You edited that again!!! lol. I know, I am the Devil Incarnate!!!
Many a man would like me checking out there ass, that's all I can say!!! Be thankfull if I am, hehe.
God, he's sending in the doodlebugs again, he must be serious!!!!
That Valhala film looks interesting. Worth a watch then is it, Jin?
Have a great day all ye in the cuckoos nest!
Peace, DST
^no spoilers on the valhalla film please, or i'll have to return-doodlebug.
so was that movie any good
Let's begin with a very one-sided, pedantic review by an online professional:
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Any literature nerd worth his salt gets a little turned on by the name “One-Eye”—it conjures images of the mighty Cyclops and even that heralded monocular of yore, Odin. You can understand my excitement, then, as trailers began emerging for Nicolas Winding Refn’s Valhalla Rising, a film seemingly spiced with allusions to religious warfare between ancient pagan religions and Christians at the dawn of England’s evangelism. A mysterious man with a single eye pitted against impending Christian hordes—the last and strongest of the Norse gods forced to make a final stand, to fight for his very existence. Epic battles and philosophical quandaries—maybe even an intellectual bent on the whole thing, providing the general public a better understanding of Christianity’s tainting of pagan texts like Beowulf and older sagas. There’s even an elderly crusader bedecked in chain mail and a scruffy white beard who proclaims himself “God”—and for the sake of every popular artist’s rendition, looks every bit the part. This was it--a clash of religions old and new, set against a historic backdrop largely overlooked today. It was my English Majory wet dream.
But alas. It was not to be. Refn’s film says few things about man and religion, focusing instead on brainings and evisceration. The film is split into five chapters, each cryptically (and foolishly) titled things like “ CHAPTER III: MEN OF GOD”. The first sets us up, revealing “One Eye” (Mads Mikkelsen) as a heathen tribe’s captive warrior—he’s never lost a “wrestling” match in his life, making him a valuable asset to the betting tribes. After being traded from one band to another, the man breaks free and, of course, murders his captors. This brings us to act two, where the Cyclops runs across several Christian crusaders circled around a group of dirty, naked women. These ladies are never explained, and the crusaders take One Eye in as their own, despite his continued silence. Indeed, the protagonist supposedly “speaks” through his child companion Are (Maarten Stevenson), though this is never a sure thing. For all we know, the protagonist simply has a penchant for staring longingly at the young boy—a tender pedophilia confused for telepathy by the evangelicals. Together, the heathen and Christians set off by boat to “take back the holy land”: Jerusalem. Unfortunately, the group runs afoul some mist during their voyage and end up marooned on some hellish alien landscape. As this weird band of warriors attempts to figure out where they’ve landed, an unknown evil threatens their every step—either they stay where they are and claim it in the name of God, or seek escape through the nearby woods.
There are at least twenty awkward close-ups of people staring off into the distance, soliloquizing vague and ominous things like “The boy said he's from hell—maybe that's where we're going” and “I had a dream like this once—where I was wandering around alive; turned out I was dead”. The gothy script is only enhanced by crappy Adobe Photoshop lighting effects; apparently rather than shoot on a rainy day, the director chose to film “around” the sun—that is, fiddle with the brightness and contrast levels so that EVERYTHING ON SCREEN looks muddy, from the rolling hillsides to Andrew Flanagan’s goofy face. The worst part of all, though, is the missed opportunity. Valhalla Rising had the potential to be something special—a statement on the death of a religion at the hands of another; a rumination on the death of a god, told through the voice of a culture that once held him dear. What we get instead is pure existentialism—whichever man is strongest earns the most followers—thus denying viewers whatever meaning the film’s loaded allusions meant to suggest. What could have been a showdown of theological proportions turns out to be the story of some crusty old outcasts who happen to land on a rock and (spoiler removed). I can’t think of a less logical way to end this flick, but there you have it. It's a stupid little movie, heavy on skull mashing and disemboweling, low on dialogue and emotion. It promises a lot, follows through on little, and means nothing.
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Boy, he sure makes it sound pretty lame, right? Well I know small budget film-makers. I've seen them work. These fucking reviewers haven't a fucking clue how much thought and effort goes into even a three minute scene where a character is just walking through the woods or down the street.
And although I'm inherently prejudiced against hoity toity film reviewers, I'm not just countering this guy for the sake of it. This movie has real merit. So here is my review:
Valhalla Rising should not be taken at its face. The reviewer drew the most obvious conclusions from the previews and had the most obvious expectations. I went in with a clear head and just watched it. He described the world pretty capabably (though with disdain), but here's my take on it.
Have any of you studied history? Beyond the stuffy textbook descriptions of ancient times, have you ever let your imagination wander? Life even in the 19th century would kill me quickly, so accustomed am I to the conveniences of modern living. But the horrors of the ancient times? Forget about it. You'd be lucky to live to 25. Crazy shit. Death and disease were everywhere. Back then human blood was as common a sight as water. Okay, so do you properly have an idea of how wretched life would have been in the time of the Christian Crusades (1095 and 1291)? Good.
Enter an untamed land of Viking tribes. A fierce one-eyed warrior slave (Mads Mikkelsen) cannot be defeated in the to-the-death 'boxing' matches held by his Viking captors. This is a closely guarded sport by the ruling class. Think of it as the Viking equivalent of the Roman Gladiator, but even less humane. No one knows who this 'One-eye' really is or where he came from. They just know that he's death on two legs.
The movie doesn't try to 'set up' the narrative by approaching story-telling in the conventional way. The film just starts and shows you these very bleak, bare, horrible things. It fills you with a sense of emotional and physical despair... because that's what it was to be alive back then. While the reviewer was bored by the long drawn out shots of characters and landscapes, I thought they added to the realism in that people were a hell of a lot more superstitious back then... They heard spirits whispering in the winds and all sorts of creepy stuff. Those long, ruminating, often psychedelic moments give the viewer an idea of what such superstition might have felt like.
So we meet this One-eye. We see how he lives. We see his world. Brutal fucking shit. Amazing film-making.
Then One-eye fucking escapes in a shower of blood and does bad, bad things to his former captors.
The physical presence of One-eye has great impact on the viewer. He's tall and menacing. And he's hell on wheels with a medium-sized axe and large dagger. He doesn't use a sword or shield.
So like the guy above said, he meets up with a band of Crusaders after escaping. They take a nightmarish boat ride through what seems like an endless mist (pretty disturbing sequence), land on an unknown shore, and we see one event lead to another. And these things occur very matter-of-factly, without any drama or fanfare (like the reviewer was hoping for).
No, forget those colorful, simplistic images of history you were taught in school. This is how it really must have been. No drama, no bright colors, just lots of cold, starving people killing one another. That, to me, makes all the 'statement' necessary about human history and existence. Human history is nothing more than the story of stronger people killing and raping weaker people. Religous belief and ideals were always just a reason for the killing...But the act of killing itself remains universal and eternal. What other statement is there to be made about humankind?
If you're expecting something like Troy or Gladiator, you'll be disappointed. But smoke a bowl, sit down, watch this. You'll find it jarring and interesting to say the least. I bet you anything the reviewer doesn't get high.
My main criticism of the movie is that it was too short. I really felt more could have been developed with the elements appearing in the latter half of the film.
So what did the film ultimately say to me? Ideals? Religion? Fantasy. Splitting open a man's head? Reality.