Thanks for the memories!

Slow pace in the most part of the movie.

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

I moderate a bad movie screening series that's described as "A celebration of awful movies through semi-regular Monday night screenings by rotating hosts. From the polluted minds behind Good Things About Bad Movies and Halloween Horror Picks."Dragonfyre was the ninth bad movie we watched, and most of us thought it was actually rather decent. What follows is the mini review I shared with the group shortly after first watching the movie. - - - -Tonight's Bad Movie was pretty watchable, at least compared to the no budget SOV garbage we usually watch. That's not to say that Dragonfyre was good, exactly, but we all agreed that it has been undeservedly kicked in the shins on IMDb... 3.4 is definitely lower than our estimations.Still, at its core, this is a movie about a retired soldier (played by an underwear model) who finds himself the guardian of a dimensional portal that allows LARPers in Lord of the Rings costumes to hassle rednecks. There's something in there about an elf princess and a Native American stereotype too, not to mention a witch and a "fyre" breathing CGI dragon. Truthfully, the obnoxious spelling in the title might be the worst thing about this movie as I otherwise kinda enjoyed watching a redneck kill orcs with a shotgun for 90 minutes.

John Norton (Rusty Joiner) is not named John Carter because that would be too obvious. He buys an isolated farm and is an ex-soldier. The farm is located near a cave that is a portal to "The Nine Worlds." He has reluctantly obtained the position of "The Sentinel" a guardian of the portal between worlds. He is aided by a blind Native American.He is also tasked in saving the Elf Princess (Masiela Lusha) from an acting career and the hordes of Orcs who desire to capture her for sacrifice, a sacrifice that would open the portals and allow the Orcs to conquer other worlds with their bows and swords. Seriously. Oh yes they also have one Nazgul.The Orcs looked and grunted convincingly. The fire was all CG, apparently fire insurance is hard to come by. The storyline, as you can tell, wasn't great and at one point I had wished they had copied "John Carter" more, however the lack of a budget prevent exotic scenery . The production starts out as if it was going to be a decent film. But then suddenly everything takes place down on the farm. The idea of getting real help to combat an army of Orcs seems alien to John Norton, who would rather fight them alone save for the occasional person who drops by.This film is in no way connected to LOTR except for the fact it borrows species from it.A desperation rental.Parental Guide: No f-bombs, sex, or nudity. Filmed in Salt Lake City.

This movie features a large body count. With all the mayhem it's easy to overlook characters that stayed engaging, some funny lines and the beautiful Texas scenery. This is an action movie and every human in the film is either an action hero or a horror victim. There are some satisfying plot culminations, and the action hero subverts a trope through a poker bluff, which takes some mindful writing. Each character who lasted more than a scene had development. Is this movie original? I've never seen a US Marine type guy fight off a horde of Orcs before, and the gun loving human side of me enjoyed the fantasy of a heroic battle an old D&D foe. The movies I'd compare it too have a tragic historical connotation of imperialism such as Zulu. There are too many movies with white protagonists slaughtering hordes of dark skinned people. As this takes place in Texas, it's impossible to separate borderland narratives in the real world from the story of this man protecting a boundary between worlds. This movie is not alone, LOTR sets the standard. This is my gripe with fantasy overall and is not specific to this movie. This movie is a mishmash of genres but is mostly a Western with Fantasy elements. It is very violent, around 1/4th as violent as Rambo 4. There is one scene that is like a tribute to Friday the 13th movies, but generally the violence is Action in nature and not Horror. There are two pulp scenes. There was no sexual violence.

"Orc Wars" (aka "Dragonfyre") was like watching a recording of a LARP event. And personally I am not one to enjoy the whole LARP scene, and I surely wasn't impressed by this movie.The orcs, well they looked like something that was copied and pasted right out of something from the Tolkien universe. So whether or not that was good, well that is debatable. Sure, the costumes and armors were great, but it was just lacking originality, because it had all been seen in the "Lord of the Rings" movies. But they get an effort for trying and for putting this much effort into the costumes.For the story, well just don't get your hopes up here, because the storyline was just downright embarrassing to witness. It was as stupid as it was uninspiring.The acting was fair enough, just don't expect anything groundbreaking or overly innovative here.As much as I enjoy sword and sorcery fantasy, then "Orc Wars" was just bad entertaining and a waste of time. And truth be told, then I actually fell asleep during this and had to get up and turn it off to find something else to catch my interest and attention. I got no idea how it ended, because I gave up about half way into the movie or so, and even there having missed out on a lot of it from falling asleep...