A Viking Saga (2008)

Drama set in the viking age, Helgi witnesses the destruction of his village and narrowly escapes to his uncle Rurik who raises him like his son. Many years later he meets the people responsible for his parents death and someone he never expected to see again.

Director:

Michael Mouyal

Writers:

Michael Mouyal, Dennis Goldberg

Stars:

Ken Vedsegaard, Peter Gantzler, Erik Holmey

2 wins.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Ken Vedsegaard	...	Oleg
Peter Gantzler	...	Askold
Erik Holmey	...	Rurik
Hans Henrik Clemensen	...	Timothy
Kenneth Carmohn	...	Svein
Jesper Pedersen	...	Leif
Kim Sønderholm	...	Dir
Julie R. Ølgaard	...	Lena (as Julie Ølgaard)
Neel Rønholt	...	Dagmar
Jan Linnebjerg	...	Koll
Alexandre Willaume	...	Oyvind (as Alexandre Willaume-Jantzen)
Lars Bjarke	...	Ulf
Klaus Hyr Hansen	...	Björn
Samuel P. Strong	...	Istan
Simon Braager	...	Young Oleg

Storyline

Drama set in the viking age, Helgi witnesses the destruction of his village and narrowly escapes to his uncle Rurik who raises him like his son. Many years later he meets the people responsible for his parents death and someone he never expected to see again.

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Plot Keywords:

viking | battlefield | violence | axe fight | axe | 

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Genres:

Adventure | Drama | History

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Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

Denmark USA

Language:

English Danish

Release Date:

13 April 2008 (USA)

Also Known As:

A Viking Saga: Son of Thor

Filming Locations:

Helsingør, Sjælland, Denmark

Box Office

Budget:

$300,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Supersonic Entertainment

Technical Specs

Runtime:

82 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby SR

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Goofs

When Oleg is an adult, he encounters Dir, the man whose thumb he cut off as a boy. When they shake hands, Dir is clearly shown missing the thumb on his right hand (at around 44 mins). Dir is later shown having both thumbs (at 59:31 and 61:23).

User Reviews

A Viking Saga that looks like it's made by some viking fans in one weekend.

Okay, so it's low budget and yes, there's going to be limits to what you can do if you haven't got the cash but here's a good example of a film that needed to reign in it's scope and give over it's meager budget to a script writer who could perhaps deliver a character based story instead of this over extended film.

The story is a stock one of a hero who as a child witnesses their village being slaughtered, they grow up and you can guess the rest. It'll be familiar in fact to anyone who's seen Hrafninn flýgur (When The Raven Flies, 1984) but with more badly acted childhood scenes than your nearest school nativity play. In fact most casual viewers are going to be put off the film in the first twenty minutes because of the poor acting from the children in it - all except one child extra though, who during a camp fire story can be seen yawning and fidgeting as much as the audience probably is.

Then you have some really, really bad sound dubbing. Some dialogue sounds like it was re-done with a tape recorder in a church hall, complete with echo and background hiss, then dubbed back over.

So it's a low budget film and the maker's have rather cleverly used viking re-enactors in scenes such as the establishing shots of Kiev and the final climactic battle at the end. Unfortunately the costumes of the re-enactors, with all the proper kit they've got, actually shows up how basic the principal character's costumes are.

Then there's the cutting in of the film's principal actors into the previously recorded re-enactors battle scenes. They used to make post- World War II fighter ace films by cutting shots of the actors in a cockpit in with real footage of an actual dogfight. That's a trick they've tried to do here with a re-enactment battle but it's so obvious thanks to the different lighting, camera style, grade of film and background scenery that it's almost comical. You can see the main characters alone in a frame slashing at nothing because they were no where near the actual re-enactment battle in the first place!

So all in all it's not a great movie, even for an independent low budget one. Put it this way, if you've seen Severed Ways: The Norse Discovery of America (2007) and managed to get to the end of it you'll probably make it to the end of this film. Just don't expect a great viking experience.