Valhalla Rising

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Valhalla Rising

April 15th 2011 03:29

Danish maverick, Nicholas Winding Refn, channels the poetic minimalism of Andrei Tarkovsky, the spiritual mysticism of Werner Herzog, and the stark surrealism of David Lynch into a dark, violent, yet strangely serene tale of degradation, emancipation, redemption, and resignation infused with savagery and despair. Valhalla Rising (2009) is the mortal journey of One-Eye (Mads Mikkelsen), a mute Norse warrior, across the rugged landscape of the mind, body, and soul, toward a destiny foreseen.

Mads Mikkelsen as One-Eye

It is the dawn of the Dark Age, 1000AD, in the misty highlands of Scotland, a terrain of desolation and majesty. One-Eye is a pagan’s slave forced by the chieftain, Barde (Alexander Morten), into fighting to the death for the amusement of his captors. He is very strong and adept and never loses, snapping necks, tearing jugulars, disemboweling his adversaries. By day he is thrust into the mud circle of wrath, by night he is chained inside a wooden cage. A young boy, Are (Maarten Stevenson) feeds him, observing the silent killer with fascination.

Maarten Anderson as Are

Through visions One-Eye has the ability to see into his own future. This enables him to break from his binds and slaughter the pagan enemies who’ve enslaved him. On his own, with Are following, One-Eye traverses the mountainside and encounters a clutch of Crusaders, Christian Vikings on route to The Holy Land. One-Eye is invited to join their mission, which he does warily.

Their boat is engulfed by fog and the journeymen become disorientated and confused. Eventually the mist clears and the men find themselves surrounded by the boreal forest, not The Holy Land. They are menaced, and the Christians believe they have entered Hell. One-Eye takes it in his stride, and uses the Vikings’ psychological frailty as fuel for his own spiritual progression. They have reached New Found Land, and One-Eye embraces Valhalla.

Director Refn, with co-screenwriter Roy Jacobsen, has constructed the narrative with very little dialogue. Valhalla Rising travels a powerful visual arc aided by a magnificent and truly evocative score, courtesy of Peterpeter and Peter Kyed, and absolutely stunning cinematography, courtesy of Morten Søborg. The imagery in Valhalla Rising is sublime. Refn composes many of shots as tableaux, with One-Eye’s visions saturated in a luminescent red. He inverses some images within the visions creating a sense of displacement; One-Eye’s profile reversed, the rippling ocean upside as a fluid sky.

The narrative is punctuated by chapter inter-titles; I Wrath, II Silent Warrior, III Men Of God, IV The Holy Land, V Hell, and VI The Sacrifice. The mood and tone are deeply introspective, the characters frequently musing, lost in thought, observing, pondering, calculating. I’m reminded of Jim Jarmusch’s mutant Western Dead Man (1995), a similar drifting, existential mood, but devoid of Dead Man’s sardonic and bitter sense of humour. Valhalla Rising is not interested in any smidgeon of amusement, yet the movie is infused with an elusive, ethereal buoyancy, an anchor being dragged through the sea bed of time and space.

Certainly the landscape is something to behold; apparently filmed entirely in Scotland, although I noticed Wales being thanked in the credits, perhaps some of the location shooting took place on that similarly unforgiving, formidable, and awesome terrain as well. Mads Mikkelsen is quietly brilliant in his unspeaking role. All the support cast is solid. The costuming is very impressive, and the brutal violence is executed superbly. I have my reservations over the use of CGI bloodletting, but Refn carries it off okay, and he does use prosthetics in the right place (there’s an excellent hatchet neck wound on one victim).

This is a movie for acquired tastes, and certainly not for those with little patience. It rewards significantly, but doesn’t suffer fools gladly. It is a movie of moments, of ideas, of feeling. Refn has likened the cinema experience to that of an acid trip (there is even a scene involving the ingestion of a psychotropic drug), and says he was inspired by one of the most expressionist directors, Mario Bava, in particular his movie Planet of the Vampires (1965), and by the curious discovery of a cairn of rune stones in Delaware. It was a dreadful oversight not to have been given a theatrical season in Australia. An instant cult classic, Valhalla Rising is a jagged gemstone glistening seductively in the abyss.

Here’s the trailer:

Valhalla Rising DVD is courtesy of Madman Entertainment, many thanks!

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Posted By: Bryn - Category: movie reviews

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Comments

8 Comments. [ Add A Comment ]

Comment by David O'Connell

April 15th 2011 05:02

20/20 Filmsight
Screen Fanatic

Great review Bryn, and beautifully summed up. Very glad you got to finally see this - and loved it as much as I do. The sublime visuals I could gaze at all day long. Refn's last two films have been staggering works. I see his next, the American film Driver, with Ryan Gosling, has just been selected for Cannes. Waiting with baited breath - and praying for something good! Or at least, not a disaster!

Comment by Bryn

April 15th 2011 16:46

Horrorphile

Thanks Dave! Gosh, Refn is a legend already! This is the kind of mediative work you'd expect from a director well into his prime. Amazing stuff. Such resonance!

Comment by JohnDoe

April 16th 2011 20:06

Film & TV on DVD

Great review Bryn,

I have been meaning to review this one myself. After revisiting it Valhalla Rising may be my favourite film of last year.

Such incredible imagery, vast feeling and mystical after effects.

Comment by Matt Shea

April 17th 2011 03:15

I need to see this film. Great review, Bryn -- you were obviously feeling this, no doubt. To be honest, I need to do some proper schooling on Refn in general -- knowledge is patchy.

Comment by Bryn

April 17th 2011 04:08

Horrorphile

John, I so wish I'd got to see it on the big screen!

Matt, yes you do need to see this. His Pusher trilogy is fantastic, especially the first part. I have Bleeder still to watch. Bronson is great.

Comment by JMD

April 19th 2011 04:06

It's good to hear you like it. I gave my parents a lot of movies a few months back and this is the movie my mom told me that they liked a lot. And they're in their 60s.