There is a lot of truth to the old adage that "one man's garbage is another's treasure," because The Neverending Story's Flying Machine, built from steel pipes, scraps of metal, discarded machine parts and left-over latex, is a veritable work of art. Four pairs of expert hands designed and fashioned it into a functional, whimsical and beautiful piece of sculpture.

With a wingspan of 30 feet, it is almost the size of an ultra light plane. Where a plane's nose would be it has a smiling dragon's face. And where a plane's rudder would be, it has a long, reptilian tail. The Flying Machine also has semi-transparent, bat-like, membrane wings. And its landing gears are two big paws fitted with recessed wheels. A man can sit inside it comfortably and remotely move its tail and wings (which sit on top of pressurized air pistons). Despite the fact that it has two large propulsion jets built into its flanks, the Flying Machine can't fly. It is a movie prop.

In the television series, The Neverending Story, the Flying Machine is a symbol of hope for the inhabitants of Fantasia whose way of life is being annihilated by The Nothing. The Flying Machine is a metal, nuts and bolts imitation of Falkor, the Luckdragon, that once flew freely over Fantasia but was imprisoned by the evil Xayide and her Dark Knights. Fifteen-year-old Fly Girl, the first female bush pilot of Fantasia, inherited the Flying Machine from her grandfather who had built it to resemble the Luckdragon. When her machine is high in the air, inhabitants of Fantasia believe they are seeing the real Falkor.

As interesting as the Flying Machine, is the team of craftsmen and artists who built it. They refer to themselves as the "Dragoneers," short for the builders and movers of the dragon-like machine.

One member of the team is Martin Lanneuville, who trained as an architect and helped build the machine. One of Lanneuville's favourite past times is combing through Montreal scrap yards looking for interesting objects. Naturally, many of his junkyard treasures found their way into the Flying Machine. Among them were roller blade wheels (now part of the landing gears), stainless steel bearings (they are part of the steering column), an old motorcycle wheel strut (it is part of the periscope which Fly Girl uses to see outside the machine), a 1940's Cadillac steering wheel (used on the steering column) and two leather bucket seats from an old Austin Mini (now used as seats for the pilot and co-pilot).