2-For-1 Review: ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ and ‘Materialists’ Both Make My Heart Go Thump-a-Thump

June 12, 2025

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CREDIT: Atsushi Nishijima/A24; Universal Pictures

How to Train Your Dragon

Starring: Mason Thames, Nico Parker, Gerard Butler, Nick Frost, Julian Dennison, Gabriel Howell, Bronwyn James, Harry Trevaldwyn, Ruth Codd, Peter Serafinowicz

Director: Dean DeBlois

Running Time: 125 Minutes

Rating: PG for Dragons Taking Humans Higher Than They Should Go

Release Date: June 13, 2025 (Theaters)

Materialists

Starring: Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans, Pedro Pascal, Marin Ireland, Zoë Winters, Dasha Nekrosova, Louisa Jacobson

Director: Celine Song

Running Time: 117 Minutes

Rating: R, mostly for Discussions of a Date Gone Very Wrong

Release Date: June 13, 2025 (Theaters)

Picture this: it’s the weekend of June 13-15, 2025, and you want to see a new release at your local multiplex. How are you supposed to ever decide?! Especially if they’re total opposites? That isn’t quite the situation we have here, although the live-action remake of How to Train Your Dragon and the Celine Song-penned-and-helmed rom-com Materialists are certainly aiming for separate lanes. So if you’re a thorough cinephile like me who tries to see absolutely everything, where should you focus first? Or should you try to pull a Barbenheimer and make a double feature out of it? Let’s suss out the situation.

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Movie Review: In ‘The Hidden World,’ The ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ Franchise is Not Particularly Fresh, But the Animation is as Beautiful as Ever

February 20, 2019

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CREDIT: DreamWorks Animation

Starring: Jay Baruchel, America Ferrera, F. Murray Abraham, Cate Blanchett, Gerard Butler, Craig Ferguson, Jonah Hill, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Kristen Wiig, Kit Harington, David Tennant

Director: Dean DeBlois

Running Time: 104 Minutes

Rating: PG for High-Flying Fantasy Danger

Release Date: February 22, 2019

I do not remember a whole lot about the first two How to Train Your Dragon films other than the fact that I generally enjoyed them. The first one was among the initial wave of expansive 3D animated blockbusters. But nine years later, studios hardly ever bother to even screen their films in 3D, and I almost never seek the extra dimension out myself. But the CG animation is still of the utmost quality. Hair blows delightfully in the wind, and from what I have heard from the trenches of animation, realistic hair movement has been one of the biggest bugaboos in this medium. And this is a franchise about dragons, which don’t have a lot of hair! So the fact that the HTTYD team cares that much about rendering its human characters as well as its fantastical creatures should tell you all you need to know about the level of craft at play.

The Hidden World, the third in the series, finds Hiccup (Jay Baruchel) and his trusty dragon Toothless realizing that they are running out of room on their little island for all the humans and dragons to fruitfully co-exist. Meanwhile, an infamous dragon hunter named Grimmel (F. Murray Abraham) has declared he has his sights set on Toothless and all the other domesticated fire-breathers. There are admirable messages here about looking past surface differences and treating nature with respect, but there is also a bit of a sense of same-old, same-old. At this point, shouldn’t everyone know that these dragons are as loyal and affectionate as dogs? But while the story may be a little pedestrian, the animation continues to stun. Toothless develops himself a bit of a crush, and let’s just say, the dragon seduction dance is a (family-friendly) sight to behold.

How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World is Recommended If You Like: The Most Thorough Animation in the Business

Grade: 3 out of 5 Night Furies