Warriors of Virtue (1997)

I have a particular love for imaginative fantasy worlds. The forest world of Tao in ‘Warriors of Virtue’ might look right at home in ‘Star Wars’. Unfortunately it is one of those movies that gives us an imaginative world, wondrous creatures and can’t find anything of interest to happen there.

Almost every plot development in the movie is from a million other fantasy movies. The movie begins with a kid named Ryan who falls through a whirlpool an into that fantasy world that with no stretch of the imagination we can guess is locked in bitter turmoil.

All the lifesprings of Tao are drying up because of a villain named Komodo (Angus McFadden who played Richard the Bruce in ‘Braveheart’). He is threatened by the Roo warriors, a race of five kangaroo-like creatures who represent the elements of earth, fire, metal, wood and water and plans to do away with them. The Roos look interesting but they don’t have any distinctive personalities beyond their elemental labels.

The movie does a good job of setting up the look of a fantasy world but it is just so ordinary. We get magical books, and a ruthless sorcerer, a princess, a wise old man, the odd warrior creatures, ancient philosophies and the lone character that is the salvation to the whole world – ho-hum. Why can they never solve their own problems without bringing in an outsider? ‘Warriors of Virtue’ seems to be positioning itself to capture the same audience as the ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ and the ‘Power Rangers’. I found this movie slightly better then either but I wish that it had aimed a little higher to come up with something truly original then trying to stoop down to match those.