I have to say this was horrible and diabolical. Yes it's PG and from a kid's perspective they may enjoy it but you can save yourself time, misery and money in renting classic children/family adventures and purchase dark crystal, Dragonslayer or return to OZ, both well made, intelligent and original at the same time. These films will reward your child with creativity, Eragon doesn't.
First off it's not the CGI that's the problem, the dragon and the magic were reasonable well done, no one could hope it would match LOTR standards but the story is empty of character and has no logic, if anything must show the flaw of the book as it is based on it after all.
Edward Speleers does his best to play Eragon, in giving him a character but Eragon in the end is nothing more then a pitiful weak country boy with Hollywood styled hair and perfectly white teeth (remarkable considering there's no showers or dentist. The character is rushed a to b while incredibly mastering elvish magic that dragon riders (or he) can somehow suddenly master (It's only explained in two sentences) Which goes on to do healing and unlocking doors which makes you go 'eh?' the development of his character is wasted even more by a pointless five minute friendly fight with his cousin/brother Roran (I say brother/cousin because his relation is only mentioned once and he does nothing else then spar) apparently it's character excuse but in truth it was a cheap way to build emotional grief later on in that Roran has to leave and has to join the army (by force because you know the king wants conscripted recruits because it's...evil) And to add more not also is Roran never seen again but Eragon only has a two minute grief over his slained uncle and never talks about him or thinks of him throughout the film. His uncle is just forgotten.
Jeremy Irons does well as brom, the slightly not quite there wise man who under no surprise was a former dragon rider, but the way he is to be in the film is flawed, he appears to be smart but has a smart alec go at the soldiers (who are in black to remind you their EVIL) who could and for some reason don't kill him yet tells eragon not to endanger himself?! And this character also amazingly jumps in to save Eragon from a blade, sacrificing himself, how he followed eragon so closely is never revealed.
Arya is a horribly done character, a very typical 'I can fight but I'm a damsel overall and second best to my future husband, I mean ERAGON) while her appearance borders on literal sexual attraction to our hero. While John Malkovich as the 'evil king' was utterly laughable, he stays in one cold place uttering crap about why he should be feared (if he got out more or used that dragon of his at the final battle then just showing he had one then we could buy why he should be a bad guy.
If you are looking for elves or dwarfs in the hero ranks then be disappointed, I mean even Arya is apparently an elf but there is no distinctive features of her. The Urgals are just bald big ex soccer hooligans in face paint. There is also a character called a-JIHAD (In caps just to show how lame it is, is it even meant to be an attempt of an Arabic name?) Robert Carlyle as Durza is the most illogical character and the plot hole itself, forget why both the good guys and the bad guys never organise themselves, forget why eragon's dragon thinks it's good to fly through a dense forest, forget that using magic to kill is wrong but incinerating an entire army is fine (does eragon even think Roran was in the invading forces that he destroyed? of course not! We're not to even think about it for their EVIL!) Forget why Durza never calls the local troops garrisoned at the eragon's home to go there and kill the boy, it would be quicker then sending in the 'ninja freaks' Forget it all and consider this. Durza is powerful and set things alight, wood, land, everything except...people? Why? that doesn't make sense, how can we not be set alight by his powers? He has telekinesis, fire, he's hard to kill in fact WHY should he even take orders from his king? Why is he not the one in charge? When you realise that and the number of LOTR ripped off screen shots (that are too many to ignore) then you realise just how poor this film is and you'll come to note the other errors as well.
Christopher Paolini surely cannot see this as good, for the good of his novel success he must stop the writers from making a sequel otherwise no one would read his books.
First off it's not the CGI that's the problem, the dragon and the magic were reasonable well done, no one could hope it would match LOTR standards but the story is empty of character and has no logic, if anything must show the flaw of the book as it is based on it after all.
Edward Speleers does his best to play Eragon, in giving him a character but Eragon in the end is nothing more then a pitiful weak country boy with Hollywood styled hair and perfectly white teeth (remarkable considering there's no showers or dentist. The character is rushed a to b while incredibly mastering elvish magic that dragon riders (or he) can somehow suddenly master (It's only explained in two sentences) Which goes on to do healing and unlocking doors which makes you go 'eh?' the development of his character is wasted even more by a pointless five minute friendly fight with his cousin/brother Roran (I say brother/cousin because his relation is only mentioned once and he does nothing else then spar) apparently it's character excuse but in truth it was a cheap way to build emotional grief later on in that Roran has to leave and has to join the army (by force because you know the king wants conscripted recruits because it's...evil) And to add more not also is Roran never seen again but Eragon only has a two minute grief over his slained uncle and never talks about him or thinks of him throughout the film. His uncle is just forgotten.
Jeremy Irons does well as brom, the slightly not quite there wise man who under no surprise was a former dragon rider, but the way he is to be in the film is flawed, he appears to be smart but has a smart alec go at the soldiers (who are in black to remind you their EVIL) who could and for some reason don't kill him yet tells eragon not to endanger himself?! And this character also amazingly jumps in to save Eragon from a blade, sacrificing himself, how he followed eragon so closely is never revealed.
Arya is a horribly done character, a very typical 'I can fight but I'm a damsel overall and second best to my future husband, I mean ERAGON) while her appearance borders on literal sexual attraction to our hero. While John Malkovich as the 'evil king' was utterly laughable, he stays in one cold place uttering crap about why he should be feared (if he got out more or used that dragon of his at the final battle then just showing he had one then we could buy why he should be a bad guy.
If you are looking for elves or dwarfs in the hero ranks then be disappointed, I mean even Arya is apparently an elf but there is no distinctive features of her. The Urgals are just bald big ex soccer hooligans in face paint. There is also a character called a-JIHAD (In caps just to show how lame it is, is it even meant to be an attempt of an Arabic name?) Robert Carlyle as Durza is the most illogical character and the plot hole itself, forget why both the good guys and the bad guys never organise themselves, forget why eragon's dragon thinks it's good to fly through a dense forest, forget that using magic to kill is wrong but incinerating an entire army is fine (does eragon even think Roran was in the invading forces that he destroyed? of course not! We're not to even think about it for their EVIL!) Forget why Durza never calls the local troops garrisoned at the eragon's home to go there and kill the boy, it would be quicker then sending in the 'ninja freaks' Forget it all and consider this. Durza is powerful and set things alight, wood, land, everything except...people? Why? that doesn't make sense, how can we not be set alight by his powers? He has telekinesis, fire, he's hard to kill in fact WHY should he even take orders from his king? Why is he not the one in charge? When you realise that and the number of LOTR ripped off screen shots (that are too many to ignore) then you realise just how poor this film is and you'll come to note the other errors as well.
Christopher Paolini surely cannot see this as good, for the good of his novel success he must stop the writers from making a sequel otherwise no one would read his books.