Norwegian Ninja

Arne Treholt, in the real world, was Norways biggest traitor during the cold war. This film dishes out the alternate reality of him being the leader of the kings secret Ninja Elite Forces. Yes, we said Norwegian Ninjas. Expect obvious model miniatures hanging from visible strings, ninjas disappearing into smoke clouds, mixed in real footage of 80s events, made-to-be-bad martial arts scenes, machos with tinted sunglasses in best "Pilot" Heritage, and action scenes straight out of the fake army manual they made for the movie ;) If you take this as a serious try on movie-making, you are in the wrong film. This is over the top Z filmmaking, and as such it blows :)

The movie tries really hard to pay tribute to old (Grindhouse) movies and is constantly aware that the audience is in on the joke. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing. Unfortunately all the winks and tributes do not work as well as I think the filmmakers intended them to be in the first place.

The short running time will be a relief to almost everybody, because the movie does feel longer (although I couldn't tell you why). The story has it's (twist) moments and it does have a few nice surprises along the way, that make this a not so bad experience. As another reviewer said, depending on your taste you might even like this better than the rating it got here. But for the rest: Rent it first, see if you like it and then you can still buy it, if you really want to

In this "true" story about the events that lead to Arne Treholts arrest for treason back in 1984, we are served a spectacular epic, with some nice stop-motion effects(in our days of CGI) and lots of absurd humor. It's not often we are served something really original, when it comes to movies. Almost every movie is either a remake or a reboot, but this! A secret ninja organization located right outside of Oslo, with the late king Olav as their leader, Trond-Viggo Torgersen really did a good job with that role. Mads Ousdal is great as Arne Treholt, he actually reminds me of Harrison Ford sometimes, but the character they've created for this movie also is great. The way he puts a cigarette in his mouth almost makes smoking look cool, and the rest of his supernatural powers, disappearing in a cloud of smoke, putting clothes on and of... It's a really amusing movie, and truly refreshing in these days, so was Inception, but personally, I think this concept was greater! Lots of bizarre humor, and ridiculous situations, an absurd masterpiece!

When I bought this movie it was because it said "From the producers of Dead Snow" on the front cover, and also because it is Norwegian. However, a movie's cover is not everything you might believe it to be.

Sure, "Norwegian Ninja" is a tribute to the old grindhouse movies, and hats off to it for that. But other than that, this movie doesn't really offer much else interesting.

The acting in the movie is actually quite alright, just bear in mind that people are speaking Norwegian here, so you might have to look at the subtitles. Luckily I understand Norwegian, so I disabled the subtitles and were able to watch the movie without having to read through them and miss out on stuff on the screen.

"Norwegian Ninja" offers a fairly weak storyline, though there were the occasional moment of glory here and there, though they were far apart. My favorite thing about the entire movie was Arne Treholt would appear and vanish in a flash of smoke every time, and it cracked me up. That was just too hilarious.

In overall, this movie didn't really entertain me anywhere near what "Dead Snow" ("Død Snø") did and it was somewhat of a disappointment. Actually I didn't even make it to the end, I gave up about three-fourths through the movie. I just found the movie to be irrelevant and uninteresting at that point.

I am sure there is a fan-base out there for a movie like this, it just didn't fit into what I enjoy in a movie. The movie is not bad, far from it, it is just an acquired taste.

This movie hits you with memorable events of the Norwegian 80's. And makes it a bit exciting and very funny. I guess that if you are born prior to or during the early 80's (preferably in Norway) you'll find this movie nostalgic and hilarious.

The director and crew has done an excellent job in utilizing special effects to make it look like the 80's. Why compete with the $100 million budget block buster movies (that time forgets in an instant). When you can make a funny movie that just as well as the story, the props and special effects make the movie memorable.

The only down side to this movie might be that foreigners will most likely not pick up on all of the 80's nostalgia and thus not understand all the humor. But this movie is very watchable anyway.