Fireball does not work that way!
Holy fuck. I am appalled at this movie. As someone who loves Dragonlance (it was the series that got me into D&D, actually), I feel like these people have shat in my lap. I'm glad that I didn't pay money to see it. I knew it had gotten bad reviews, and I knew not to expect much, but... fuck. Let me get a glass of wine before I continue.
Okay, let's dissect this carcass, shall we? First, the animation. It's... average. Not detracting in and of itself, but it ties in with the second point. The CGI is used for some background stuff, and flame effects, and most notably, dragons and draconians. Now, all the Heroes of the Lance (the main characters) are done in 'traditional' animation. Anyone who remembers Autumn Twilight will know that soon after leaving Solace (itself shortened to about two minutes of running, a short argument with Flint about the boat, and Raistlin making about four of the goblins fall asleep), the party encounters draconians disguised as monks looking for the blue crystal staff. The draconians throw off their robes to reveal winged lizardmen. The dracs are done in CGI, and when they fight traditionally-animated characters, it looks... odd. They clash, and clash horribly.
Story-wise, it hits the major plot points of the first book, but everything has to be condensed into 90 minutes, so it suffers. Also, it's difficult to get past the glaring animation fuck-ups (in one scene, Verminaard's mace goes THROUGH HIS BODY and the hand holding the bottom end is partially behind his back). There's a lot left out, and a lot of what wasn't left out was changed slightly. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't remember Onyx (the black dragon guarding the Disks of Mishakal) having a human form. And even if she did, I certainly wouldn't expect her to be in that form when appearing in front of TAKHISIS! Takhisis, fucking Dragonqueen, Evil Goddess Extraordinaire! SHE CREATED YOU! SHOW SOME FUCKING RESPECT! TAKE YOUR NATURAL FORM! Also, the reason for the title of this post - the Fireball spell, as shown in this movie, is essentially a fast-moving Flaming Sphere. This, I admit, is a gamer-geek nitpick, but it pissed us all off. Oh yeah! The Forestmaster! Okay, a unicorn covered in vines was pretty cool. The eyes being ON THE FRONT OF THE FACE was not. You ever see a horse with eyes on the front of its head? It's fucking creepy.
Sound: well. You can definitely tell that a good portion of the budget went to getting the voices. Keifer Sutherland as Raistlin, Lucy Lawless as Goldmoon, Michelle Trachtenberg (I bet I spelled that wrong) as Tika, and a bunch of people who I recognize for being voice actors (Phil LaMaar is the first one that comes to mind). I didn't hear any big glaring sound glitches, and the animation and sound synced up pretty good. So, I wouldn't say that sound added to the awfulness, but it didn't do enough to take anything away from it.
As Joel said, "there was a constant buzz of exposition from Cory, explaining why everything was happening," so, I won't bore you with any more of what they left out. It was a lot. Suffice to say, I'm very disappointed.
The one good thing I will say about this movie is that it caused the majority of my Dragonlance players to want to out-shine what the Heroes of the Lance did, based on their shitty portrayal in the movie. Also, umm... it's worth sitting through if you're going to riff on it, MST3K-style. I suggest some sort of inebriation. It soothes the pain, especially if you're a Dragonlance fan.
So, in summation, fuck this movie. Fuck it in the ear. Unless, of course, you're watching it because of how bad it is. The name "Dragonlance" is attached to a lot of crap, and this is another addition to the pile. I'm sorry for my favorite series (well, Legends was way better than Chronicles, IMO).
Damn it.