In the Name of the King

IN THE NAME OF THE KING: TAI CHI MASTER Meets Fire Dragon?

by Dr. Craig Reid

On the surface, to say that IN THE NAME OF THE KING: A DUNGEON SIEGE TALE is a cross between TAI CHI MASTER and FIERY DRAGON KID would be deemed as high praise indeed. However, there is more to this than meets the eye. From a Hong Kong cinema standpoint, the look and feel of the action is more like DUEL TO THE DEATH meets MOON WARRIORS ala the curious hybrid progenies ofHOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS andCURSE OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER. One might ask if this is all true, what is up with these statements and what is wrong with this movie?

This big-budget made-in-the-West movie, helmed by a German director, features an Englishman in the lead who fights like a Chinese/Hong Kong action star against an American actor lauded for his Italian mafia rolls. Add to that a lack of press screenings, a cast that will not grant interviews (though, to be fair, I have been given access to more clips than what you can see on You Tube), and you have to wonder. In fact, the big buzz on the internet has been less about the film itself and more about hot-headed director Uwe Boll's penchant for challenging movie critics to fights in the boxing ring. Tired of having his movies lambasted, Boll has already flattened one mild-mannered Spanish webmaster and has bouts lined up with four other journalists. It is safe to say that these journalists lack even the most basic martial arts training, based on that first boxing match. Boll's combative skills clearly match his movie making abilities.

Still, having said that, IN THE NAME OF THE KING will probably be the best film he's ever done, for which he could thank Hong Kong cinema. But that same cinematic sensibility could play to the film's detriment. More on this later.

Inspired by the video game "Dungeon Siege" and shot in British Columbia, IN THE NAME OF THE KING is about a hardworking farmer simply called Farmer (Jason Statham) whose life is changed forever when a marauding band of Krugs (animalistic brutes in the thrall of an evil sorcerer) thunder down upon the unsuspecting village of Stonebridge, killing his son and kidnapping his wife Solana (Claire Forlani). Galvanized by grief, the once peace-loving peasant leads his mentor Norick (Ron Perlman) and brother-in-law Bastian (Will Sanderson) in pursuit of the Krug army to free Solana. As the Krug overrun the countryside, Farmer and his companions discover that the true source of their power is Gallian (Ray Liotta), a formidable and power-hungry wizard. Gallian plans to use his hellish militia to overthrow King Konreid (Burt Reynolds) and place his sniveling pawn, Duke Fallow, on the throne.

While the King's forces ride forth to engage the bloodthirsty Krug, Farmer and his companions slip unseen through the treacherous mountain passes of Ehb into uncharted territory. A daring nighttime raid on a Krug encampment turns tragic when Norick and Bastian are captured and Farmer barely escapes with his life. Desperate to find his wife and friends, Farmer joins the royal army in an epic battle. His extraordinary heroics catch the attention of Gallian, who suspects there is more to the simple country squire than meets the eye. In a final confrontation that will determine the fate of Ehb, it is up to Farmer to claim his birthright and defeat Gallian, or allow the evil wizard to take control of the land.

Best known for transforming video games into original onscreen adventures (BLOOD RAYNE), Boll was approached by videogame maker Gas Powered Games to translate legendary developer Chris Taylor's game "Dungeon Siege" onto film. What nearly TKO'd Boll on the spot was the budget - a whopping $60 million.

"This was a game that lent itself to becoming a PG-13 rated adventure fantasy," says Boll. "It was clear that we had a chance to reach a much wider audience with this one. Plus, let's face it, this is the biggest budget ever for a German production, three times more than what I had to work with for BLOOD RAYNE or ALONE IN THE DARK. Giving me $60 million is the equivalent of giving someone like Michael Bay $150 million, and I must admit, it has been the best experience of my life to finally have enough money for a big movie."

While the film uses 'Dungeon Siege" as a starting point, it is far from a literal adaptation of the video game. "We knew from the beginning that the ?Dungeon Siege' title would be a subtitle for this film, because we were aiming for something much bigger. The videogame begins with the Krug looting a farm and killing everyone on it. From there, the scriptwriters developed a completely original plot. We had to develop characters from scratch. Farmer is in the game, but the other characters are almost completely new."

Boll raised the stakes for his hero by having the Krug kidnap Farmer's wife and hold her hostage. 'In the game, everyone, including his wife, is killed, and he goes on a revenge trip. I didn't want it to be just an ongoing massacre. I wanted a real story. We put Farmer in a situation where he basically has to save the whole kingdom in order to get his wife back.

"We developed the script over a period of one-and-a-half years with various writers. It was essential that our hero had a real reason for what he's doing. That's part of the reason that the film is not extremely violent."

Kevin Costner and Pierce Brosnan were initially slated to be in the film, but because of the envisioned physically demanding action sequences, Boll opted to cast a younger action star. "Jason, beside his charisma and physicality - and once being a member of the British Olympic diving team - he can really kick ass, can do all of his own stunts, and there was very little he couldn't handle," Boll recalls.

Despite Statham's status as one of today's most in-demand action heroes, Boll notes that Statham was a "super-easy guy" to work with on the set. "That was crucial because we were shooting for over three-and-a-half months under extremely difficult conditions. His attitude rubbed off on the other actors. He didn't ask for a lot of perks. There were no superstar extras. Everyone had the same trailer; everyone ate normal food. Jason is a totally normal guy, and that helped make the whole shoot a dream."

With Statham signed on, Boll was able to attract the likes of Ray Liotta, who had become friends with Statham when they worked together on REVOLVER. Liotta brings to the film his street gangster credibility in the form of the scheming sorcerer Gallian. Boll describes Liotta as the other side of the acting coin from Statham. "Ray is a real Method actor," Boll shares. 'He stayed in character throughout the shoot. He would be sitting in darkness in between takes. He didn't want to have contact with other people. The other stars, Matthew (Lillard) and Ron (Perlman) can make jokes and then just shoot a scene. Yet you could not do that with Ray. Even as a director you have to treat him like the evil king of the movie."

Boll also brought aboard Kristanna Loken to portray Elora, a sexy tree-dwelling Amazon. Having previously worked with Loken, Boll was sure she was up to the physical challenges of the role. "I cast her as the leader of the tree women because I knew that this part will be hard on an actress," he says. "She had to perform most of it in a harness that made it appear that she was hanging from a vine. I needed a really tough, acrobatic, athletic woman, and I knew from Kristanna's work in BLOOD RAYN, which we shot under extraordinarily harsh conditions in Romania, that she would be perfect and that she could endure the pain."

In fact, it was the award-winning Hong Kong Fant-Asia film director and veteran action director Ching Siu-tung (Tony Ching) who came up with the concept of the tree women, aerial nymphs who call to mind, in the words of Boll,"'the agile acrobats of Cirque du Soleil." Ching also brought with him ten specially trained stunt people from China to play the king's personal guards, black-clad ninjas.

"I brought Tony in because I didn't want to have the same kind of action scenes you see all the time in period films like KINGDOM OF HEAVEN and TROY," explains Boll. "It is always the same stuff. I was looking for something that would be different and new for a big adventure movie."

Herein lies the problem of Western filmmakers who know nothing about Hong Kong action cinema and the talent they are using. Any Hong Kong film fan who sees even the trailer of IN THE NAME OF THE KING on YouTube will immediately recognize the style of fights and wirework from Ching's early DUEL TO THE DEATH (the second movie he directed), which was shot some 30 years ago. Furthermore, Statham's Farmer character and fighting abilities mirrors Andy Lau's bumpkin hero portrayal in MOON WARRIORS, for which Ching directed the action 15 years ago. The aerial nymphs that Boll just spoke about zip around in the trees similar to the screaming ninja in DUEL TO THE DEATH and in the action-choreographed wire-fu gags by Ching in last year's CURSE OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER.

Another major fallacy of this film? It is too late.

Back in 1994, Yuen Woo-ping's TAI CHI MASTER and FIRE DRAGON were made and released at a time when the whole Fant-Asia film craze was heading south in Asia, people were losing interest in the genre, so the films failed at the boxoffice. Similarly for IN THE NAME OF THE KING, it was shot and is now being released at the tail end of the Hong Kong film fad that has been ebbing in Hollywood over the past several years.

Plus, there is one other major detail that was completely overlooked, which is why director John Sturges will go down in cinematic history for his film MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (1960), a movie that was a direct rip-off (or, as film critics like to say, "adaptation") of Akira Kurosawa's masterpiece THE SEVEN SAMURAI (1954).

Back then, Sturges was intelligent enough to recognize that his version of SEVEN SAMURAI should not and must not have seven American actors running around wielding samurai swords and fighting like samurai warriors. Instead, he opted to have his heroes be characters that we in the West could visually accept?seven gunslingers that could shoot their way out of trouble. They were also seven characters we could culturally associate with and cheer for at the same time. To have Statham jumping around like some ancient Chinese martial arts warrior, swinging a broadsword like a Shaolin monk on drugs. . . Although interesting, it is out of place and at the wrong time to be featured in a Western tale.

But what wasn't out of place were the Canadian Rocky Mountains and rustic Vancouver Island that provided the majestic vistas of Ehb.

"We didn't have to create any of the landscape in the computer," Boll says. "We worked in places where you have only helicopter access. We were surrounded by huge mountains and big waterfalls, and the medieval-style castles are CGI, but the mountains and the lakes around them are completely real."

Working on a film of this scale was exhilarating for Boll. It has become commonplace to use computer effects to create crowds in films, but Boll was adamant that they would use real people whenever possible. 'We traveled with up to 200 horses, 100 trucks and 800 extras. The huge battle scene in the forest is all real people. The only CGI crowd duplication we did was in front of the castle when the King is speaking to all of his troops. We all know that we can duplicate people in a computer, but it becomes boring. Does it make the movie better? I don't think so."

At times, the film's logistics were overwhelming. 'Everybody was in elaborate costumes, shooting in summer. It was crazy. The Krug are played by people in full body suits. It got up to between 90 and 100 degrees some days and they had to fight, jump and run through the forest in their suits. We did everything we could to get water to them. Sometimes you would see them lying on the ground and think they were resting, but they had actually passed out."

But at the end of the day Boll admits that everything was worth it to do the film the way it was done. His voice crackling with guarded pride, he says, 'When you see it on a big screen, it doesn't seem like just another fantasy film. IN THE NAME OF THE KING has romance and drama. It's not just for video game fans. It's rated PG-13, so the whole family can see it. It won't just appeal to guys; it is a fantasy adventure with a happy ending, which will appeal to a much bigger crowd. It is really a great date movie."