L'odyssée fantastique

Voyage of the Unicorn is a mini-series which premiered on Odyssey Channel 3/2/01 & 3/3/01. It involved a lot of the same producing staff as another great mini-series 10th Kingdom. The plot development is fast but easy to understand. The scenery is beautiful. The general plot is a mythology professor (Beau Bridges) and his 2 daughters get whisked away into a fantasyland where they discover they must save the fairyland from the dreaded and terribly evil trolls. They have a great adventure and meet loads of interesting characters on the way to saving the fairyland. The film is a great story for all ages. If you liked 10th Kingdom, you'll like this story too

I don't like films that are overly preachy. A lot of religious films tend to preach to the point of being redundant. Thankfully this is not one. Voyage of the Unicorn had me caught up in the adventure, so much, that I did not realize it was trying to convey a message about having faith. It was there from the beginning but not to the point of knocking my head with it.

The Aisling family has to escape trolls by traveling to another universe. The lose of the Aisling matriarch is still very upsetting to them. This adventure serves as an awakening to a new start. The family grows stronger through having faith.

This could be a completely misguided assessment. It just seems like this is what was done. This movie isn't perfect, with several odd moments, but it will suffice for a presumably low budget fantasy film. As a bonus the music score and selections are nice fit for this film.

I just saw this again on cable and was blown away by it. Amazing fantasy show - my only question was - where was this show when it was originally broadcast? This was a beautiful movie. The shots and settings looked like another world. I loved the trolls and the dragons and the magic ship. It's hard to find good fantasy shows without someone getting killed all the time. I watched this with my whole family. I loved the two girls and how for once girls were the heroes, of course their dad played by Beau Bridges did a great job too. I just wish I could rent this somewhere instead of taping it or having to buy it on Amazon or wherever.

Although Beau Bridges is getting a little long in the tooth to play the father of teenagers, much less a swashbuckler, he once again provided us with good entertainment. Thank you Beau. The rest of the cast was up to the job as well. Some,(but not all) of the makeup was a little mask-like, but the overall effect was pretty good. The only low point was a sequence involving the older daughter which looked like a music video produced by a seventh grade drama class. Fortunately it didn't last long enough to make me go for the remote. All in all it is a good watch and a lot of good clean family entertainment. A few parts may be a little scary for the younger kids (Tho I've seen seven year olds play video games that scare ME) but if you explain to them ahead of time that its only a fairy tale they should be o.k.. Its well worth watching. I'll give it a score of eight.

Some good eye candies are ruined in this movie by the most outrageous comments I've heard in a children's movie. "When it comes to magic, don't ask too many questions" came out of one child's mouth. The writer's obviously no fan of William Drummond ("He that will not reason is a bigot; he that cannot reason is a fool; he that dares not reason is a slave"). Or how about some Socrates ("There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance").

"Faith precedes miracles" is another gem from the child. But when faith doesn't work, it's fate, or God's will, or a test, or, uh, mysterious ways.

The film also sets up from the start a false dichotomy about reality and magic. That, of course, implies a god of the gaps, and in any case, as Friedrich Nietzsche pointed out, "a casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything."

The funniest thing, though, is that the dad let slip that "snakes are common in mythology." Then the child devalues the library.

Then the dad attempts magic and the daughter an Indian dance. The story ends with the girl saying, "By believing one sees." That's all the evidence anyone has of faith: they must first delude themselves.