REVIEW: ‘How to Train Your Dragon 3’ and old-fashioned romance
Fans of romantic movies often watch the Hallmark Channel. As for me, I’ll take the newest How to Train Your Dragon film.
Don’t get me wrong: I, too, enjoy squeaky-clean romantic flicks starring Candace Cameron-Bure. I’ve seen every Love Finds You film out there. (They’re on UP TV.)
But those movies don’t hold the attention of my children, who need to see positive role models on the big screen falling in love. How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World (PG), which opens this weekend, fills that void.
It is the third film in the How to Train Your Dragon series and follows the story of a dragon-loving Viking named Hiccup, who was 15 when the series began but is now a 20-year-old adult. Hiccup taught his people to live peacefully with dragons. He how to train your dragon 3 watch online free
taught them to appreciate dragons, not kill them. He even has a dragon pet, named Toothless.The Hidden World opens with Hiccup and his friends roaming the countryside to set caged dragons free from poachers. The dragons then fly back to Hiccup’s village, Berk, where they live alongside other level-headed Vikings.
Not everyone, though, agrees with Hiccup. In fact, most Vikings don’t.
A poacher named Grimmel the Grisly then enters the story. He’s the meanest dragon-killer out there, and he’s searching for Hiccup. If Hiccup is found, then the thousands of dragons he’s protecting will be endangered.
Yet Hiccup has a plan. It involves finding a Bermuda Triangle-like location where dragons originate. It’s across the ocean, at the edge of world, and — if found — could provide a save home for the dragons forever.
That’s the plot.
Love, though, is the theme of The Hidden World. We see Hiccup and his girlfriend, Astrid, finally get serious about marriage. We watch Toothless, a rare night fury dragon, find a mate who is just like him. And we learn how Hiccup’s deceased father, Stoick, remained committed to the love of his life, Valka. Fans of the series will remember that Valka was taken by a dragon and presumed dead. Through flashbacks, we watch a young Hiccup ask his father: Are you going to get us a new mom? Stoick responds: I don’t want another. Your mom was the only woman for me.
Stoick then tells Hiccup: “There’s no greater gift than love.”
It’s a scene pulled straight out of a Hallmark movie and plopped into a dragon cartoon. Of course, the point isn’t not to remarry. The point is to be committed to the one you’re with. That’s what the Bible teaches about marriage, right? It’s a much-needed message for our hook-up culture.
There are other lessons, too, including about leadership, courage, self-doubt and humility. There’s a broader message for the culture about living with peace with your neighbor. (Grimmel wants to kill the dragons because humans are superior. Hiccup just wants both sides to live harmoniously.)
The Hidden World isn’t a perfect film — we hear “oh my gods” and “for Thor’s sake,” among other exclamations — but the violence remains in mostly kid-friendly territory. There’s no blood. There’s no dead bodies.
Overall, it’s family-friendly … and a fun flick.
Entertainment rating: 3 out of 5 stars. Family-friendly rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars.
BIRDS OF PREY (AND THE FANTABULOUS EMANCIPATION OF ONE HARLEY QUINN)Margot Robbie is the most adorable sociopath you’d ever want to hang out and blow stuff up with in “Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn).”
The sour “Suicide Squad” gave us a little taste of the artist formerly known as Harleen Quinzel in 2016, when she was the Joker’s dutifully violent girlfriend; “Birds of Prey” offers a veritable smorgasbord of this DC Comics super-villain in all her charismatic, complicated glory. By detailing the character’s origin story and establishing her own franchise, director Cathy Yan pulls off the tricky feat of blending elaborate action sequences with compelling character development, of transporting us to a richly specific Gotham City but sprinkling in just the right amount of pop-culture references, ranging from Bernie Sanders to Tweety Bird to Frida Kahlo.
From its lively and vibrant animated opening, Yan’s film is a complete blast, filled with zippy energy and irresistible girl power. And Robbie, in her seemingly endless versatility, is up for every challenge in a role that’s as demanding physically as it is verbally. She is positively infectious in the candy-colored chaos she creates.Robbie shines radiantly at the film’s center as the newly single Harley Quinn – whether she’s rhapsodizing about a hangover-curing bacon-and-egg breakfast sandwich or emerging from a cloud of rainbow-colored glitter and smoke in slow motion, a sly grin on her made-up face. But Robbie gets great help from a diverse and talented array of co-stars, including Jurnee Smollett-Bell, displaying serious action chops in the fierce, physical role of songstress Black Canary. The script from Christina Hodson (“Bumblebee”) is a muscular celebration of feminine strength, of women discovering and honing their powers to prop each other up in a world where men keep letting them down – or worse. These are ladies who will happily offer each other a hair tie before heading into battle together.
But after a thrilling first act with its self-referential humor, cheeky graphics and knowing narration, “Birds of Prey” drags in the middle as it jumps around in time and establishes the backstories for the various “birds” with whom Harley will team up eventually. This seems sort of inevitable when going through the motions of setting up new characters within a burgeoning franchise, but the downshift feels jarring compared to the fast-paced section that preceded it.
Besides Black Canary, the nightclub singer whose voice carries overpowering sonic waves, there’s Mary Elizabeth Winstead as the amusingly stoic and socially awkward Huntress, who’s spent her whole life training to exact revenge with a crossbow. Rosie Perez’s Renee Montoya is a bit underdeveloped as a former Gotham City police detective who’s battling her demons even as she finds new purpose as a vigilante. And Ella Jay Basco brings a naturalism to the role of teenage pickpocket Cassandra Cain, who draws them all together when she steals the film’s MacGuffin – a valuable diamond – from the head honcho to mob boss Roman Sionis, aka Black Mask (Ewan McGregor).
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