The film stars Dennis Quaid, David Thewlis, Pete Postlethwaite, Dina Meyer, and Sean Connery as the voice of Draco the Dragon.

The film received mixed reviews, with critics praising the premise, visual effects, and character development but panning the script as confusing and clichéd.

According to Johnson, before the film was ever called Dragonheart and had the element of the shared heart, it began with the premise of ...the last dragon and the last knight that finally meet up in a stalemate and make a deal.

[5] Pogue described the story's themes as "a disillusioned man's struggle to recapture his idealism" and "the attempt to maintain one's passion in the cesspool of the world".

Creating the backstory of the dragon culture and spiritual afterlife proved challenging for Pogue; he had to think of Draco's motivations and why he clings to life rather than letting Bowen kill him and end his despair.

Two days later, on Monday morning, Universal gave Johnson the green light to start making the film as the script produced a strong emotional response from studio executives.

He and Pogue shaped it for Sean Connery, a client of Creative Artists Agency (CAA) at the time, who was Johnson's only choice in mind to voice Draco.

Johnson wanted to "animalize" Connery's voice by giving it "deep resounding rumbles, and make the vocabulary such that it didn't sound quite human".

After completing location scouting, CAA sent numerous English and Irish actors to meet with Johnson for the Bowen role, including Gabriel Byrne, Timothy Dalton, and Pierce Brosnan.

[9] Other actors considered to replace Neeson included Harrison Ford,[10] Mel Gibson, and Patrick Swayze, Cohen's first choice for Bowen before Dennis Quaid accepted the role.

For a campfire scene test, Johnson had the then-unknown Clive Owen fill in for Liam Neeson as Bowen opposite an animatronic Draco made by Jim Henson's Creature Shop.

[13] After working with De Laurentiis on Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story in 1993, Rob Cohen agreed to take over as director, and Universal announced his attachment to the film in January 1994.

[17] Other changes to the script under Cohen's direction include: Also removed were scenes showing the developing love story between Bowen and Kara, which the final film only alludes to without proper resolution.

Cohen reportedly removed the scene because he felt Kara should be more of an action-oriented character swinging axes around and didn't believe she would make "sappy speeches".

[18] Pogue however said that Cohen cut the scene because he couldn't get the desired performance, which involved having Kara and Bowen in an intimate embrace instead of the hand kiss, and conflicted with Dina Meyer.

Pogue also said the film suffered because Universal aimed to turn Dragonheart into a kids' movie as the dark and weighty elements were either removed or dumbed down.

[9][15] Another change Cohen made to the script that was a bone of contention to Pogue was the lack of logic in adding the pigs to the swamp village scene.

They are trying to eat a seemingly dead Draco for an easy meal before turning on Bowen, Kara, and Gilbert for being the victims of a cruel joke, yet the pigs surrounding the villagers would've sustained them.

[9] After leaving Alien 3, sculptor Gary Pollard supervised and sculpted the first Draco design, a wyvern with a long snout and a crown of feather-like horns.

[19] To stay within the budget Universal was willing to shell out with Johnson directing, the developers approached Jim Henson's Creature Shop to create the Draco through traditional means.

The dragon model was done within eight weeks, including a quarter-scale puppet and a full-size head that could speak with real-time lip sync through camera speed manipulation.

He was in Rome to shoot Daylight on-location during this period and had to review animation sequences with ILM, giving them his comments and instructions through a satellite hookup.

[23] The main theme song, "The World of the Heart", and its companion track, "To the Stars", were used in many film trailers such as Two Brothers, Mulan, Anna and the King, Dragonheart: A New Beginning, The Young Black Stallion, and Seven Years in Tibet, among others.

Clip montages at the Academy Awards feature the Dragonheart theme, as do the closing credits of the U.S. broadcasts of the Olympic Games, making it a well-known film score.

All tracks are written by Randy EdelmanReleased on May 31, 1996, Dragonheart collected $15 million during its opening weekend, ranking in third place at the box office behind Twister and Mission: Impossible.

[33] Revell (under their Promodeler line) produced and released only 5000 units of a limited edition vinyl model kit of Draco and Bowen, sculpted by John Dennett.

The site's consensus states: "Dragonheart gives us medieval action, a splendidly mulleted Dennis Quaid, and Sean Connery as a talking dragon -- and, unfortunately, a story that largely fails to engage".

[41] Roger Ebert gave the film three out of four stars: "While no reasonable person over the age of 12 would presumably be able to take it seriously, it nevertheless has a lighthearted joy, a cheerfulness, an insouciance, that recalls the days when movies were content to be fun.

[53] The character of Draco also gained popularity, often being ranked as one of cinema's most memorable dragons, with fans noting him as ILM's best work on the heels of Jurassic Park and praising Sean Connery's vocal performance.

[55] On various days throughout the year in Toronto, the AMC Yonge & Dundas 24 theater screens a fully restored "20th anniversary edition" of Dragonheart with never-before-seen footage, enhanced visual effects, and a digitally remastered soundtrack.