An English knight named Sir Bowen (Dennis Quaid) serves the Saxon Prince Einon (David Thewlis), putting down a peasants’ revolt. The Prince’s father is killed and the King’s Celtic wife Queen Aislinn (Julie Christie) takes the wounded Prince Einon before a dragon and asks the creature (voice of Sean Connery) to save the new King’s life. The dragon makes Einon promise to be a just ruler and replaces Einon’s wounded heart with half his own. But Einon becomes an oppressive ruler who uses the peasants as forced labor to build a castle and has the peasants’ leader Redbeard (Terry O’Neill) blinded. Bowen concludes that his patron has been corrupted by the dragon’s heart and hunts down all the dragons he can find, becoming a skilled dragonslayer.
Twelve years later, the tyrant Einon has rebuilt his castle. The peasant leader’s daughter Kara (Dina Meyer) asks Einon to free her father and he does, by killing him. The monk and poet Brother Gilbert (Pete Postlethwaite) follows the dragonslayer Bowen to record his exploits. Bowen tracks a dragon to its cave, not knowing that it is the very one who shared his heart with Einon. The battle ends in stalemate, with Bowen trapped in the dragon’s mouth with his sword against the roof of his mouth, ready to plunge it into the creature’s brain. After a long conversation, they agree to a partnership to defraud villagers by staging fake dragonslayings for gold. Bowen names the dragon Draco.
Kara tries to assassinate Einon and is imprisoned. Einon’s mother, Queen Aislinn, disappointed in her son, helps Kara escape. She tries to rally her village against the tyrant but they sacrifice her to Draco instead. Draco takes her to his lair, but Einon arrives to save her and battles Bowen. In the process, Bowen realizes that Einon was never worthy of his devotion. Bowen is nearly killed but Draco intervenes and reveals to Einon that he has half of Draco’s heart. Realizing that if he kills Draco, he will die, Einon flees in fear. Kara asks Bowen to help her overthrow the tyrant, but he refuses.
Bowen reunites with Brother Gilbert. Appalled by their actions, Kara tries to expose Bowen and Draco, but the villagers don’t believe her until they try to cut up the dragon for meat and Draco bolts. The villagers surround Bowen, Kara, and Gilbert, threatening to eat them instead, but Draco rescues them. They hide out in the tomb of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. Draco reveals that he had hoped to reunite the dragons and the humans and earn himself a place in the stars by saving Einon. He fears he has lost his soul. But he agrees to help Kara and Brother Gilbert in opposition to Einon. Having had a vision of King Arthur (voice of John Gielgud), Bowen agrees to join them.
They organize and train the villagers into an army. They have nearly defeated Einon when Gilbert puts an arrow into Einon’s heart and Draco feels the pain. He falls from the sky and is captured. Einon realizes he is immortal as long as the dragon lives and vows to keep Draco safe. Queen Aislinn agrees to kill Draco as the dragon requests, but Einon kills her. The rebels invade the castle to save Draco. Bowen and Einon duel, ending with Bowen throwing Einon from a tower. The dragon begs Bowen to slay him and end Einon for all. Einon rises and Bowen throws an axe into Draco’s half-heart, killing both. Draco’s body disappears as his soul joins his fellow dragons as a new star in the constellation Draco. His star shines over the kingdom ruled by Bowen and Kara.
The film was directed by Rob Cohen and written by Charles Edward Pogue, based on a story by him and Patrick Read Johnson. It was nominated for the Best Visual Effects Oscar and various other awards. It received mixed reviews but made a profit. Sean Connery was always supposed to voice Draco. The dragon began in Jim Henson’s Creature Shop and finished with ILM’s caricature software CGI. The creature’s face resembled that of Sean Connery quite a bit. It was the first movie dragon that could carry on a conversation. Critics suggested that the dragon was the most believable part of the film. It won the Saturn for Best Fantasy Film and an Oscar nomination for special effects.
Two hundred photos of Sean Connery were used to create Draco’s facial expressions. The dragon is only on screen for 23 minutes. Dennis Quaid learned to handle a sword from Kiyoshi Yamasaki. Jerry Goldsmith wanted to do the music but that fell through, but Randy Edelman’s score was wonderful. Universal Studios wanted Whoopi Goldberg to be the voice of Draco. Liam Neeson was considered for Bowen, but he was rejected as not action-movie material. We are left to wonder why the villagers were desperate to cut up the dragon for meat or resort to cannibalism, when the village was surrounded by pigs. This is probably the most perfectly realized dragon I have ever seen, and Sean Connery as its voice is wonderful.