Reign of Fire
Reign of Fire is a 2002 action/science
fiction film directed by Rob Bowman and starring Christian Bale, Matthew McConaughey,
Izabella Scorupco, and Gerard Butler. It takes place in the year 2024 in England,
after dragons have reawakened. In Japan, the film was called Salamander.
Tagline:Fight Fire With Fire
Cast
Christian Bale - Quinn Abercromby
Matthew McConaughey - Denton Van Zan
Izabella Scorupco - Alex Jensen
Gerard Butler - Creedy
Scott Moutter - Jared Wilke (as Scott James Moutter)
David Kennedy -
Eddie Stax
Alexander Siddig - Ajay
Ned Dennehy - Barlow
Rory Keenan - Devon
Terence Maynard
- Gideon
Doug Cockle - Goosh
Randall Carlton - Burke
(Tito)
Chris Kelly - Mead
Ben Thornton - Young Quinn
Alice Krige
- Karen Abercromby
Plot
During Underground construction
in London around the year 2008, a huge, hibernating dragon is discovered and springs
to life, instantly incinerating all construction workers with its fiery breath.
The only survivor is the 12-year-old Quinn Abercromby (Ben Thornton), whose mother
(Alice Krige) was chief of the construction crew. The dragon escapes, and soon
thousands of them work their way through Europe and eventually the rest of the
world, burning everything, feeding on the ashes, and multiplying at an exponential
rate. The world powers use their most powerful weapons, but this only hastens
the destruction of the planet.
In 2024, the adult Quinn (played by Christian Bale) runs a medieval stone castle in Northumberland, a lonely bastion of mankind, afraid of the sky and the dragons that could attack any time. Their hope is to outlast the dragons, wait until they die out again (as they presumably did several times before) and go into hibernation. Unfortunately, the people are beginning to starve while waiting for their crops to ripen. Eddie Stax (David Kennedy) and his children attempt to leave the castle, but they actually lure a dragon to them. One of Eddie's children's friends, and one of his children, are killed by the dragon, and most of the crops are burned.
One day, a team of American dragonslayers arrive, led by Denton Van Zan (Matthew McConaughey) and bringing a Chieftain tank and an Agusta A109 helicopter, piloted by Alex (Izabella Scorupco). Mistrusting, but needing each other, the two leaders Quinn and Van Zan work together and eventually manage to kill the dragon that destroyed the crop. The inhabitants of the castle celebrate the victory, only to be chastised by Van Zan, who is disgusted by their behaviour, having lost three of his team in the battle.
Afterwards Van Zan and Alex tells Quinn that all dragons his unit have encountered so far are female. Their theory is that they are like fish, the females would lay their eggs, then the male would come and fertilize them, leaving them with the concept that there is only a single male within the whole dragon population world-wide.
Van Zan and his unit go to London to find the single male dragon, and discover a road block. Van Zan then sends Alex to find a new way around. The male dragon soon arrives and annihilates nearly the entire army. The male dragon follows their route back to the castle and destroys it. The castle inhabitants are however saved by hiding in an underground shelter that is designed to survive the intense heat, but Quinn's dear friend, Creedy (Gerard Butler), is killed, as he tries to go save more people in the castle.
Defeated, Van Zan returns to the castle, rescuing Quinn and the surviving children from the castle's cellar. Quinn tells Van Zan that they and Alex will hunt the male dragon in London. They use the helicopter to follow the coastline to the city, unnoticed, where they see that the dragons are beginning to starve and are resorting to cannibalism. Denton's plan is to fire an explosive charge, placed on a crossbow bolt, into the dragon's mouth during the brief moment it inhales, drawing air to produce fire. During the battle, Van Zan is unable to destroy the dragon using his crossbow and attacks the dragon with no more than his axe in a head-on leap. He is killed when the dragon swallows him in mid-air. Quinn and Alex are able to lure the dragon to street level and Quinn destroys it with his own crossbow.
At least three months after the male dragon is slain, Quinn and Alex are seen erecting a radio tower and receive a transmission from another group of survivors in France. The sun is shining brightly and it is implied that there have been no dragon sightings for quite some time.
The
film contained a trailer for Kingdom Hearts, one of the few films to contain a
trailer for the game.[citation needed]
The trailer for the movie included
the line "How did they go from one to a million in less than a year?"
which did not appear in the movie.
The trailer states that the film's opening
takes place in London 2084 A.D. when in fact it takes place 80 years earlier;
in 2008 A.D. The majority of the action doesn't take place in London, rather around
Northumberland.
Despite posters portraying London being destroyed by the dragons,
no such scene appears. Instead one only sees the ruins of London in two scenes,
one of which being the climax of the film. When it is first seen a soldier remarks
that it looks like the city was destroyed by nuclear weapons, and is corrected
by Van Zan.
Also, despite the posters also showing dragons being engaged by
human military forces, no such actions occur in the film, but are alluded to by
Van Zan.
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