The Northman

I hadn't realized this film was directed by Robert Eggers, else I would've been better prepared. It's not what I expected, and it was hard to really get into.

That said, I can appreciate the film for its art. I would say it's a gem for cinephiles. It's like viewing the imagination of a medieval Viking peasant as he listens to a bard tell the tale of Amleth.

Great for what it is, but does not evoke emotional connection to the characters, and therefore feels less satisfying.

This film looks good, sounds good, has the actors to be good, but dissappoints.

Another film that is all about clips that look really good but on watching, it is difficult to feel any real interest in the story coz it is so rambling and jumps about..

Other aspects are just unbelievable, nonsense battle scenes etc.

This obviously was made with a lavish budget, visually it looks great, but it doesn't make up for the lacking of story. I couldn't help but compare this to 'The 13th Warrior' which does have a good story (similar era)

The music, if that's what you call it, quickly began to get on my nerves with the constant 'dirge'.

Another irritance was the weird variable accents, sometimes Scottish, bit of Irish, inconsistant mish mash.

I kept waiting for it to get interesting, but it never did 6/10 just for visuals.

Can't really recommend it unless you either love the main actor and/or Viking movies. Even then I actually like both, but am still disappointed overall mostly due to the script

Its full of irrelevant filler, the right move was to make it shorter as it runs a lot longer than it needed too so does drag on. The plot has some really dumb "moves" in it, which can make it a little frustrating to watch. I could go on but you get the idea, Producer and Director are probably somewhat to blame too, but overall the Directing was good other than not trying to tighten this up more

On the brighter side Acting is good, there is some action and it is a revenge movie, though not an original one by any stretch.

Everything about this movie screams "beastly." Literal screams along with metaphorical ones. It's a beastly movie with a beastly cast giving beastly performances behind a backdrop of beastly cinematography scored with beastly music. Beastly men in beastly fights.

I had a smile on my face for most of the movie. I was fully invested in the story and characters. The directing is top-notch with a style that gives the movie a character of its own. There are so many beautiful shots. And I give it major props for going all out and holding nothing back (we need more R-rated movies!!).

In my review for Dune, I mentioned that so many scenes feel so epic even without action. Regular scenes of them walking are somehow epic. It's the same way with The Northman. It's filled with epic non-action moments, which are heavily aided by the music and cinematography. When this is the case, even the slow parts feel escalated.

The entire cast gives great performances, but I need to single out Anya Taylor-Joy. I want her cast in every movie. She has the acting talent as well as a screen presence and charisma that has you glued to every scene she's in. I've liked her in everything I've seen of hers, which already includes so many great movies like Split/Glass, Last Night in Soho, and Morgan. We're witnessing the birth of a star. It's possible I'm a bit biased due to her being one of the most beautiful women on the planet.

I highly recommend The Northman. If any cinemas in your area are playing it on a premium screen, it's definitely worth it. Unfortunately IMAX is still showing Fantastic Beasts. (2 viewings, opening Thursday EMAX 4/21/2022, Dolby Atmos 5/3/2022)

The cinematography is fantastic and the soundtrack is powerful, though almost too much at times. But the plot is too simplistic which makes the runtime ridiculously overlong. The acting isn't terrible, but the dialogue is atrocious, wooden, and mechanically delivered. It would have served the film better had it been done in native languages (Russian, Slavic, Icelandic, Norwegian, Scandinavian...), but doing it in English gave it the feel of early Gaul. I liked the Tibetan-Bon singing in the film, but it didn't fit the setting at all, since that is Russian-Tibetan, not Icelandic-based. I think Eggers tried to be too expansive with his period-appropriateness. The film dragged a lot as it lacked any intriguing subplots or mysteriousness. As an action film, it was only so-so, since the action scenes lacked action, and Amleth too often looked as if he was flexing for photo ops and not actually fighting or killing. Too many dream sequences that just felt glommed on to the thin story. Sadly, an easy film to let run in the background until the revenge mayhem towards the end. Cool to see Bjork in a film!