Delgo

Rating – 1/4

*SPOILERS*

Imagine a film from 2008. An independent fantasy film from the brainchild of Marc F. Adler meant to compete with big movies from Disney, DreamWorks, Warner Bros. and Avatar (more on this later). It was going to be the next big adventure. A “human story set in a non-human world” as stated by the creators. Yeah, keep dreaming. Its name is Delgo. But don’t call it Delgo, call it “Cliché: The Fantasy Movie”, because the film is just a bunch of clichés and stock characters that we definitely “haven’t” seen before. And while I didn’t like the movie, I did find the story behind the production to be rather fascinating, and of course, the amazing box office numbers. Broke records, folks. Broke records. 

And the plot concerns two warring factions, the Lockni and the Nohrin. Years ago, the Nohrin drove the Lockni from their homes and there was constant fighting. An evil young Nohrin royal named Sedessa tried to take matters further but was banished. And now in the present, she plots her revenge. And it’s up to a young Lockni named Delgo to save his people, and along the way, he falls in love with a beautiful Nohrin princess named Kyla. The hero’s journey, ladies and gentleman. Definitely “haven’t” seen this before. 

For a relatively unknown film, Delgo boasts an impressive star-studded cast. There’s Freddie Prinze Jr, Chris Kattan, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Michael Clarke Duncan, Anne Bancroft, Louis Gossett Jr, Val Kilmer, Malcolm McDowell, Burt Reynolds, and many others. Just look at IMDB for a complete list. Jesus, surprised this movie DIDN’T cost as much as Avatar. Once again, more on that later. 

Unfortunately, a good cast doesn’t automatically make a good movie and Delgo is one of them. For example, Prinze Jr. isn’t exactly what you’d call a hero. Instead, his performance comes off as more of a sassy teenager than a badass protagonist. He’s not whiny or annoying, and is still smart and likeable, but I think it’s just a case of miscasting. Jennifer Love Hewitt as Kyla is also pretty bland. She says stock dialogue, is the damsel in distress, and doesn’t have much character. Can’t blame the actors though, because there was really nothing for them to work with. 

But then there’s the sidekick Filo (Kattan). Oh boy! This guy makes Jar-Jar Binks look like he should win Best Supporting Actor. Yeah, Filo is that bad. It’s almost as if he’s trying to annoy people throughout the film and his sole purpose was to be a disruption. He’s whiny, he’s annoying, he fails at being comedic, he never does anything except scream in terror over little things, and he WON’T…SHUT…UP! Throughout the movie, I was really hoping he’d die. It’s not a good sign for a film when you can’t get behind your protagonists. 

As for the other actors, they do okay. Michael Clarke Duncan plays a good mentor figure. Malcolm McDowell and Val Kilmer are good as Nohrin military commanders, and Louis Gossett Jr. does well as the Nohrin king. And despite the film’s repeated flaws, the one positive part is Anne Bancroft as the evil Empress Sedessa. She’s genuinely threatening to the protagonists, has no mercy, and is the typical seductive villainess. However, Bancroft makes it work and it’s a shame that this happened to be her last film before she died. She deserved better. All of these actors deserved better. 

Besides the problematic protagonists, the film also suffers from subpar animation. The Lockni look like a cross between dinosaurs and turtles mixed with human DNA. It looks more freaky than charming. As for the Nohrin, they look like purple-skinned aliens, which fit better in the fantasy setting, but are still uncanny to look at. In fact, the animation looks more like video game graphics rather than a film or TV series. Second, the animation is also pretty stiff and not fluid with the characters’ movements, almost making it look like stop-motion at times. This film took NINE years to make and it literally shows, as some of the animation is behind the times. It’s not the worst animation per se, but it’s not professional. And it makes the movie hard to watch at certain points. 

Finally, the biggest problem with Delgo is the plot and the writing. It’s every fantasy and adventure cliché in the book. Nobody protagonist. Hammy villain. Wise mentor. Sidekick. Love interest. Dumb villains with horrible shooting skills. An epic fight sequence. And a big damn kiss. Seriously, there was nothing new. Clichés themselves aren’t necessarily bad, but there was nothing fresh. And combined with the subpar animation, it made the story worse. And Adler wanted Delgo to be the next Lord of the Rings or Star Wars. As I’ve said before in previous reviews: you should be yourself and not try to be something else because there’s only one Star Wars and one Lord of the Rings. You want a good adventure, watch those films instead. 

And remember how I kept mentioning Avatar? Well, the reason is that Adler and his team considered suing James Cameron for the similarities between the two films, alleging that Cameron stole them. Um, Mr. Adler, you can’t accuse someone of stealing when you did it yourself. You stole from every cliché in the book, fantasy settings and magical creatures are nothing new, and the story is nothing new either. Is it a wonder why they dropped their intentions to sue? And Avatar made billions more at the box office than Delgo did so they lost a second time. 

Speaking of money, Delgo has the dubious distinction of being one of the biggest box office bombs of all time, making only $915,000 on a budget of $40 million. At the time, it was the lowest grossing movie ever, until 2012 when The Oogieloves and the Big Balloon Adventure “beat” it. Yeah, it was for the best that they dropped the lawsuit, or else risk losing more money. That’s what I meant by saying it broke records. I never meant in a good way.

And honestly, as much as I didn’t like this movie, I thought it was just forgettable. And it really was. I don’t remember this movie coming out or even seeing a trailer for it. Sadly, forgettable is what it’ll probably be forever. And part of me does feel bad for Adler and company. Imagine raising all of that money, building your own studio, getting all of those big-name actors, and completing a dream project, only to have it come crashing down. To give credit where credit is due, in an industry that’s full of competition, it at least tried to compete. To me, this is a situation where I believe there is a good movie in here somewhere, but the execution failed. I do not believe it’s the worst animated film of all time, nor the worst film of all time, but it’s still bad.

And even if you’ve never heard of it before, it’s still not worth checking out.