This movie is the worst lump of shit ever excreted from the bowels of a filmmaker in the history of… everything.

Contrary to what the movie trailers lead me to believe (i.e. that this was going to be the giant reptilian equivalent of “Transformers”), this movie is actually about the modern-day fulfillment of a 500 year old ancient Korean legend. Let me repeat that: this movie is about a 500 year old ancient Korean legend. As such, half the movie is in Korean. (Yes, they actually speak in Korean.) When I saw that the director/writer was named Hyung-rae Shim, I should’ve known. But still, I watched on.

The dialog alone was so horrid that it made the vomit that was “Star Wars: Phantom Menace” read like Chaucer. (That line killed at the Genius Bar at the Apple Store*.) I found myself wondering if it was originally written in Korean, translated into Sanskrit, then finally into English by no less than the same people who brought you the instructions for my Sony AM/FM radio.

For those of you just joining us: European dragons = cool. Korean dragons = teh suck.

The majority of the cast comprised what we in the biz like to call “unknowns.” The only exception to this was the unfortunate collusion of the ambiguously famous Robert Forster and Elizabeth Peña. Excluding these “professional” actors, I had never heard of anyone in the film. As such, these nobody innocents can’t really be held responsible for the suck.

The bad (human) guys resemble the bastard mix of a Cylon (classic model) and some sort of a Mad Max / Lancelot wannabe. Ostensibly, they’re supposed to be ancient Koreans. I won’t bother going into history lessons.

To be fair, there were some (deliberately?) funny moments in the movie. It’s hard to judge how effective they were, though, because the entire audience was laughing out loud throughout the whole movie. Constantly. And not the “oh, that’s funny” kind of laugh. It was more the uncomfortable “Oh my God, this is AWFUL” kind. Everyone. Constantly.

Things I learned from Dragon Wars:

• The US Army is no match for a dragon, but an ancient medallion will kick their asses.
• Otherwise normal people are very quick to believe that they are 500 year old reincarnated Korean warriors destined to fight big, nasty dragons for the survival of the unvierse.
• Elizabeth Peña will never work in Hollywood again.
• *Perfectly functional iPods will take a shit if exposed to this movie.

I rate this puddle of vomit 3 steps below Cloak & Dagger, starring one Dabney Coleman. The only saving grace was that some of the girls were quite cute.

[.5 / 5 stars]