Redbad (2018)

The power struggles and wars between the Frisian Redbad and his sworn enemy Pepin of Herstal, Lord of the Franks.

Director:

Roel Reiné

Writer:

Alex van Galen (screenplay)

Stars:

Gijs Naber, Lisa Smit, Huub Stapel

6 wins & 1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Gijs Naber	...	Redbad
Lisa Smit	...	Fenne
Huub Stapel	...	Aldigisl
Derek de Lint	...	Eibert
Aus Greidanus	...	Odulf (as Aus Greidanus sr.)
Peter Faber	...	Sibod
Marieke Heebink	...	Alemke
Sierd Jan van der Meulen	...	Baby Poppo
Mike Weerts	...	Scout
Jack Wouterse	...	Willibrord
Tibo Vandenborre	...	Charles Martel
Daphne Wellens	...	Trude
Pieter Embrechts	...	General Focard
Søren Malling	...	Wiglek
Morten Rose	...	Gund

Storyline

700 AD. Northern Europe is divided into two worlds: the Frisians, Saxons and Danes live above the rivers, below the rivers live the Franks. They want to achieve what even the Romans did not succeed: conquer all of Europe. They put in a new weapon to enslave the Gentiles: Christianity. They target Europe's main trading center, where the Frisian king Aldigisl rules.

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Plot Keywords:

child murder | 8th century | frankish empire | frisian history | rape | 

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Taglines:

The road to freedom is paved in blood.

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Genres:

Action | Adventure | Drama | History | War

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Did You Know?

Trivia

Early test footage of the film was shown at Dutch Comic Con.

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Goofs

While now in the center of the Netherlands, Dorestad was much closer to the North Sea coast in the era of the film, and was subject to both seasonal flooding from the Rhine river system, as well as potential catastrophic marine inundation from the west over the vast tidal salt flats to the west.

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Alternate Versions

In January 2019 the movie aired on TV in the Netherlands as a four part mini-series.

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Connections

Edited into Redbad - The Legend (2019)

User Reviews

Slow paced, taking too many liberties with history and not much of an actual story.

Set in an alternate universe where Frisians speak perfect Holland Dutch (Odd considering Frisian is a recognized language besides dutch), the Frankish speak English and the Danish speak English is well.

It tries to tie together historical events, figures and legends that took place in the same period but often not in the same place. Then there are the long list of things that simply do not belong in that time period as they belong to the later middle ages like the weapons and castles. Much of how the historical setting is displayed is fictional or belongs to different time periods or different people.

This extreme artistic liberty with history could have worked out pretty well if it had created an actual engaging story. Unfortunately the movie does fail in that aspect by using all the movie cliches spread out in such a way that the halfway through the film we were left wondering if it was actually building up to something and basically got bored.

It doesn't help that the action sequences often made little sense where often the Frisians fighting would be surrounded and spread out only to suddenly be grouped together and victorious after a camera angle change.

It really is a shame as the acting itself was good (except for Frisians speaking perfect dutch without an accent), the imagery pretty, etc. There really is a hint of a potentially good movie in there if they had been more critical towards the story.

Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

Netherlands

Language:

Dutch English

Release Date:

28 June 2018 (Netherlands)

Also Known As:

Redbad

Box Office

Budget:

EUR7,000,000 (estimated)

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$482,806

Company Credits

Production Co:

Farmhouse Film & TV, Bulletproof Cupid, Rebel Entertainment

Technical Specs

Runtime:

160 min

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.39:1