pennypenser

The story that is behind this film is obviously a strong, emotional one about love and sacrifice. Unfortunately for me the film does not live up to its potential. While the production value is great and the cast have a great look the performance and direction failed to connect.

The story meanders a bit too much and I lost interest a few times. The film's structure and pacing did not build but stops and starts. I heard about this film from an article comparing it to Top Gun Maverick, in which it was recommended to the reader to check this film out as it got overshadowed by Top Gun Maverick. Yes it got overshadowed and for good reason, TGM has a story that builds, characters that connect better than this film.

If you come at this film as a piece of escapist entertainment with little expectation, then you can enjoy it.

It is completely silly at times, with the Norwegians reacting very bizarely most of the time, and it seemed to me that the budget restricted the size of the cast for most of the scenes.

Even so, it still made me laugh, and I did get caught up in the story enough to watch it through to the end.

How do you take the myths of trolls and make them realistic? Well this film takes a shot at this, and sometimes it sort of works, and other times it falls flat on its face.

If you've got a bit of time to spare and want something light to take your mind of the doom and gloom of the world, this might work for you.

I was interested to see what the director of "The Babadook" would make next, and I was not really prepared for this period piece filled with equal amounts of realism and brutality.

This is a very well made film, with great performances from the main leads, set in a time of colonisation on the island of Tasmania, when the white settlers were waging war against the first nations people.

But this is a tale of revenge, with a strong woman determined to avenge the death of her husband and baby at the hands of the corrupt and evil British Colonial men.

As hard as it is at times to watch, it is very compelling, the story and characters engage you and I had to see how it would play out, not guessing at how it would all end and being surprised at the ending.

The depiction of the realism of the difficulty of living at such a time was like a punch to the solar plexus.