Valhalla Rising

"Valhalla Rising" is a strange movie that will split the audience into lovers and haters like you can see in the comments here. To me its these movies that are most interesting. If a movie goer sees a movie like this with breathtakingly beautiful and artistic cinematography on a low budget and still rates it with one or two stars, its either pure ignorance or something was struck that resonated in a negative way.

I already loved the previous movies of director Winding Refn but this one goes into a totally different direction. Its hard to explain the plot because most of it happens in the viewers head. What you see is mostly mythological and religious symbolism all revolving around the main character "One eye". A warrior who fights with a raw power of which we never know its human or not because he is mute and keeps the same empty expression in his face throughout the movie (only in some scenes it seems like hints of a smile shine through).

The movie starts with "One eye" held captive and has to fight battles to the death in which he always prevails. This first part of the movie has some raw violence in it and could be viewed as the "most entertaining" part because after this "Valhalla Rising" turns into a slow moving journey to an unknown place with barely any dialog and a droning ambient soundtrack.

Its hard to say what really happens in the several segments the movie is split into but the religious tone ("Hell", "Sacrifice") already show this is not a movie on a more existential level. And as I am still trying to piece the impressions of "Valhalla Rising" together I find that its a movie that sticks with you long after watching if you let yourself dive into the dense atmosphere. The imagery is stunning throughout, the most simple shots like a close up of knifes being washed in a river look like a beautiful painting and the constant difference between the beauty of the cinematography and the cold colors, raw violence and the dark droning soundtrack are as captivating as Mads MIkkelsen playing the cold expressionless "One Eye" like a force of nature.

I can't put my finger on what sucked me into this movie but "Valhalla Rising" is an experience open minded movie fans should not miss and I am looking forward to future projects from this promising director.

As far as bizarre and uncomfortable art films go, Nicolas Winding Refn's Valhalla Rising is pretty tame. In fact, it is so comparatively tame that the film's marketers felt they could serve it up as an action-packed Viking film—a terrible decision that caused the film to be a horrendous flop; because after all, this is a bizarre and uncomfortable art film. When I say "tame," of course, I do not mean it does not have an explicit evisceration scene—because it does—I mean it has a relatively discernible plot and characters with names.

The protagonist, One Eye (Mads Mikkelsen in a stark, fearsome performance), does not say a single word in the entire film. The other characters do a lousy job of filling in the silence, for I think I counted somewhere in the vicinity of twenty-four lines in total.

In addition to long periods of silence, the film also features clay-covered voodoo rock men, inverted dream sequences (I think), and a lot of existential symbolism—making it, without a doubt, a very bizarre and uncomfortable art film.

(Disclaimer: The film features starkly beautiful cinematography and brilliant performances. Certainly worth watching)

Valhalla Rising came out of nowhere, the trailer looked promising and had a "300" vibe to it. It looked stylized but realistic, brutal and with a respectable story. A plethora of aspects were extremely disappointing. The first few minutes are an outstanding way to start off this film, but the fifty minutes after are extremely boring. I was tempted to leave. While I enjoy a nice story with brutal action, there isn't much of a story here. It's more about the mythology than the story., and you'll hope for something to occur as each pointless minute passes along until the credits start to roll. It is one that is open to interpretation but most people won't bother. It simply doesn't make sense, and it has that "House of 1000 Corpses" random picture factor that gives it an easy way to be called unique. "One Eye" was the only iconic character in this film, the rest have a 21st century feeling in the way they look and dress. The world was often too grim and dark to fully enjoy the scenery. The attention to detail is impressive but felt only known to the writers as Valhalla Rising failed to present what it wanted to towards the audience.

I do applaud the filmmakers for creating a respectable indie film with their limited resources. Its' best features are the voices/sound effects, the vibrant (almost pink) blood in the dark setting and the brutal (but limited) action sequences.

Simply put, I am extremely disappointed. In the end, if you're looking for a brutal film with an epic storyline, you won't find one here. If you want something unique to everything else out there, a film with an underlying deep meaning like no other film out there, you may find Valhalla Rising worth your time. Audiences will be split.

I was expecting an epic battle movie about Vikings (as my mistake was to not check who's the director) and hell was I mistaken. What was delivered was an astonishing movie about humanity. In my humble opinion this is a masterpiece, despite being visually and acoustically amazing it is an in-depth look into mankind as it is rarely found. There is a lot in this movie (which in itself is amazing when one is looking on the minimal use of words)and I have to admit I did not get all the hints and metaphors used.

If you want entertainment go and watch something else use your brain and you will enjoy this movie! I normally do not write reviews or rate movies here but I strongly felt that this movie was underrated by a mile. Further, this reminded me to go and finally buy Denmarks best trilogy!

I saw it as a poem. Heavy, beautiful cinematography,Mads Mikkelsen as perfect option for One Eye, the Crusade theme and the visions as parts of ancient world source of meanigs, the lonely, silent man and the boy beautiful illustrated. Not comfortable images but fair illustration of a lost world spirit. So, admirable poem about life, options , answers and duty.