Story triumphs visuals! I say that all the time and this one is no exception. A classic fantasy tale with dragons, wizards, magic and so on with James Earl Jones voicing the milicicious Oamadon with his booming voice, brilliant!. Told at an engaging tempo with great sense of atmosphere. The animation is its weak spot, but unless you are sensitive to that technical aspect, you will be absorbed in the well told story and the great characters. It has a clever twist of science vs. magic which I didn't like in the first place, but adjusted to with time. A great fantasy adventure for all ages.

Concerned about the prospects of logic and magic existing side-by-side in harmony, a Medieval wizard summons the help of a twentieth century board gamer inventor who believes in dragons in this popular animated feature film. The movie is adapted from two separate books about dragons: one that speculates the existence of dragons and their biology, and the other a more straightforward fantasy adventure yarn. Memorable as many of the action sequences are, the film is at its best when channeling the more speculative book. The pseudoscience behind dragons, how they breath fire and how they fly is endlessly fascinating. The film also crosses some curious science fiction territory as the game board inventor also gets to experience how a dragon mind works after the wizard accidentally melds him with a dragon. The vast majority of the film though channels the adventure tale, which is significantly less interesting, especially as the characters keep droning on about science versus magic. That said, the film offers some thought-provoking notions in terms of the role of magic in human evolution, such as the idea that television screens were inspired by the crystal balls of fortune tellers and that planes resulted from fairies inspiring humankind to consider flight. The film benefits from some decent vocal work too. Only Harry Morgan disappoints due to the distinctive nature of his voice; he always sounds like Col. Potter from 'M*A*S*H'. James Earl Jones is especially good as the chief villain and John Ritter is perfect as the easily excited protagonist.

Unlike other Rankin and Bass animated movies--The Hobbit and The Last Unicorn--this film isn't based on a single work. It doesn't have a "primary text," if you will, to accurately relate or deviate from. It's based on other works, but it is a mixture of two: (1) the "speculative natural history" book titled Flight of Dragons (1979) by Peter Dickinson, and (2) the novel, The Dragon and the George (1976), by Gordon R. Dickson. I'm not familiar with either of these works (though I wish I was). Needless to say, the narrative of this film is unique and not one that precedes its production.Some brief plot summary: the film concerns the adventures of a former biology student turned fantasy novelist / fantasy game maker. He creates a very "Dungeons and Dragons" type game and a world to go along with it. And, through some various magical happenings, he gets whisked away to the fantasy world he created. There he finds out that he is the champion of this world. He has to fight an evil necromancer named Ommadon (voiced by James Earl Jones). The story is filled with dragons, elves, rangers, knights, magical spells, fairies, slime worms, dreary taverns, etc..On the level of plot, it's very thrilling.But the plot is not the only thing that endears me to this film. Let me just list some of the elements that make it a masterpiece.The animation style: Rankin and Bass's unique animation style comes through here. Slightly strange, borderline grotesque, the artistic style creates a tension between the real world elements the drawings are derived from and the abstractions the drawings are supposed to represent. Thus, there is a kind of rawness / baseness to it.The drawings are stylized, for sure, but the nature of the stylization is such that it might even be described as a resistance to stylization. In other words, the artists strived for reality while realizing that reality was beyond the pale of animation. In other animated films, artists seem to abstain from any ambition to "realistically" represent something. And in this way you get the "four-fingered" hands of so much animation / cartoons.The voice acting: There is some strange voice acting in this film, but it endears me to it. Particularly, the voice actor who plays the voice of the Princess character, Millisande, is quite awkward yet completely satisfying for its mystical, almost recitative quality. Also, the voice actor who relates the character of Smrgol the Dragon—James Gregory—is brilliant! He's an old dragon, tired out by life, and the husky voice no-nonsense delivery completely communicates this. John Ritter does the voice of the main character, Peter Dickinson, and he ramps up the nerdy quality of his voice to the extreme. And, of course, James Earl Jones as the archvillain is just brilliant. He evil laughter is pure art.The thematic content: For a kid's film, this flick engages with some serious philosophical issues. Ultimately, this film is about the conflict between magic and science, empiricism and emotion, two fundamentally distinct ways of understanding the world. Without giving away too much of the plot, the main character becomes the avatar for reason and logic, science and math; thus, the baddies become the representatives of superstition, magic, fear, and other emotional ways of coming to terms with the world.Spoiler alert: It's a strange twist, but the main character's quest ultimately preserves "the magical realm," which is an absolute incongruity considering his way of understanding the world necessarily undermines it.But I forgive this film this as it really begs the question, "Are our imaginations and flights of fancy, our impulses toward wonder and beautiful ignorance necessarily incompatible with the scientific endeavor? Is there something worthwhile is hearing "a god's anger" in the thunder rather than, say, "the manifestation of a meteorological phenomenon?" Is there something lost when we "unweave" the rainbow?The film doesn't answer this rich question. It's the source of its aesthetic power is that is even raises it.

If you think this is a cartoon for kids, then your in for a surprise, its every part the adults fighting fantasy that every dungeons and dragons epic was. But its done in such a way that any family member can watch.The acting and cast is first grade without the ridiculous accents that cheap actors cant shake off and don't seem to want to when voice acting. Its sad that the world of Disney has cheapened the animation genre with over the top cheesy adaptations making monstrosities of classic tales and even factual histories into pop up musicals. Then people discovered Manga which was soon ruined by excessive nudity and cheap sex sells titles. I'm glad to say this timeless "flight of dragons" brings back animation and "art" to the level deserving of mass viewing.As with all stories, it must be believable and amazing at the same time, without being predictable. You must have guessed I'm a sceptic since decades of disappointing films, movies and cartoons. But Flight of Dragons has lasted 30 years strong, and now my children watch it and everyone I introduced this animation to has passed it on too. And no matter how many times I watch it, I am always captivated by the swooping musical score and the sincerity of the way Jules Bass and Arthur Rankin Jr want to transport you to their love of the books they have an obvious fanaticism to. I hope unlike G.Lucas and Steve.S they will keep their cast of expert animators and artists.