I was stunned to read some of the positive reviews about this movie. Not to be a fly in the ointment but this movie was absolutely horrendous. The director, Michael Chapman, tries to follow the script of the Icelandic sagas, which is an impossible task to achieve without thoroughly boring an audience, so the characters are left spouting meaningless lines like "I am..(pause for dramatic effect) Gunnar" instead of the more realistic (but infinitely more boring) "I am so-and-so, son of Eilif, grandson of Torkjell, 2nd cousin to Hallgeir Bloody Tooth, 4th brother-in-law twice removed to Helgi the Red, who defeated your great-grandmother in battle." Chapman goes out of his way to employ a largely Icelandic cast but then fails to get any advice from them on how to pronounce the character's names, which doesn't help the intended realism.
Okay, so maybe sticking to the Eddas and the Sagas wouldn't make for exciting cinema but instead of fleshing out the characters and making them people we can relate to Chapman makes them stereotypical and one-dimensional. The audience is led to believe the Vikings are overly macho brutes who take killing very lightly and seldom think of anything other than upholding their honor and obtaining bloody revenge.
The hero, Kjartan (Ralf "Terminator" Moeller), mostly grunts, flexes his muscles and speaks in a strong German accent about how he's going to "awenge his fatter". The training scene with Gunnar is another perfect example of the hideous dialogue throughout the movie. "Go ahead and kill me," is Gunnar's introduction to their first swordfighting lesson. "I don't vant to kill you," answers Arnold (er, Kjartan) and the two predictably end up bonding after Gunnar's spear nearly shaves several inches off our hero's manhood.
There are some redeeming moments in the film: the Icelandic scenery is stunning and there are several scenes where the characters chase each other over raging streams on 5-ft. tall Shetland ponies. Ingebjorg Stefansdottir's breasts are stunning and for a "virgin" she wastes no time in showing our hero how grateful she is by climbing on top of him, which she does frequently and gratuitously throughout the movie. The two have sex wherever they can find a warm, hot spring and manage to fall deeply in love without ever having to enter into any conversation.
The final battle scene though is the movie's shining moment in time: the Icelandic minstrels start playing Scottish bagpipe brogues and Kjartan mistakenly grabs the wrong prop - a circular Roman shield from the "Gladiator" set and embraces Ketil in a struggle to the death. Our hero emerges victorious when the evil villain's axe bounces off his chest and he shouts out the memorable and oft-repeated line "Vatter, I have awenged you!" Not to be outdone (his union contract called for him to have the final say), Ketil continues to egg on his enemy for a full 5 seconds after being decapitated before realizing he lacks vocal cords.
Okay, so maybe sticking to the Eddas and the Sagas wouldn't make for exciting cinema but instead of fleshing out the characters and making them people we can relate to Chapman makes them stereotypical and one-dimensional. The audience is led to believe the Vikings are overly macho brutes who take killing very lightly and seldom think of anything other than upholding their honor and obtaining bloody revenge.
The hero, Kjartan (Ralf "Terminator" Moeller), mostly grunts, flexes his muscles and speaks in a strong German accent about how he's going to "awenge his fatter". The training scene with Gunnar is another perfect example of the hideous dialogue throughout the movie. "Go ahead and kill me," is Gunnar's introduction to their first swordfighting lesson. "I don't vant to kill you," answers Arnold (er, Kjartan) and the two predictably end up bonding after Gunnar's spear nearly shaves several inches off our hero's manhood.
There are some redeeming moments in the film: the Icelandic scenery is stunning and there are several scenes where the characters chase each other over raging streams on 5-ft. tall Shetland ponies. Ingebjorg Stefansdottir's breasts are stunning and for a "virgin" she wastes no time in showing our hero how grateful she is by climbing on top of him, which she does frequently and gratuitously throughout the movie. The two have sex wherever they can find a warm, hot spring and manage to fall deeply in love without ever having to enter into any conversation.
The final battle scene though is the movie's shining moment in time: the Icelandic minstrels start playing Scottish bagpipe brogues and Kjartan mistakenly grabs the wrong prop - a circular Roman shield from the "Gladiator" set and embraces Ketil in a struggle to the death. Our hero emerges victorious when the evil villain's axe bounces off his chest and he shouts out the memorable and oft-repeated line "Vatter, I have awenged you!" Not to be outdone (his union contract called for him to have the final say), Ketil continues to egg on his enemy for a full 5 seconds after being decapitated before realizing he lacks vocal cords.