In the Name of the King: Two Worlds

A sequel with only a tenth of the budget of its predecessor obviously doesn't stand a chance in the comparison. Instead of Burt Reynolds as a king facing an army of 1000 Orcs in leather armour, you get some unknown young man as a king with an army of 20 extras in black cotton. The fortress looks like anyone could destroy it on a Monday morning. The dragon shows some professional CGI effects, one rare point that exceeds the expectations. Nevertheless, if you decide to do a fantasy movie when you are forced to make many restrictions, either the story and characters must save the day (like in 'Warrior Angels'), or you make uncompromising, hilarious trash (such as 'Barbarian Queen'). In "Two Worlds", neither of these two possibilities is accomplished, it must be said.

Movies where fantasy heroes are traveling to the modern age (from 'Beastmaster 2' to 'Masters of the Universe') are usually cheesy. They fortunately tried the other way around here and moved a modern day hero to the distant past: Dolph Lundgren. As Granger the Stranger, he has unusual things to worry about, like drinking water probably full of bacteria, and he certainly has no respect for kings and witches. Natassia Malthe gets the funniest part, which must have been a nice change for her after the Bloodrayne stuff: she is a doctor trying to find out more about the medicine of the future. The story is well paced, so the 90 minutes passed quickly, but I was left with a feeling that I didn't quite get what I expected.

Let me begin by saying that I found the first "In the Name of the King" quite entertaining and I gave it a 7 or 8 stars, if I recall correctly, even though it didn't deserve them. This film may not even deserve the three I'm giving it. I'm trying my best to think up of something coherent to say in this film's defence, and I find it quite problematic. Even if we forget about the blatantly obvious car behind the trees in a few medieval scenes, there's still a lot of problems remaining. The acting feels unnatural, events happen for no reason, epic armies consist of ten men on each side. Come on, herr Boll! You did far better with the first one. Yes, the first one was hands-down better. I thought about racking my brains on some of the things and events in the film, but this will mean that I should include spoilers, which I wouldn't really like.

The largest problem however seems to be that the film attempts to be "larger" than it is. It tries to imply that it's grand, while constantly contradicting itself through the points suppiled above.

I really like this film's poster though. Please, dear reader, open a new tab with the picture and analyse it. You see our hero Granger clad in what seems to be full plate armour, holding a longsword heroically. You see a battle of epic proportions happening in the background. You see a fair lady dish out the pain using a hand-and-a-half sword or something like that. You see a dragon that breathes fire with devastating effect. You see that guy with the beard on the left of the sword-maiden (played by Aleks Paunovic) about to stab someone in this conflict of epic proportions. You see a great city, or at least a part of it, in the background. What I really like about this poster is that the film also contradicts each and every single damn thing in it. Not ONE thing is the same as the poster portrays it.

If you're a masochist like I would appear to be (for watching yet another Boll-film), or if you like bad films like I do, go ahead and give it a watch. Else, please go and watch something more entertaining. Your life is more valuable than this film.

It amazes me that people are still giving this guy money to make movies. He has yet again demonstrated that he should never ever ever make another movie again. The story was probably one of the worst ideas he has had yet. After the last movie with a great cast being, yet another, total let down I didn't have high expectations on this one. Even with the extremely low expectations I had going in to this one it was worse than I could possibly imagine. The acting was mediocre, and the overall plot was not interesting at all. I was ashamed that Dolf even took the part in this movie.

Save your money and don't bother with this.

To be fair to this movie, it might have had a chance had it been directed and produced by someone else - anyone else - than the now infamous Uwe Boll. Mr Boll can perhaps most accurately be described as a modern-day Ed Wood, and is at best a director whose work produces performances of the finest teak, whose stories have the gravitas and literacy of a MacDonalds burger wrapper, the visual crafting and fine artistic sensibilities of a no parking sign, and whose cinematic inspiration apparently stems solely from bargain bin video games of the 1980s.

If you want to know what this film is like, simply look up Uwe's resume on this website and check out any or all of the titles he has written, directed and produced. They are all pretty much on the same level. How he still draws in investors to any project he is connected to mystifies me completely.

But there is one great thing about Uwe Boll. I know with absolute certainty that if his name is on the credits in any capacity whatsoever, to avoid that film like the plague. Somehow I missed seeing it with this film, my attention being drawn aside by the fact that apparently Jason Statham was in the first In the Name of the King movie. I should pay more attention. Mea culpa.

Thank you.

Uwe Boll is the stuff of legends, he's a director so detested that he's become one of those things that is trendy to hate. People slate him and rate his movies without even seeing them and I find that a damn shame.

The trouble with Boll is he doesn't have a style, you watch a Bruckheimer/Bay/Spielberg/Nolan etc film you can tell it's one of theres whereas Boll has no identity beyond his love of adapting video games.

I personally don't think the hatred is justified, yes he's done some stinkers and yes the man himself is a lunatic but he has done some very enjoyable films as well.

In The Name Of The King (2007) wasn't one of them, but it was passable. This sequel however is a cliched mess.

It was doomed from the outset, Lungren turned the roll down and only later changed his mind due to his divorce and financial situation. So immediatly you have a leading man who doesn't want to be there, and was vocal about this fact.

To make matters worse Lungren injured himself on the first day of filming, this is evident throughout the movie as he is barely mobile and has a nasty limp.

The film itself is a highly cliched tale involving a man who is dragged through time and forced to fullfill a prophecy. Yeah, exactly.

The Good:

Natalie Burn & Aleks Paunovic

CGI is better than expected

The Bad:

Script is poor

Stupidly cliched

Lungrens injury is blatant

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

Every fantasy movie needs a black forest from which no man has ever made out alive!