Critique of a Critique

For my college writing course, I had to find an article online that I disagreed with and debunk it. Sooo... yeah. I decided to find a critical review of HTTYD and see what the critic held against it. I found a pretty good one, and I had fun running around and seeing what he thought and seeing how I strongly disagreed with him! Anyway, I thought I might as well post it here!

Prepare for the fire breathing! When I read this assignment I knew immediately what I was going to do with it! Just a few days before, I had discovered a very critical review of the movie How To Train Your Dragon. Not only was the review not favorable, it was actually at points inaccurate. The author is a noted movie critic, so I expected more of him. Roger Ebert was well known for his concise and interesting opinions on film before his death. I would have hoped he would have put a little more work and thought into this review because it was highly unimpressive.

I will just go into a couple of his opinions and debunk them. He accuses the movie of being a film that aspires to be a video game. His reasoning behind it is due to the fact that the film has a fairly large amount of flight scenes in it, and these are handled with an over-the-shoulder camera angle at times. He also complains that the film spends far too much time doing that rather than developing the characters. He asks if anyone can remember when the protagonists of stories were teens and not children, and he even claims that the 3D was a complete waste of money. Every single one of these opinions is ridiculous.

First, the film does have a lot of flying, it has a lot of fights between good and evil dragons, but the real heart of the movie is the relationship between the boy and dragon. Sure, the flying is exciting enough to feel like a video game, but that is not its purpose in the film. Practically everyone who likes it likes it for the relationship between Hiccup and Toothless. It harkens back to other stories of great friendship and loyalty (the Lord of the Rings for one), and also has the classic and beautiful story of a boy befriending a powerful, fearsome, magnificent creature. In truth, much more of the movie is devoted to building the friendship of the boy and dragon. The whole second act is an exploration if that. Just because they fly during that does not mean there is no character development. How does one befriend a flying creature without riding it? How To Train Your Dragon is usually applauded for the beauty of the relationship between Hiccup and his dragon, but apparently Mr. Ebert missed something.

Roger Ebert also accused the movie of having a child protagonist and wished back for the days when it was older teens who were proving themselves. Quite frankly, he is completely incorrect. Hiccup, the protagonist, is fifteen in the film. He is not a ten year old as he is accused of being. Fifteen is a very unique, very interesting, age to delve into because it is in the middle of the teen years. Hiccup is certainly not a child, but he is not a man either, and this is actually one of the films strong points, not one of its weaknesses. I mean, come on! How many ten year olds have the beginnings of facial hair?

Finally, the review claimed that the 3D experience was not worth the money. Absolute rubbish. Many, many critics praised How To Train Your Dragon for its stunning use of 3D in the environments and flight scenes. It was extremely immersive and beautiful, and one professional critic went as far as to say that it rivaled the famous Avatar. This view, though possibly stated a little too strongly, is held by most everyone, including myself. The exhilaration of soaring behind a dragon in 3D is quiet the movie experience, and the way the 3D was subtly used to pull the viewer into the gorgeous landscape of the film was marvelous. Where this Ebert’s opinion came from, I really can’t say.

So, apologies for the length of this, but it was a topic I was itching to do. I respect Roger Ebert’s reviews usually, but I must say he really missed the mark on this. How To Train Your Dragon is a very popular movie, and with the approach of the sequel, it is becoming even more so. This movie, this wonderful film, is popular for good a reasons. Roger Ebert missed those reasons.