Legend of the Sea (2012) – Review

Where to watch Legend of the Sea

3 Stars

Legend of the Sea is a Korean animated film that has been kicking about for a while before being recast with American actors in a bid to cash in on some of that lucrative childrens’ home video market. The fact that it’s a charming little sucker with cute touches like a prawn army that makes up the imperial guard only adds to it’s offbeat appeal. The Eastern Sea has been peaceful under the reign of the Dragon King, that’s about to change when the evil octopus Ocho is freed from her banishment and unleashes her vengence upon the kingdom. Draco, the prince, is the only one who knows of her plans and leaps into action to stop her. The story also involves the search for and protection of a luminous pearl. The theme is one of peace and prosperity, if you missed that, don’t worry the characters chant that very phrase no less than five times in the closing scenes.

The lead character is an adorable creation known as Drako the Dragon, impressively voiced by Rob Schneider. This is a tale aimed at and made for very young children. There are moments of light comedy throughout but nothing offensive or questionable occurs. My personal favorite character is a Bruce Lee inspired star fish. The upper end of these types of films are able to entertain adults and children simultaneously. No such luck here, there is very little directed at anyone over the age of 12.

Outside of the main titles that are done in both Korean and English, the American distributor does a good job covering the fact that this is a outsourced production retrofitted to sell in the states. Throw in a name like Rob Schneider, include a couple of jokes about Los Angles traffic and bam, you’ve got a flick that could pass for a native. Although kids may be thrown off when, on a few occasions, the animated characters break out in songs that are recorded in foreign languages, or maybe they won’t as kids are sophisticated nowadays. I’ve seen children work iPhones with more fluidity than my parents.

The songs are pleasant (those in English), the characters are cute and the colorful yet subpar animation won’t bother the younger set. Your kids will most likely be amused for the 76 minute running time. However, my guess is that they won’t be begging you to include it in their repeat viewing collection.

Director: Benjamin Toh
Stars: Rob Schneider

Comments

  1. :cry: :neutral: worst. Movie. Ever. I watched the whole thing, but that was only because it had Chinese dragons ( my favorite kind of dragon ) and speaking of that, what a waste of dragons! It is on netflix, so if you ever see it anywhere, just think about the fact that you could watch something better like A Monster In Paris ( which I highly recommend) I would rather watch Dora the explorer.

  2. Wow. This review must have lower standards then my 5 yr old niece. Niether her or her older sister were able sit still and watch this movie for long. They wound up playing with their baby brother (who is 2 on the 1st) and his toys rather then watch this thing. I like the concept of the movie, it is interesting, but the voice acting is SO subpar and the animation style is more of an early 2000s video game then a classic CGI movie. Unfortunatly, my Mom thought the cover of the movie looked cute so she wound up wasting $2 on it. If the voice actors had taken the movie just a little bi tmore serious, it might have been a bit more insufferable. I can excuse crappy CGI/animation if the voice acting makes it worthwhile. However, bad story writing is harder to excuse. Legend of the sea is in desperate need of a rewrite. I may drudge up 72 min at a later time to slip it in my laptop and force myself to watch the whole movie so I can get a better concept of the story, but not anytime soon. I for one give this wasted potential 0 stars out of 5 for the time being.

  3. Something wrong with the person who reviewed and gave 3stars rating to this movie! This movie is crap!! Animation, rendering and everything is a total crap!!! And I don’t believe it’s done by the Korean. More like made in china!!!

  4. I was not impressed with this movie at all. The animation was not great at all. And the way the characters act and talk with each other is not great for kids any way you look at it. I can understand having “bad guys” and a story line good vs evil but honestly, this movie was horrible and even at $1.25 rental price from Redbox it was a big waste of money. We stopped the show after 20 minutes and explained to our 6 and 9 year old that they are not allowed to act or talk like that so we really don’t want them watching shows that have characters behaving how we ask them not to.

    I’m honestly surprised the review of this movie was so high! I do not recommend this movie at all.

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