Crew
Director – Anne Black, Screenplay – Anne Black, Kynan Griffin & Justin Partridge, Producers – Jennifer Griffin, Kynan Griffin & Justin Partridge, Photography – Ty Arnold, Music – Paul Aalito, Visual Effects – Blufire Studios, Visual Effects Supervisor – Matt Hoffman, Creature Design/Animation – Mikhail Merkurieff, Production Design – Justin Partridge. Production Company – Arrowstorm Entertainment/Uncle Louie Productions/M Squared Entertainment/Blufire Studios.
Cast
Richard McWilliams (Will Shepherd), Nicola Posener (Kate Sterling), Ian Cullen (Baron/Lord Robert Sterling), Rogan Ap Cynan (Philip Brodie), Maggie Daniels (Lady Eleanor Spriggs), Anthony Murphy (Tom Shepherd), Michael O’Flaherty (Crow), Nick Devlin (Sam)
Plot
Will Shepherd is a simple sheep herder. His father takes him to see the local lord Robert Sterling to ask if Will can be taken on as a bondsman. On the way there, Will’s father is attacked and incinerated by a dragon. Will goes on to Sterling Manor where Lord Sterling says he has no need of a bondsman but places Will to work shovelling muck in the stables. Will forms an attachment to Sterling’s daughter Kate and the two admit feelings for one another. The aristocratic Philip Brodie then comes from the capital, offering to wed Kate. Sterling sees this as the opportunity to regain the standing he once had. At the same time, the dragon is threatening the area and Will becomes determined to kill it.
Arrowstorm Entertainment is a Utah-based film production company that specialise in low-budget, usually genre films. Formed in 2011, their first film was Dawn of the Dragonslayer here. This was followed by the likes of Orc Wars (2012), Oƨombie (2012), The Shadow Cabal (2012), Dragonfyre (2013), Zombie Hunter (2013), Survivor (2014), Christmas Dragon (2015), Cyborg X (2016), We All Fall Down (2016), Magellan (2017), 626 Evolution (2017), The Appearance (2018), Curse of Crom: The Legend of Halloween (2023) and the tv series; The Outpost (2018-21) and The Wayfarers (2025- ), as well as the fantasy film series Mythica: A Quest for Heroes (2014), Mythica: The Darkspore (2015), Mythica: The Necromancer (2015), Mythica: The Iron Crown (2016), Mythica: The Godslayer/Mythica: The Dragonslayer (2016) and Mythica: Stormbound (2023).
Anne Black, sometimes credited as Anne K. Black, emerged as a production designer and has served said function on several other Arrowstorm films. She made her directorial debut with Dawn of the Dragonslayer and went on to also make the sequel The Crown and the Dragon (2012) and the first two Mythica films, A Quest for Heroes and The Darkspore.
While their other films seem to be made on distinctly B-budgets, often raised by crowdsourcing, Arrowstorm appear to have gone all out when it comes to Dawn of the Dragonslayer. The film was shot on location in Ireland and the countryside looks beautifully expansive, especially in the dvd restoration seen here. There has even been attention paid to shooting in what look like real castles to sets for cottages built into the hillside.
In her films, Anne Black has a very nice ability to make the world and the characters feel lived in and believable. The heart of the film is a romance at which Richard McWilliams, an actor who should have gone onto bigger things, seems perfectly cast as the callow farmboy. Nicola Posener, a mainstay of the Mythica and other Arrowstorm films, is okay as the love interest – the only point of believability that got me is the scene where she is seen bathing in a stream, which is undone by the supposedly mediaeval girl displaying bikini tan lines.
It segues into a very nicely made domestic drama. After the epic opening, things becomes dragged out around Sterling Manor and the goings on there between Richard McWilliams and Nicola Posener and the threat of Rogan Ap Cynan desiring her hand. These scenes are slower than you want them to be; you keep wanting the film to open up into the dragonslayer drama that it promises to be, but it only does so near the end. The film eventually arrives at an ending, which satisfyingly pits Richard McWilliams in combat against the dragon.
The only drawback of Dawn of the Dragonslayer is the variable nature of the effects. The scenes with the winged dragon flying at a distance through the mists look great. On the other hand, when the climactic scenes require us to see the full dragon in shot it look rather ungainly as though it has the head of a fish. However, all of this comes together for a suitably triumphal climax.
Trailer here
Full film available here