How to Train Your Dragon

Here is a computer-animated movie. Berk is home to a band of Vikings but the island is constantly beset by dragons. Thus, it is of little surprise that the Vikings of Berk are particularly skilled at fighting dragons.

Our hero is a hapless Viking lad named Hiccup. He has attributes better suited to a tinker gnome from Krynn, only his inventions work fairly well. He desperately wants to slay a dragon but, being puny and weak, is always left in safety during dragon raids. However, on one raid, he hurries out with one of his inventions to prove he too can be a dragon slayer. Though he shoots a dragon out of the sky with his netflinger, no one believes him. Thus, he finds the entangled dragon which he is unable to kill, so he adopts him.  Thus begins the friendship of Hiccup the Viking and Toothless the Dragon. It is great fun to see - in 3D - Hiccup and his dragon soaring through the sky.

As with most Viking movies, there are problems. First, the names. Hiccup? Snotlout? Fishlegs? Well, this is based on a kids book so the names can be forgiven. Then there is the Scottish accents. These are Scottish Vikings. The ships and shields are good but the siege engines are out of place. But these are just nitpicky things that really don't detract from the movie, even with a stickler like me.

Highly recommended.

 

I saw this in April 2010.  The cast included the Gerard Butler (Hiccup's father, Stoick), Jonah Hill (Snotlout), Christopher Mintz-Plasse (Fishlegs), Kristen Wiig (Ruffnut), and David Tennant (Spitelout).  Though not as well-known as his co-stars, Jay Baruchel (Hiccup) certainly holds his own and proves to be a very effective dorky nerd as epic hero.  The movie had a sequel, the cleverly named How to Train Your Dragon 2, and has a third in production.