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Overall Rating : 1.5/10
Directed By : Mark McNabb
Dalton Mugridge (The Mystical Adventures of Billy Owens)
Ciara O’Hanlon (The Mystical Adventures of Billy Owens)
Christopher Fazio (The Mystical Adventures of Billy Owens)
Roddy Piper (WWE Hall of Famer)
Supplied By : MTI Home Video
Film Reviewed By : Rick L. Blalock
Date Reviewed : May. 7, 2010
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| PLOT Billy Owens is back for another enchanting adventure! Along with his three fellow friends in magic, they come together to help their teacher, Thurgood , when his soul becomes trapped in an ancient amulet. Legend says that inserting the empowered amulet into a cursed scepter will unlock vast powers and unworldly Viking treasures! Now, with the powers of magic, friendship and teamwork, our four young heroes must take on the evil wizard, Mr. Mould, to find a way to release Thurgood before he is trapped in the amulet… forever! |
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| THE REVIEW After their regular school year, Billy Owens and his young friends take lessons in magic from Thurgood, their teacher. The kids look forward to a fun summer, one that includes Carnivals and horseback riding when Mandy's cousin arrives. But their summer gets interrupted when their beloved teacher Thurgood's spirit gets tripped within an ancient amulet. Through some investigating the kids discover that the only why to save his soul is to place the amulet into a powerful scepter, along with freeing Thurgood's soul, the act would also grant ancient viking powers to those responsible. When an evil Wizard by the name of Mould goes after the same scepter and powers along with the school bully that he has turned into his henchman, Billy, Mandy, Devon and Danny, must race into some deep caverns to retrieve the artifact - but they must hurry, as they only have until sunrise, if they shall fail, than Thurgood's spirit becomes trapped in the Amulet for good. This the second film in the series, the series that follows Billy Owens and his friends on their magical adventures, is just your lower budget equivalent of the HARRY POTTER films and book series. Short on a much lower budget, that includes cheaper and fewer effects, the BILLY OWENS films also are toned down, following Christian beliefs and moral as to teach kids life lessons and such, from what I gather from the film,'s overall tame vibe. The previous film, THE MYSTICAL ADVENTURES OF BILLY OWENS is a film in which I did not see, because it's one that I chose to pass on reviewing when it was released. The reason being is that it just didn't appeal to me much, so with BILLY OWENS AND THE SECRET OF THE RUNES, I decided to give it a shot, if only for the participation of one Roddy Piper. Seeing as I am a big wrestling fan, seeing Piper in a film isn't bad sometimes(take THEY LIVE or MARKED MAN for example), but more times than not, he can be involved in some pretty rough films. Unfortunately, BILLY OWENS AND THE SECRET OF THE RUNES, just so happens to be such a film. Low budget pictures are never a problem for me, if they are indeed done well(a little creativity can take you further than any money can take you as far as a film goes, believe it or not), but BILLY OWENS AND THE SECRET OF THE RUNES is highly lackluster in all aspects, and the fact that it was made on the cheap is apparent all through out the film. There is no real character build up at all really, we briefly get acquainted with the kids and their families, before being shuttled off into the cor of the story. And the core of the story is as basic as they come; the kids not to find an ancient scepter in order to free the spirit of their teacher from an amulet, but surprise, someone else wants what their after. It's all predictable, the kids go through no real tests on their journey to the scepter, nothing really happens in between, besides the kids trying to sound intelligent whist spouting off random facts about an ancient something or other. All which sounds as unconvincing as it can get, as this child actors clearly do not know anything about what the are preaching. In fact the acting here was well below average to be honest. I don't want to say terrible, because the leading Actors are indeed all preteens, but it is. The film virtually pits this group of preteens front and center and relies on them to carry the entire movie. In this case, it necessarily isn't a good idea, because it's clear that these kids have had very little training, if any. The performances by the leading kids(and even some of the adults) are very wooden stiff, as most of their lines of dialogue feel rehearsed or read, and completely unnatural. BILLY OWENS AND THE SECRET OF THE RUNES is film that promises a family adventure, but is truly a dry affair. While this film is tailored for the imagination of children, it really has nothing that would likely keep the interest of the audience it is targeting that I could see. I have no idea if the first film fared better with this objective, but as for it's follow-up, I hate to say it, but it's pretty bare and boring to say the least. |
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| GORE
METER N/A |
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MUSICAL
SCORE 2/10 The score consists of your typical adventure inspired scoring. | ||||
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| OVERALL
IMPRESSION OF THE FILM While I try to give every film a chance(I even found something to like in MTI's previous family oriented film, JUSTIN TIME), with BILLY OWENS AND THE SECRET OF THE RUNES I just couldn't find anything worthwhile, not even Roddy Piper's small role could help(He even served as an Associate producer on the film). So with that said I wasn't too impressed by this, but then again, it wasn't actually made for my age bracket - so maybe some of the younger audience will like it. But as for me, the film had a few flaws(namely the poor acting as I stated), that I just couldn't see past. The BILLY OWENS films were directed and co-written by who also directed the film STUDY HELL, a film that I reviewed back in 2006. While STUDY HELL was also bad in my opinion, I found it to be just slightly better than this one. This DVD will be released May 11, 2010 |
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