The Northlander

Hyped with tons of **fake, duplicate reviews by the cast and producers.** Notice how the written reviews on IMDb are nearly all around 2/10 stars, while the IMDb score is 8.4 based on only 500 reviews. You can see how all the written reviews on letterboxd are duplicates with the same review text in French written under different names (http://letterboxd.com/film/the-northlander/). Seems like an interesting Mad Max-like premise but its obviously an **indie film**, so don't watch expecting it to be even a B-list movie.

It is obvious that this movie had its viewer rating box stuffed to some extent, I see this kind of thing a lot, especially with the occasional big money project, although I don't think this is a BIG money project.

It is also obvious some people have written negative reviews on this movie who may not have even watched it.

There are some things about this particular movie that are exceptional. The costume and make up was done really well. Many of the actors have hideous scars and they are wearing pretty realistic post apocalyptic clothes. Now mind you, I never could figure out how they got the scarring, which seemed to be a central theme to the movie, or why the scarring was significant, nonetheless, the people who did the work did an excellent job.

The camera work was very good, and the cinematography was at times breath taking. This was complimented by appropriate decent sounding back ground music. The acting was also decent. (The weapons were kind of ludicrous though). Editing however seemed to be non existent, as one time a wad of snot came out of the male protagonist's nose, you would think the people in charge of the movie at the very least would have edited this out.

So some of the ingredients were there for a very good movie. The major problem with it is that after an hour a viewer still does not really know what is going on. We are given a synopsis of the movie, and there is a narrated intro at the start, but even with those it does not come together. I lay this squarely at the feet of director/writer.

I feel sorry for all the movie crew who did such good work, it was wasted effort. The guy who shouldered this project should have allowed constructive criticism at each stage of this movie, especially in the script and story boarding. It must be nice to have that kind of money to spend as you want, but its definitely not fair to those who turned in first class work on the project, hoping for recognition.

I usually do not bother watching a movie with less than 60% on IMDb, in fact nearer to 70%, but I am a sucker for anything set in the future. I guess I am going to have to be stricter about this.

I find myself asking "how can this happen"? Quite how 900 people got this movie to 59% (at the time of writing) is beyond me. Is there some new way for studios to leave fake reviews on IMDb? This movie is SO SLOW it might as well be in slow motion.

It is actually painful to sit through, practically plot less, the acting is dire and there nothing here for anyone. Even the fight scenes look like badly rehearsed wrestling from the 1970's.

Some movies leave you wanting those 2 hours of your life back, but others make you determined to just forget it. This one only lasts 83 minutes but it feels like 5 hours! I gave it a couple of days and tried again, sadly it was just as bad.

The reason I felt compelled to come and leave you this review is so that you might at least be saved from watching this terrible movie. It is too late for me, but not for you, choose something else!! I love movies and will give almost any a go but this is complete tripe.

I guess that from now on I will have to wait until tens of thousands have voted if I am to trust IMDb scores.

I was amused by the diversity in ratings: 7.5 average from supposedly 500+ people. But only eight reviews? Six of those (evidently the honest ones) are very negative and all state the same thing: no comprehensible plot line. The other two reviews, both praising the film, are in the same chopped-English. Bogus positive reviews? Bogus ratings? Obviously so. First, a good movie doesn't get 500 ratings and only 8 reviews. Second, the chopped-English positive reviews make it pretty evident they were bought (or from foreign members of the crew). Result: I have better things to do with my time than watch an obviously scammed film.

OMG what was that all about? Someone should tell Benjamin that there is a big difference between being deep and being obtuse. It's bad enough that the acting is so stilted, but honestly, the story line is non-existent. My theory is that a group of first-year film students got lost in the badlands with nothing but a bag of drugs and a camera stuck in slow motion mode. I saw this movie with a large group of people,and afterwards everyone had lots of compliments for the scenery, the props, the costumes, even the stunt performers... but not one of them could tell me what the story was about, whether the movie had any kind of point to make, or why anyone would bother to produce this kind of self-indulgent garbage. Do not waste your time watching this movie.