Dragonheart

Patrick Read Johnson's manager Melinda Jason also managed screenplay writer Charles Edward Pogue, who previously wrote for David Cronenberg's remake of The Fly and was working on an adaptation of A Princess of Mars for Disney. When meeting for drinks in Bora Bora, Johnson pitched the idea for Dragonheart to Pogue, and he agreed to work on the film. Together, Johnson and Pogue worked on the script, developing the characters and the Old Code.[4] According to Pogue, the screenplay for Dragonheart is among his best work, and it moved countless people to tears. After Pogue finished the script in 1990, it went unchanged for the next four years, but since it got such a resounding response, Universal fired Johnson in the hopes of getting a more experienced director like Steven Spielberg. Since Jurassic Park was released and Universal Studios sought to have Draco made with CGI like the dinosaurs, this meant there had to be script alterations per Draco's allowed screen time based on the film's budget. As a result, Draco would appear less often than his appearances in the original script, which included a sequence with Bowen flying around on Draco's back.[8]

According to Pogue, after Rob Cohen's hiring, the film production became troublesome as he felt the director "had neither the poetry in his soul nor the panache to bring Dragonheart to the screen."[9] Changes to the script under Cohen's direction include reducing the Queen Aislinn character to "a glorified bit player"; the deletion of a scene between Gilbert and Bowen by a riverbank where they talk about their goals and motivations. Also removed were scenes showing the developing love story between Bowen and Kara, which the final film only alludes to without any proper resolution. For example, Kara and Bowen declare their love for each other, during which Bowen asks Kara for her "lady's favor." Kara reveals Einon raped her and therefore has nothing to give Bowen, so Bowen kneels and gives her a chaste kiss on the hand. Cohen reportedly removed the scene because he felt Kara should be more of an action-oriented character swinging axes around and didn't believe she would go about making "sappy speeches." However, according to Pogue, Cohen cut the scene because he couldn't get the desired performance, which involved having Kara and Bowen in an intimate embrace instead of the kiss on the hand, and conflicted with Dina Meyer. This issue also caused the deletion of a scene with the peasant army giving Bowen a suit of armor they make for him and Bowen being overwhelmed with emotion, which Pogue considered Dennis Quaid's best scene. Cohen's desire to showcase Draco as the film's main attraction caused the deletion of vital "connective tissue" scenes and made the film feel inconsistent and rushed as a result. Pogue also said the film suffered because Universal aimed to turn Dragonheart into a kids' movie as the dark and serious elements were either removed or dumbed-down. As Johnson said, "They messed with the script and started adding things like, "Ready or not here I come! It's Draco!" I mean, we never had that stuff in our script! All this cheesy crap that just juvenilized the picture."[7][8]

Another change Cohen made to the script that was a bone of contention to Pogue was the lack of logic in adding the pigs to the swamp village scene. In Johnson's words,

"Critical elements were missing, things were replaced, and there was all this silly stuff. Like this village that's surrounded by 10 million pigs, but all the people are starving, and yelling out, "We're starving! We need meat! Let's kill the dragon," but they're surrounded by pigs! So, I'm trying to find the logic here. I just didn't get that."

Pogue explains that Draco uses the scams he and Bowen do as a way to "pick at Bowen's conscience and test his morality"; each village they go to is more poverty-stricken than the last. This point would come to a head and serve Bowen's character arc at the swamp village, where its people are beyond impoverished, and Bowen feels he can no longer justify the scams as a way to be a thorn in Einon's side. When Cohen added the pigs to the scene, Pogue told De Laurentiis it would make everyone look stupid because the villagers were supposed to be starving. They're trying to eat a seemingly dead Draco for an easy meal before turning on Bowen, Kara, and Gilbert for being the victims of a joke, yet, they're surrounded by pigs that would have sustained them. Both Pogue and De Laurentiis brought the illogical nature of adding the pigs to Cohen's attention, but he dismissed their concerns. The pigs stayed in the film, and the elements that would serve Bowen's arc were rendered pointless.[8][9]

According to Johnson, the script changes also damaged Einon's character. Johnson envisioned Kenneth Branagh or a similar actor in the role as a quiet and confident villain with a sense of unpredictability who'd go crazy upon realizing that his and Draco's fates are connected. To Johnson, the script revisions turned Einon into a continuously shouting brat and a character that couldn't be developed.[7]

"This was a guy who had been given immortality. He knows it, or at least believes it. He's been saved by a dragon; he's blessed, and unstoppable. An unstoppable guy doesn't go around raging, he's supremely confident and quiet. He kills with a whisper, and not with a scream. My idea was Kenneth Branagh, or someone of that ilk. They made Einon into this character who had nowhere to go. Throughout the whole first act of the movie was just screaming and yelling and throwing things around! He was just being a whiny brat. Where do you go from there? You can't get bigger, and you can't get smaller because the movie is supposed to build. My idea was for him to just be so quiet and you just wouldn't know what he was going to do next. He had half of a dragon's heart inside of him. And it isn't until you see this dragon return to come for him, and he realizes that if the dragon dies he's dead, that he really begins to panic, and then he starts to go crazy. That's what you want, but you don't start there!"

During his time location scouting in Spain, Johnson created the character of Draco. He and Pogue shaped it for Sean Connery, a client of Creative Artists Agency (CAA) at the time, who was Johnson's only choice in mind to voice Draco. Johnson wanted to "animalize" Connery's voice by giving it "deep resounding rumbles, and make the vocabulary such that it didn't sound quite human." Instead of how it's heard in the final film, "it wasn't just gonna be Sean Connery's voice coming out of the dragon."

After completing location scouting, CAA sent numerous English actors to meet with Johnson for the Bowen role, including Gabriel Byrne, Timothy Dalton, and Pierce Brosnan. English actresses sent for the part of Kara included Elizabeth Hurley and Patsy Kensit. Johnson then met the then-up-and-coming Liam Neeson, and the two hit it off, with Johnson noting how Neeson could be both brooding and funny. However, much to Johnson's chagrin, the studio refused to believe Neeson could pull off the action hero role since he just completed Darkman. Wanting a big name lead actor for the film, Universal sent the Dragonheart script to actors such as Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon,[10] and Arnold Schwarzenegger as potential Bowen candidates.[4] The studio even suggested that Whoopi Goldberg voice Draco instead of Connery.[7] Other actors considered to replace Neeson included Harrison Ford,[11] Mel Gibson, and Patrick Swayze, Cohen's first choice for Bowen before Dennis Quaid accepted the role.[12] With the castings of Quaid as Bowen and Meyer as Kara, Johnson said

"...I love Dennis Quaid; I love everything he's done. I just didn't think he should be in 10th century England, any more than Kevin Costner should be in Sherwood Forest. Not that they weren't enjoyable in their roles. Frankly, I think Dennis Quaid saved the movie, as much as it could have been saved...Dennis Quaid just wasn't the right man for the role; Liam Neeson was the right man for the role... And Dina Meyer...again...10th century England?! Beverly Hills 10 A.D.? Bless her heart, she tried. It didn't help that they stuck her in that funny red wig that was constantly changing shape and size. The whole thing just flabbergasted me."

Johnson also claimed that David Thewlis's performance as Einon was greatly hindered by how Cohen shot the scenes with Lee Oakes as young Einon first. Oakes spoke with a thick Northern English accent, forcing Thewlis to mimic the child actor's accent.[7]

After leaving Alien 3, sculptor Gary Pollard supervised and sculpted the first Draco design, a wyvern with a long snout, and a crown of feather-like horns.[13] To stay within the budget that Universal was willing to shell out with Johnson directing, the developers approached Jim Henson's Creature Shop to create the Draco through traditional means. The dragon model, including a quarter-scale puppet and a full-size head that could speak with real-time lip-sync through camera speed manipulation, was done within eight weeks.[7] Then the crew went to Shepperton Studios in England to begin shooting the film, starting with the campfire scene. The team faced difficulties in keeping within the budget.[3] Unfortunately, the test didn't convince Universal that Draco could have enough dynamic movement.

After Jurassic Park's theatrical release, the CG dinosaurs convinced De Laurentiis to bring Draco to life with CGI. Universal hired several effects companies to do Draco animation tests. Due to time constraints, ILM did a screen test for Dragonheart using a "stretched out" version of the Tyrannosaurus rex from Jurassic Park. The test impressed Universal, so they attached ILM to the movie.[3][13]

Rob Cohen hired Phil Tippett, a visual effects producer specializing in creature design and character animation, to animate Draco for Dragonheart. Tippett states that his studio's responsibilities for Dragonheart differed from what they did for Jurassic Park since Draco would have more screen time (23 minutes for Draco instead of six and a half for the dinosaurs). They were mostly responsible for Draco's actual look and design and the storyboards, blocking, and action sequence timing.[3] Tippett worked closely with sculptor Peter Konig in designing Draco. Konig crafted between 20 and 30 maquettes before Cohen approved the final design. Konig improved the ones that Cohen said "[felt] right," adding forearms as Cohen wanted Draco to use his hands.[7] Cohen's ideas for Draco's design stemmed from the traditional Chinese guardian lion, which Cohen describes as having "a lion-like elegance, a fierceness," and that it is "ultimately a proud...visually powerful creature". As Draco had to emote, Tippett infused human features into Draco's face to make it mammalian rather than reptilian; his muzzle was designed to be a mixture of a highland gorilla and a human mouth to accommodate his dialogue. Draco's face was designed to resemble Sean Connery's after his casting. Cohen also drew ideas from nature, such as the boa constrictor's jaw structure, horses' musculature, and retractable teeth. Tippett also considered how Cohen would frame the scenes involving Draco, the size difference between Draco and the human actors, and what he would be doing throughout the film.[3] Tippett and his crew created a five-foot model of Draco for lighting reference and an articulated model used as a reference for Draco's poses.

It took five months for four modelers to make Draco's digital model with ILM's Alias software. Originally, Draco's scales and wings were going to have an iridescent quality; it is visible in some scenes but mostly not. His wingspan was initially calculated as 125 ft to support his body but halved to 72 ft to be more practical. His eyes were also more detailed and dilated. Those were some of the design elements dropped either because of software issues, running out of time, and wanting to make Draco as realistic as possible and not too fantastical..[14][13]

Dragonheart is the first film to use ILM's Caricature software, developed to help lip-sync Draco's animation to Sean Connery's voiceover work; Cary Phillips received the Academy Scientific and Technical Achievement Award for creating the software. The movie is also noted for having the first realistic CG dragon in film, and Draco is the first dragon ILM made that's capable of human speech.[15][16]

Actual filming began in July 1994 in Slovakia. During sequences with Draco and Bowen in them, visual effects supervisor Scott Squires and his teams used what they called a "monster stick"—a pole with a bar and two red circles at the top—as an indicator for where Draco's eyes would be for Quaid's reference. They also set up speakers through which Cohen would read Draco's lines for Quaid, which Quaid said: "helped [him] out a lot."[3]

While filming the scenes involving Draco in flight, the crew used a microlight for reference and then edited the footage to "put Draco over the top of that and remove any traces of the aircraft."[3]

Although Draco is fully CGI-rendered, some scenes used full-sized models of some of his body parts. One of them was Draco's foot, used to pin Bowen to the ground, and the other was Draco's jaw during the scene where Bowen gets trapped inside it. While the foot was a non-moving prop, the jaw had moving parts, and a puppeteer operated it.[3]

According to Cohen, they spent an additional 13 months working on the film after making the final cut. He was in Rome to shoot Daylight on-location during this period and had to review animation sequences with ILM, giving them his comments and instructions through a satellite hookup.[3]

After reading the script, Jerry Goldsmith personally requested Johnson to let him score Dragonheart when Johnson was set to direct the film. However, Goldsmith never got to write any music for the movie as things fell through during production, and he left the project when Universal let Johnson go.[7]

Randy Edelman composed the score. The main theme song, "The World of the Heart," and the companion track, "To the Stars," were used in many film trailers such as Two Brothers, Mulan, Anna and the King, and Seven Years in Tibet, among others. Clip montages at the Academy Awards feature the Dragonheart theme, as do the closing credits of the U.S. broadcasts of the Olympic Games, making it a well-known film score.[17] MCA Records released the film's soundtrack album on May 28, 1996, containing 15 music tracks.

Alternate Japanese poster

The film was released on May 31, 1996, and grossed $115 million against the budget of $57 million.[2]

Dragonheart was released on VHS on November 19, 1996, and on DVD as a "Collector's Edition" on March 31, 1998. The film was later released on HD DVD on May 29, 2007. Dragonheart and Dragonheart: A New Beginning were released on a one-disc print known as "2 Legendary Tales" on March 2, 2004. Dragonheart was released on Blu-ray Disc on March 27, 2012.

Charles Edward Pogue wrote a 262-page novelization of Dragonheart, published by The Berkley Publishing Group in June 1996. Based on his original screenplay with “several new inspirations that weren’t in any of the various drafts,” it's more faithful to his vision of Dragonheart as the transcendent film it should have been.[9][18] It was released in several languages and five editions in the U.S. to widespread critical acclaim. Readers praised Pogue's writing, how the book develops the story, setting, and characters more than the film, noting its darker and more serious tone than that of the film. In 1999, Adriana Gabriel adapted the movie into a junior novelization.

Some of the notable differences from the film are:

• A scene Kara, Gilbert, and the rebels gifting Bowen a new shield and suit of armor they design and make for him. The armor is adorned with the Old Code symbol (a silver sword hilt up within a golden circle) combined with the Draco constellation.
• Some of Queen Aislinn's background is revealed. She has a larger role like in the original script, including a deleted extended dialogue scene with Kara when she helps the latter escape Einon's castle.

• During the scene where Bowen and Draco scam Lord Felton, Draco causes more damage to the lord's property. His fireballs cause a blizzard of flour to cover everything, and Draco causes a giant grist wheel to crash into the side of Felton's house. Bowen charges toward Draco on horseback, but the 'fight' abruptly ends when Draco pretends to eat Bowen and flies off carrying his horse toward their waterfall base, leading into Bowen and Draco's discussion about the latter's yearning for death.
• A cut scene where Draco and Bowen scam an overweight lord in a village by a lake after scamming Felton. Bowen 'shoots' Draco down with a bow and arrow, and Draco falls into the lake, eventually leading to their conversation about the Old Code and Bowen accusing Draco of pricking his conscience.
• As Gilbert practices archery in a forest clearing with Hewe and a boy named Trev, he inadvertently kills Brok's falcon shortly after the knight releases it. Brok, Felton, and two other men follow the fallen bird to the rebels' location. During the altercation, Hewe cuts off Felton's hand, and the insurgents are pursued, leading to Brok discovering the rebel camp.
• A vivid nightmare sequence where Bowen dreams of the dragons he had killed, himself fighting Einon, Einon transforming into Draco, and Bowen sucked into a black void where he's unable to hear himself screaming for Draco. After this, Bowen is awoken by Kara, leading to the deleted scene where she calls Bowen the source of her confidence.
• More scenes with Draco than the film could afford to have:
  • One is a 'hug' between him and Bowen in the rain at Avalon, which was in the original script and storyboards.[19]
  • Another being a scene where, on the eve of battle, Bowen flies around the rebel camp and Einon's castle on Draco's back as his scales change color to match the night sky and enable them to fly around undetected. Meanwhile, Aislinn presents the dragonslayers to Einon, and Bowen allows Draco to destroy his trophy shield (trophy talon necklace in one early version of the script).
• The features ILM removed from Draco due to budget, lack of time, and software issues such as the iridescent scales, nictitating membrane, glowing eyes, and maimed right hand.
• A developed romance between Bowen and Kara, where the film only hints it.
• A cut scene in the cistern of Einon's castle, where Kara gives Bowen her father's headband as her 'lady's favor,' and they kiss before going to save Draco.
• A deleted scene with Gilbert and Bowen discussing their goals, a pilgrimage to find Avalon and killing dragons, respectively.
• A scene where Einon returns to Draco's cave after the encounter at the waterfall, finds Aislinn there, and gets suspicious that she's hiding something from him.
• Insight into several characters' mindsets such as Draco, Bowen, Kara, Einon, and Brok.
• Moments of sexual nature and graphic violence such as amputation and many instances of bloodletting.
• As they perform their scams, Draco and Bowen alternate between who'd win or lose: sometimes Draco pretends to eat Bowen and flies off, and sometimes Bowen fakes killing Draco, and Draco would swim away unnoticed.
• When Draco ascends to heaven, celestial colors fill the sky, and his spirit becomes a shooting star that soars to the constellation to become its brightest star.

In the years following its release and strong home media sales, Dragonheart gained a following and is considered a cult classic.[25][26] The character of Draco also gained popularity, often being ranked as one of cinema's most memorable dragons, with fans noting him as ILM's best work on the heels of Jurassic Park and praising Sean Connery's vocal performance.[27] In 2006, Draco was ranked no. 6 on a Top 10 list of movie dragons by Karl Heitmueller for MTV Movie News.[28]

On various days throughout the year in Toronto, the AMC Yonge & Dundas 24 theatre screens a fully restored "20th anniversary edition" of Dragonheart with never-before-seen footage, enhanced visual effects, and a digitally remastered soundtrack.[29] On May 31, 2016, in celebration of the film's 20th anniversary, a retrospective article was published on the making of Dragonheart featuring Scott Squires and Phil Tippett, among others who worked on the film.[16]

A direct-to-video sequel to the film, Dragonheart: A New Beginning, was released in 2000, followed by three prequels: Dragonheart 3: The Sorcerer's Curse in 2015, Dragonheart: Battle for the Heartfire in 2017, and Dragonheart: Vengeance in 2020.

In a 2013 MTV interview about his then-upcoming film 5-25-77, Dragonheart creator Patrick Read Johnson expressed a desire to remake the movie with Sean Connery and Liam Neeson, his original choice for Bowen before Universal fired Johnson from the project.[30] In April 2016, Matthew Feitshans, screenwriter of the Dragonheart prequels, stated that Universal wants to use the prequels to keep up the film series' momentum, mentioning the possibility and hopes of them leading to a big-budget remake of the original film.[31] In 2018, Patrick Read Johnson reiterated that he was still interested in the project, "I would love to give that a go."[32]

After its release, Dragonheart spawned a spin-off 2D hack and slash game for the PlayStation, Saturn, PC, and Game Boy called DragonHeart: Fire & Steel, made by Acclaim Entertainment.