Dragonkeeper

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Jian-Ping Li directs. Jose Manuel Piñero behind the camera. Arturo Cardelús scores. José Manuel Jiménez cuts. Runs lean at under 100 minutes. A commercial under-performer on release. Produced in China, Spain. Dialogue in Mandarin, English, Spanish.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

• 1Earned back only 24% of its budget on initial theatrical — a commercial disappointment on release.
• 2Released 2 years ago.
• 3Dialogue crosses 3 languages: Mandarin, English, Spanish.
• 4International production across 2 countries: China, Spain.
• 5Directed by Jian-Ping Li, shot by Jose Manuel Piñero. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
• 6Original score by Arturo Cardelús. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
• 7Editor José Manuel Jiménez shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
• 8Mario Gas and Lucía Pérez and Fernando Castro carry the top of the cast.
• 9Marketing tagline: "Everybody just saw a girl.".
• 10IMDB entry: tt7093904 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

The technical file

Cinematography

Jose Manuel Piñero

Original score

Arturo Cardelús

Editing

José Manuel Jiménez

Production design

Elisabeth Castro

VFX supervisor

Xi Lin

Sound

Juan Ferro

Runtime

99 min · 1h 39m

Aspect ratio (typical)

1.37:1 (Academy)

Status

Released

Budget

$25,600,000

Box office

$6,206,231

Return

24% of budget

Original language

ES

Certification (US)

PG

IMDB

Dragonkeeper (2024) ↗

Rotten Tomatoes

67% 🍅 Fresh

IMDB rating

5.8/10 · 2,379 votes

MPAA

PG

Stills · wallpapers

Selected frames

Full-resolution frames — open one to save it as a wallpaper.

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Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

• 

  ▶
  Official Trailer

  Trailer · Official
• 

  ▶
  Official US Trailer

  Trailer · Official

Community reviews

What people are saying

• CinemaSerf2024-09-29
  ★ 6/10

  With the emperor ailing in his capital, he sends out messengers to secure the one thing that can save him from certain death: the blood of a live dragon. Luckily for the few remaining dragons, though, there's a young girl "Ping" and her pet rat "Hua" who are determined to preserve their last egg and ensure that "Kai" is born in the sacred birthing pool safe and sound. It's quite good fun, this, and I always liked the Chinese depictions of dragons as rather more lithe and nimble then the grumpy, scarred and scaly Western interpretations, but otherwise this is a rather thinly padded out story that might better have tried to incorporate more from this six book series it's based on into it's plot to better build up the characters and fill out the plot. That said, it doesn't hang around and there's plenty of action as the youngster and the ancient dragon "Long Danzi" take on the whole Imperial army - and it's dastardly and scheming agent - whilst trying to preserve this fragile blue egg until it's ready to hatch. There's a gentle moral to the story about self reliance and the odd humorous moment too, and though it's probably not a film that the very young will really get much from, the animation is lively and colourful with some menacing bugs and fiery blue fisticuffs and it's worth a watch on the telly if you like the family fantasy genre.

  Read full review ↓

Production companies

Who made it

• 

  Movistar Plus

  ES

• CH

  China Film Animation

  CN

• GU

  Guardián de Dragones AIE

• TE

  Telefonica

• CH

  China Film Administration

  CN

• 

  Atresmedia Cine

  ES

Key crew

• EditorJosé Manuel Jiménez
• NovelCarole Wilkinson
• Visual DevelopmentSergio Pablos
• ProducerManuel Cristóbal
• ProducerLarry Levene
• ProducerJung Huang
• ProducerGabriel Arias-Salgado
• ProducerAxel Kuschevatzky
• ProducerMikel Lejarza
• ProducerMercedes Gamero
• Art DirectionZhang Bo
• Supervisor of Production ResourcesJavier Martínez
• ProducerFu Ruoqing
• ProducerPedro Pérez
• Executive ProducerLarry Levene
• Executive ProducerFu Ruoqing
• ProducerAurora de Cos
• ProducerSong Weiwei
• ProducerMingyu Peng
• Executive ProducerSimon Crowe
• Executive ProducerMatthew Joynes
• Executive ProducerZhang Huixia
• Additional MusicJiale Yi
• Animation DirectorAbraham López Guerrero

Themes & keywords

What it's about, really

• fantasy world
• giant dragon
• animation

Release history · US

When it landed

• Theatrical2024-05-03PG
• Digital2024-07-07PG
• Physical2024-08-27PG· DVD & Blu-ray

Also known as

International titles

• La Leyenda Del DragónMX
• Dragon KeeperIL
• 养龙人CN
• نگهبان اژدهاIR