OUT OF COMPETITION – Dean DeBlois is back with his Dragons

The Festival is on the way up. Direction from on high with Harold the Viking and his dragon Krokmou for high flying adventures. How to Train your Dragon 2 by Dean DeBlois will be screened at the Grand Théâtre Lumière in celebration of the twentieth anniversary of Dreamworks studios. Stand by for take-off in 3D.

Photo from the film © RR

Harold, Astrid and Rustik have grown up. As adults now, they are taking full advantage of their cohabitation with mythical creatures to conquer a new territory, the heavens. While their friends spend their time competing in matches of a kind of Quidditch with dragons and sheep, Harold and Krokmou explore uncharted vistas. They discover a strange grotto, the lair of hundreds of dragons.
 

Dean DeBlois wrote this new opus without losing any of his childlike spirit. Encouraged by the box-office success of the first film in this series, with 27 million tickets sold around the world, he wanted to make How to Train your Dragon 2, but on the condition that a third episode is in the offing.
 

The director was determined to make this film a sequel in a series, not a whole new adventure. On screen we find the same characters, five years later, which involved some very ambitious technical work. They needed to be aged, given a new wardrobe, their features had to be changed, without sacrificing their personal identities. “Harold was the most difficult to tackle. He still had to be a bit gauche because his goofy clumsiness is what makes him so charming,” Dean DeBlois explains. 

As for casting, the same actors will lend their voices to the main characters. Jay Baruchel, who made his appearance in Million Dollar Baby and Tropic Thunder, plays Harold and Astrid is portrayed by the voice of America Ferrara, alias Ugly Betty. How to Train your Dragon 2 also sees the arrival of new characters, with new voices. And not just any voices: Cate Blanchett plays Valka and Eret will be voiced by Kit Harington, who will be recognised from his rendering of Jon Snow in Game of Thrones.
 

The final episode in the trilogy should come to the silver screen on 2016. With How to Train your Dragon 3,  Dean DeBlois promises to end the series with nothing less than an apotheosis.
 

Tarik Khaldi

SCREENINGS

Friday 16 May / Grand Théâtre Lumière / 12 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.

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