Ronal the Barbarian (2011)

I watched this out of pure curiosity, to see if "adult" animation was still little boys playing dress-up in daddy's suits making dick jokes when actual adult (read: complex story lines and interesting characters with actual stakes) animation is being made right now by Pixar and Dreamworks. It is still like that sadly, for some "adult" mean aiming directly for language, sex and violence and doing it so heavy handedly that it becomes more childish instead. Now, the film does look fairly good to its credit so it has that going for it, too bad everything else about it is poor.

Think along the lines of Scary Movie, Vampires Suck and Meet the Spartans and you have an acutely good idea of what this is, near humor-like substitute for those who know no better or much in general. Had it been live action, it would have been classed as absolute dreck but being animated seems to have saved it from actual criticism which is a shame.

The characters aren't likable and are weakly written ciphers when they're not being stereotypes, the plot is flimsy even for your basic "unlikely hero rises to challenge in order to save family" storyline and the worst aspect of it is the supposed "adult" orientation it supposedly has. Like I said earlier, it revels in the fact it knows how to swear, make constant testicle gags (including one which just went on for far too long) and what boobies are. Problem is though, you need to be funny sometimes without relying on insult comedy, making a weak dick joke or just saying "fuck" to keep things going.

I say it's not horrible because you do get one or two decent jokes and it's not ugly most of the time to look at though but when your script is the same person speaking every line but coming out of different bodies it can't really hope for greatness. Oh and it's short too, cheaply made kids film short which seems fitting.

Fmovies: Ronal is a skinny, weak, good for nothing member of the barbarian clan who happens to be the only one who hasn't been captured by the evil Lord Volcazar (who plans to sacrifice all barbarians to god Zaal for his immortality). Advised by a shaman that only a sacred sword can defeat Volcazar, he must find it before it's too late together with a couple of friends found along the way.

This movie is a parody of Conan the Barbarian and King Arthur's Excalibur. All sequences are treated in a very funny and entertaining manner, which makes it a great comedy. Although I had some problems understanding it (it's Danish so I had to follow all the subtitles), it will make you laugh or at least put a smile on your face very often. Although it's not a big title, it has good action and quite a good story but it's a bit too predictable and superficial and it leaves you with a feeling that it was a low budget movie (although its producers could have avoided this problem). I think this is a good movie, especially for the animation and comedy fans!

....maybe it is more funny when you are Danish!

A simply completely funny movie, have seen it several times.

Ronal the Barbarian fmovies. Great Adventure through a Conan the Barbarian and Red Sonja spoof. This thing pulls few punches (and punchlines) in Ronal's epic "not a quest" to save his tribe from being used as a sacrifice to an evil god to take over the world. There's a minuscule similarity to How to Train yer Dragon but that was a Viking spoof.

Balls jokes, Boob jokes, Sex jokes (straight and gay), and some nice cartoon style blood and guts.

Some are critical of the animation, but lets face it, this movie is more about making a few nutsack jokes and less about trying to wow the world with state of the art CGI. The Animation is decent and watchable.

See it if you have a sense of humor. Avoid it if "Triggered" is part of your vocabulary and has noting to do with guns.

The other reviewer apparently wasn't watching the same picture that I was. Ronal the Barbarian is a weakling who must rise to the occasion when all of his clanmates are captured for evil purposes, and seeks to liberate them by finding and wielding the Sword of Crane in a fully tongue-in-cheek sendup of sword-and-sorcery pictures, spoofing Robert E. Howard's Conan the Barbarian and loads of imitators in addition to riffing wickedly upon the goofy relationship between classic heavy metal and the fantasy genre. The gags translate very well and if you're a fan of Robert E. Howard like I am you'll have more than a few hearty laughs out of this, especially a scene where Ronal uses an invisibility potion to perform a heist - man, that was funny! I can't understand why the other reviewer dumped on this picture (In Danish with English subtitles - I preferred this; English dubbed version available in some markets).

Pixar, Dreamworks animation etc have all done great stuff within the animation genre and especially with 3D animation. Outside of the USA things have been slightly different.

There have been some attempts by France, Spain etc but some have been very disappointing and others have been mediocre at best. Films like Renaissance (2006), Kaena: La prophétie (2003), have been entertaining but usually lacking both in story and technically.

When comes to the Scandinavian countries it is even more rare to see a full length animated feature that actually is just as good as their counterparts.

Ronal Barbaren (2011) seems to be just that movie. Film is about young Ronal who is a weak geek, among tough, hard barbarians (even the women have bigger biceps then him) but must go on dangerous journey in order to save his tribe from the evil Volcazar.

On his quest of course he meets lots of weird individuals, who joins him and in the process helps him to grow as person.

In the bottom of this funny film is a serious coming of age story, aimed mainly at teens who may or may not recognize themselves in young Ronal and his band of misfits.

The most refreshing about this film is the non Disney approach, meaning trying to only suit a massmarket, using bland stereotypes, musical scenes, and predictable story lines.

The directors is not breaking new ground, this film filled with crude adolescent humor, sex jokes and is basically a parody of Lord of the rings, Conan etc but delivers mainly because US productions is very family oriented while this film is mainly directed at teenagers and adults with a very crude sense of humor.

I urge anyone to see this film, you will probably not see anything like it in USA for a long time.

Unless of course Seth McFarlane decides to make a 3D film....