it. So glad. And you should do the same. PROS: Casting was good for the most part CONS: They butchered it and the story suffered. Rating: 2 AirRaid fucked around with this message at 11:50 on Dec 16, 2006 |
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Dec 16, 2006 11:47
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Juvenile and amateurish. I didn't really like the book, but I tried the movie because sometimes I like the movie more than a book. Not in this case. The movie was boring, hackeneyed, cliched, and overall forgettable. What's so frustrating is that Jeremy Irons is one of the best actors of our generation and he keeps signing on for these shitfest movies (Dungeons & Dragons comes to mind). It's really too bad. If you ever get a chance to go to London, see him in whatever Shakespeare he's doing at the time and you'll appreciate how truly talented he is. Not this stinker, though. 1.5
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Dec 16, 2006 23:39
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I have never read the books, but from I could tell it was halfassed and was missing a good hunk of everything. For one, I didn't care for the characters. I found myself not caring for their lives. Everything was rushed, the editing was crap, the cinematography put me to sleep, so much information was missing that I found myself having NO idea that was going on, but still I took a stab in the dark at it and found that my assumptions were correct because the story was so generic and cliche in the first place. The dialogue was elementary and forced. Film is about story telling, it failed in every aspect. Pros: I snuck a couple cans of Canadian Dry Cons: The movie loving sucked 1
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Dec 17, 2006 09:43
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On a literary level the book is horrible. On every level the movie is horrible. .5
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Dec 17, 2006 22:15
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Ever listen to Rhapsody, Dragonforce, or Dio? Ever find yourself believing in the glory of steel, or the power of the dragonflame? No? Well, I have. I enjoy the cheese, the epic feel, the heavy metal spirit of Eragon. I sure as gently caress enjoy a dragon or two, that's the truth. Jeremy Irons delivered the goods as Brom, injecting years of experience into cliche lines and making them mean something. John Malkovich chewed up the scenery with gusto, and was fun to watch. The newcomer they got to play Eragon did a handsome job, he was considerably less wooden than you'd expect. It's the classic struggle of good versus evil, on a backdrop painted from 80's album covers. If Jeremy Irons giving an epic speech about the glorious age of dragon riders left you unaffected, then the riddle of steel is lost on you. 5/5
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Dec 18, 2006 15:28
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I didn't think it was that bad. Of course, I didn't read the books or any reviews before seeing it. One reviewer summed it up pretty well as "Star Wars: A New Hope with dragons, except not really good". That description is surprisingly uncanny. Some of the problems are that the movie starts off with a long expositional dialogue and I wondered if I should have been taking notes. I laughed every time the stolen stone was vaguely referred to simply as "a stone", as if that was supposed to mean anything to me. Eragon starts out too arrogant and cocky, and somehow becomes competent without explanation for his competence and without learning a lesson to make him less arrogant. Even after he loses the training duel with Obi-Wan Guy, he's still arrogant. That was annoying. It feels like some of the Jedi Pupil learning stuff was cut out, there is no explanation for how he learns some of the things he does, he just does them. There are only a handful of characters with screen time, and only Eragon and Obi-Wan Guy have any characterization, the others aren't interesting or fleshed out. I also didn't like the ending - it wasn't an ending, it felt more like "to be continued" (although it wasn't), and it made me wonder why I sat through an hour and a half to get what amounts to a "to be continued". I also have to wonder if there's even enough plot left for a part 2. In the view of a non-book reader, this was a mediocre movie, but not abombinable. 2.5/5
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Dec 18, 2006 15:55
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This movie was not good. I haven't read the book yte, but plan to. Wish I had before seeing the movie, because I have a feeling that the Shade and Malkovich's character might have been cool had I been able to project my own interpretation of them. But as it is, I can't imagine that even when I read it I'll be able to completely obliterate two of the worst villain portrayals I've ever seen in a movie that is expected to be taken seriously. The pacing and sense of time passing was probably the worst thing about this movie, although believe me when I tell you that it was all bad. There's a line right near the end where the elf woman jokingly says "Yesterday you were but a farmboy, and today you are a hero!" She was exaggerating, of course, because many months had passed (apparently) since all this had happened. But you'd never know it. When she said that it really felt like all that ridiculous poo poo happened in one dumb, badly acted day. I hated Eragon. 1/5 for the kind of cool shadowdragon thing, that I hear wasn't even in the book to begin with.
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Dec 18, 2006 16:54
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This movie is a complete peice of trash. It is not like the book. If you enjoyed the book do not watch this movie as it will piss you off a great deal. 1/5
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Dec 18, 2006 20:33
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Dear god this movie was retched. In fact, the only good part was the fact that the group I went to see it with were constantly making fun of how it ripped off both Star Wars and LoTR. I have never read the book, and after this, I don't want to. You can tell that Eragon was written by a 15 year old with friends in the publishing industry. I felt like I paid to watch a horrible sci-fi channel movie. Also jumping on the "worst use of John Malkovich in a movie". He was like Darth Maul, with an overabundance of lines. 1/5
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Dec 19, 2006 03:58
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No discussion in the review forum. That means one post per thread.
Somebody fucked around with this message at 08:04 on Dec 19, 2006 |
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Dec 19, 2006 05:16
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I saw Eragon a few nights ago with some friends, two of which had read the book. I enjoyed watching the movie on a level of, let's say, enjoying the pretty pictures, but overall I thought it was fairly cheesy and poorly directed. If you really enjoy special effects and fantasty stuff, it's worth seeing on the big screen - the dragon is animated REALLY well and integrated into the world with a kind of weight that such things generally lack, and the magic effects (exploding arrow thing and "dragon vision" or whatever it's called) are very nice as well. The acting, I thought, was pretty good, with one major exception: John Malkovich. Yes, he's fun because of who he is, but seriously... he's the one guy in the whole movie with an American accent, except it's a weird American accent because it's John Malkovich. If I was the director of this movie, and had a huge budget, and already had Jeremy Irons and everyone else cast, and John Malkovich showed up and started talking the way he does... I would have fired him immediately. It's completely distracting and ridiculous. Robert Carlyle chews the gently caress out of the scenery and is REALLY fun to watch, but is a cliched character who inexplicably has constantly changing makeup. The movie's sense of passage of time is atrocious, and that is really distracting even to someone who hasn't read the book. It feels like it takes a week for the entire movie to happen, when apparently it takes many months. The dragon does in fact grow to full maturity in about a minute. I read that in a review before I saw the movie and couldn't believe a film would be so stupid, but there it is. The direction is sloppy and sometimes completely lacks style. The first shot in the movie is a dutch angle, on the ground in a forest, with horses riding by. The ultimate cliched start to an action sequence with horses. The hand to hand combat is poorly directed and gives no sense of tension. The sound design is actually pretty drat good, except that the music is occasionally SO loving CHEESY that it distracted me from the movie. There's only so much of "HAPPY TRIUMPHANT ORCHESTRA MUSIC" I can take, especially when it only pops up for twenty seconds to highlight some minor skirmish. Plus major points for sound effects and fun stuff like that, but minus points for excessive use of the rumbly subwoofer method of creating excitement. The script is also full of very clichéd lines, though since the movie was so cheesy they didn't always draw me out of the film. There was a bit of laughing at these lines in the audience I saw the film with, though, so your mileage may vary. One of my friends who read the book walked out towards the end. He said he would have left earlier, but he didn't want to sit out in the lobby waiting for the rest of us for too long. I realize this review is repeating a lot of what other people have said, but I thought I'd give a fairly detailed rundown of what I thought anyway... hopefully this will be helpful. edit: NEARLY FORGOT! Shadowdragon thing was, in fact, awesome. When it appeared with Carlyle riding it, that was the most badass moment in the film. Unfortunately, this is entirely a fabrication of the film, so bleh.
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Dec 19, 2006 19:30
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I'd have to agree with this. Plus, the trailer was far better than the actual movie. O_o
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Dec 22, 2006 04:57
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I went into this movie wanting to hate it, mostly because I wanted to watch Stranger Than Fiction and my boyfriend made us go to this instead. In the first three minutes I wanted it to be over. When it ended, I didn't want it to end. I really liked this movie, which I think is even more of a big deal because I was so against watching it in the first place. Yes, it was cheesy, and simplistic, but fantasy movies always are, and that's what you should expect going into a PG(?) movie about dragons. I liked the characters a lot, especially Saphira. I could tell that there were gaps in the plot but it was certainly no Goblet of Fire, in which the first 200 pages are condensed into ten minutes worth of movie. The only thing that ruined it for me was that my boyfriend kept telling me how much of the plot they were leaving out. I think I was better off not having read the book before I saw the movie. I don't think I would have enjoyed it as much otherwise. 4/5
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Dec 24, 2006 01:57
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It's an amazing accomplishment to have every single line of dialogue make me roll my eyes. .5/5
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Dec 27, 2006 17:49
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"I wanna write a book!" "Oh? What about?" "Well, it's gonna be about a DRAGON! It's called Eragon!" "Isn't that just 'dragon' with an 'e' on the front instead of a 'd'?" "Oh, that's just there to distract people from realizing that I'm just rewriting Star Wars, but crossing out 'millennium falcon' and writing 'Saphira'. *1 year later* "Man that Two Towers movie was SO COOL! I'm gonna make my book JUST LIKE THAT!" "But haven't you already written half of it? I mean, you're almost up to the part where the dragon is going to blow up the death-star-esque war machine..." "Screw that! I'll put in the battle of Helm's Deep instead! That way, if my book gets published and eventually turns into a lovely movie someday, I can watch it and say 'man, this is SO much lamer than Two Towers!" 4.5/5 for comedy value
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Dec 28, 2006 06:52
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This movie is a giant piece of crap. It looks like it the words for the script were thrown into the washing machine and then randomly drawn out. It is missing so much stuff that the movie could have expanded on, but failed. I'm usually a sucker for Fantasy movies, but this just didn't have anything of quality. Well the CGI was ok.. It's incredibly short and not worth any amount of money you have to pay for it...even if that amount is .10 canadian cents. 1/5
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Dec 28, 2006 10:11
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The only points it gets from me are the "so horrible it's funny" parts. That book may not have been the best of the best, but it deserved better. 1/5
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Dec 28, 2006 20:31
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This movie was painful. Its only saving grace was that I only paid 6 dollars to see. Though I mourn the loss of that 6 dollars daily since I saw it. 1 is too generous. 0 is more appropriate.
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Dec 28, 2006 23:39
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I bathed in cheese. I've never hated a movie this much in my life. Five minutes in, I knew I wanted to leave, but my little sister forced me to stick it out. If you are a fan of the books, don't be like, "oh well I'm a fan, I've gotta see it for posterity." NO. DON'T. Avoid it like the plague. 1
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Dec 31, 2006 05:06
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I haven't read the book, nor do I plan to. My wife and 11 year-old have read the book and I've overheard much of it on audio-book. There's no need for me to read the book because I can see the ending coming a mile a way. Anybody that's watched a movie in the last 10 years can predict the outcome. I understand that it was written by a 15-year-old kid that was heavily influenced by pop-culture sci-fi and fantasy, but that does not mean it had to be published for Christ's sake. I have to wonder how much editing was done by the publisher... ...which brings me to the the movie. Can you imagine a room full of professional movie makers sitting around trying to piece together scenes that won't have the Tolkien Estate and G. Lucas sending hordes of stormtrooper orc lawyers to sue their rear end back to the "small farming village of fantasy staple" that they grew up in? "The description of the Razak sound too much like ring wraiths, let's make them covered in worms and poo poo." "Don't give the elves pointed ears and let's make the dwarves kind of tall..." When in comes the director, Stefen Fangsomething totally new to directing but all full of ideas from his works as a special effects guy. "Let's make the sword all flame up for no loving reason because flames are cool! Let's make the scene where the scary shade guy promotes one of his guyswhoarenotorcs just like in that cool Empire Strikes Back movie! Let's make sure to hide the fact that the dragon is CGI by constantly covering Eragon's legs with the wings, because that's what I learned in FX school! I GOT IT!!! Let's make the shade guy's make-up change from inconsistent tattoos to decomposing scary undead thing with no chap-stick in sight!! More fire!!! More fireball spells!! FIRE IS COOL!!!!!!" Ironically enough, one of the previews before the movie started was for "Epic Movie". I entertained myself throughout the movie by imagining all the parodies that will result from it's making. When the garage door closed on the rebel cave hide-out. The "just add wind" formula for the dragon's growth spurts. Eragon's ability to learn spells that he was never taught and his ability to become a master swordsman/dragon rider apparently by just giving it a good honest try a few times. The greasy-haired goth-emo character of Murtag. And finally the ability of John Malkovich to exist in the vacuum of his greatness, totally immune to the European accents of all the other characters around him. Conclusion: Horribly derivative book gets turned into horribly derivative movie that tries to save itself by making changes that amount to "MORE FIREBALLS AND CGI!!!" But I'm easy to please; there were explosions and a dragon and my 11-year-old thought it was cool. I expect the Dungeon Siege movie to be better. 3/5
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Dec 31, 2006 20:21
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I started watching this with the expectation that I would want to rip my face out the way people were reviewing this movie. It was far from as terrible as everyone is making it out to be. In fact, my biggest beef with the movie was the way they butchered the story. The acting was OK, the CG was OK. AirRaid pretty much got everything spot on in my opinion. Voting a 2.5/5. Not a fantastic movie, but not overly terrible either.
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Jan 5, 2007 23:52
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I took my son out to see this as an Xmas present from his aunt. Oh lordie. I knew it would be bad. He and I are fans of the books and I'd been following information about the movie. Hell, I'll just list my gripes. Rachel Weisz has an awesome set of tits, but that doesn't make her a good voice talent. Saphira takes more time to mature from being 18" long to 24" long than she does from 24" long to 24 feet long. What the unholy gently caress were they thinking? A montage could have taken 30 seconds of screen time. Instead we get flashing pretty colors and POOF adult dragon in 15 seconds of story time. Galbatorix. Why does he even make an appearance. Furthermore, why is John Malkovich, probably the single most overrated line-reader (I won't say actor because he isn't) playing him? Good god he sucked. Angela. Why is she a 12 year-old mallrat? Who the gently caress was that girl? She couldn't act her way out of a cloud of steam. Why does Eragon look nothing like Murtagh? They're brother's for gently caress's sake. As my wife stated, "Saphira isn't blue enough". They have dug themselves into a mighty deep hole with the way they mangled the plot. I doubt that they could make Eldest now. 1/5. I would have given it .5/5 except for Jeremy Irons as an awesome Bronn, even if his dialogue was all mangled.
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Jan 8, 2007 23:27
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Just got back from the theater. Eragon was terrible. I'll sit through nearly anything, sure, but right about the point where Brom kicked the bucket, I wanted to walk out. If I hadn't been there with friends, I very likely would have. The movie is beautiful, it has that much going for it. But it doesn't really have a sense of style, and doesn't do anything new. It's got sparkle... but sparkle does you no good if you just fling it around haphazardly. The plot? Ugh. I hate stories that are carried along by the power of stupid people doing stupid things, because their opponents are even stupider. The editing was choppy, rushing from scene to scene with far too much haste (and too little respect for continuity and time of day, holy fuggin' geez.) There was just no time to get to know and root for the characters. I never felt concerned for anyone involved. I was bored. There was a shining moment of wicked-cool fighting towards the end, but that's about all that Eragon had going for it. Maybe I'll read the book, and maybe I won't want to bludgeon myself unconsious with it... but ugh, this was a bad movie. 1.5/5 for this one. It gets points for shiny dragons and Jeremy Irons, and that's about it.
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Jan 10, 2007 04:45
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It was bad, but it wasn't that bad. I'd say it's about on par with The Phantom Menace. ... poo poo. When I put it like that, it was bad. Oh well, I enjoyed the special effects at the end and enjoyed laughing at the bad dialogue. It should be said that I went into this entirely blind and had never even heard of the book. It is also worth pointing out that while I love films I have never studied them, so things like editting and the finer details often pass me by. That said, the editting in this was awful, and there were several shots and scenes that I cannot understand why they didn't reshoot. In particular there's a bit where Malkovich is talking, and he goes down a step, and his voice does that "shake" thing that happens when you jump while you're talking. Things like that. It was a 5 second shot. How hard could it have been to reshoot it. How did people not notice. In short, just watch the final battle, it looks really pretty. I'm giving it a 1.5 and every point of that is for the final battle. Iblys fucked around with this message at 07:12 on Jan 23, 2007 |
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Jan 23, 2007 07:10
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For anyone thinking of seeing this because Jeremy Irons is in it, I want to remind you that Jeremy Irons also did Dungeons and Dragons. This movie was awful. 0/5
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Jan 29, 2007 19:00
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This movie is awful. At first I was very excited to see this movie after reading the first book. Once the trailer came out I became a little skeptical but nevertheless I was going to see this movie. In short, I have never wanted to walk out a movie in my entire life. Even if it was some chick flick that I had to watch with my girlfriend. Do not see this movie if you want to keep yourself from shoving your soda straw into your eyeball. On a positive note it is pretty drat funny. .5/5
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Feb 9, 2007 03:00
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