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March 28, 2024, 05:25:58 PM

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The Northman (2022)

Started by Dusty Substance, December 20, 2021, 06:09:37 PM

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Noodle Lizard

I liked this quite a lot, although I did flit between loving it and hating it a few times throughout. So I'd agree with "uneven".

I like that it managed to incorporate the fantastical elements of Viking folklore without really becoming an outright fantasy film, and the more obviously Eggers bits were all great. Of course the story was a bit generic, but I thought it was a fine template that was plot-light enough to allow the atmosphere and more esoteric set-pieces breath.

On the other hand - and perhaps this is just because I have Eggers saying he had to make a few compromises fresh in my mind - it did feel quite obvious when there might have been studio interference. Anna Taylor-Joy is a fine actress, but her character felt a bit like an afterthought at times, and an obligatory love interest would absolutely be the first thing a studio might suggest. There were a couple of scenes with him and her which felt so tonally and stylistically detached from the rest of it that I wonder if they might have been later additions/reshoots.

For another criticism, I thought some of the action was poorly executed - almost as if it wasn't quite finished. Even clearly "impressive action bit" ones like that first Viking raid near the beginning didn't have quite the whack they needed. Not Eggers' strong suit, perhaps.

Still, it's a solid B+. Beautifully shot and sound designed, mostly well-acted (Skarsgard actually being a weak link for me) and a good deal of it was properly enjoyable, which is more than can be said for most things I see in the cinema.

JaDanketies

It was good but it was not properly good because the storyline missed all the right beats. It could've been a lot tighter too. A lot of scenes were very similar to Gladiator which is much superior / one of the best movies of all time. Just felt like none of it had any emotional impact. I kinda thought it would end like that too.

We went to a cinema called Everyman which is "changing the cinema experience" and had nice chairs, waiters (before the movie starts) drinks, cocktails, food (I got a tiny pizza, I reckon 3 tapas plates would be enough for one). The tickets themselves were only £15 compared to a tenner for the AMC, but the booze and food added plenty to the price anyway. Was good, will definitely choose it over the regular cinema in future (unless I'm going with the 2 y/o)

The last exceptional movie I saw at the pictures was 3 Billboards

 7.5

Mister Six

Quote from: Thomas on April 19, 2022, 02:41:22 PMSimple Viking saga, big cinema experience. I particularly liked the ambiguous moments of mythological perception, as when he battled an undead old fella for the sword (but then actually didn't), and the ascensions to Valhalla. Did well not to make a horse galloping through space look ridiculous.

I'd echo this. It's s testament to the man's skill that such a slight story can remain so compelling over such a long runtime (although like a couple of others I thought it sagged a bit in
Spoiler alert
the uncle's village, during those three nights of terror
[close]
). I'd have liked a bit more of the Eggersy weirdness, but perhaps the balance of real and unreal was appropriate, I dunno. Gave the violence a bit of grit, that's for sure.

8 leering Dafoes out of 10.

Mister Six

Quote from: surreal on April 20, 2022, 10:21:56 AMGood casting, Skarsgard was imposing as always - he's never going to be the best actor but in the right roles he does work well. 

I strongly disagree with that. His characters in this, True Blood and Generation Kill are all markedly different, and he inhabits them well.

Magnum Valentino

Aye, and We Hate Everyone, and Succession too. He's a great actor and has enormous physical charisma.

dead-ced-dead

I, too, feel that Skarsgard is a really good actor, I just think he's never been able to find that one "breakout" role that will change the public's consciousness of him, and thus has remained comparatively underrated.

I think the only difference between him and his similarly talented peers, is his peers do excellent work but have that one BIG role (franchise, TV show, best picture nominated film etc.) I know True Blood was huge, but I think it being from 2008-14 just pulls it outside people's consciousness limit for most viewers.

Every attempt at a franchise seems to fall on its face. Not his fault, he did the best he could in them, it's just they didn't hit for one reason or another (Tarzan; this; Godzilla vs. Kong was a pandemic hit, but he was drowned in the cast and in a boring character, The Stand, Battleship etc)

Glebe

Oh yeah it was driving me mad trying to figure out where I'd seen the usurping brother before. Claes Bang out of the Gatiss & Moffat Dracula, innit?

Twit 2


Aw, this could have been a lot better :(

Started quite strongly but flatlined near the middle and really outstayed it's welcome towards the end.
It all felt a bit flat and cold.

By my calculations, his films are better the less budget he has to work with, so hopefully this was a flop.

It was a three bagger, I reckon. I'm wondering if he bit off more than he could chew, or if there were concessions made to the studio because of the big budget. Either way, it's a shame.

zomgmouse

this is three for three of eggers' films that i have found to be alluring in some respects (mostly visual) and completely offputting in others (mostly the script and dialogue) - overall, a mess. and true to that i think this is simultaneously his most engaging and also shonkiest film.

some good action moments to genuinely get caught up in, björk and dafoe (and to an extent gleeson) were very good - enjoyed the mystical stuff in general. most of the rest of the cast were bollocks and the script and the dialogue (as alluded to above) were for the most part terrible. cliché use of drums with the build and then silence. tries to say something about fate and men but doesn't really do that.

i think i am officially done with eggers

Bence Fekete

My acid trips are going to improve exponentially as a result of this movie.

Magnum Valentino

Quote from: Glebe on May 10, 2022, 05:01:24 PMOh yeah it was driving me mad trying to figure out where I'd seen the usurping brother before. Claes Bang out of the Gatiss & Moffat Dracula, innit?

It fucking was not!

It was!

I loved him in Draclia, surprised that I've not seen him in anything since, including (in this case) something I actually HAVE seen him in.

Glebe

I hope he plays several more dracalas.

Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth

No more Draculeas!

Quote from: Harvey Milk on April 21, 2022, 12:16:42 PM
I'm really glad that Hollywood's take from the failure of Morbius is that "nobody likes vampire movies" and so Eggers doesn't get to remake Nosferatu. I love Eggers, but why the fuck did he (and Karyn Kusama, for that matter) think that Dracula needed yet another fucking adaptation? Beyond casting Willem Dafoe as the Count, which would be amazing, what's the point? Eggers is obviously capable of so much more than that. Let's just leave the Count Orlok version of the story at Murnau and Herzog and be done with it.

JaDanketies

Quote from: Bence Fekete on May 17, 2022, 08:35:37 AMMy acid trips are going to improve exponentially as a result of this movie.

A lot of it was referencing Fly Agaric / Amanita Muscaria which is not very much like acid at all. Some of the music reminded me of Wardruna who are quite trippy

dannyfc

Really underwhelmed, not sure what I was expecting but i generally love A24 and just found this a run of the mill revenge story with very little emotional investment in the characters involved.

Good cast but mediocre performances IMO. Best scene was them doing the dance around the fire.

Yeah, it's just so flat and pointless. Like that bit at the end where you think

Spoiler alert
"oh, he's gonna realise that all this revenge lark is a big waste of time and he's got it out of his system now, and he's gonna live out the rest of his days bonking witchy Anya in the woods and raising kids with a big smile on his face", and then he's like "muh revenge!" and dives into the sea. Stupid prick.
[close]

Oof, just remembered that bit where

Spoiler alert
he gets the sword off the dead skelington bloke.
[close]

Really embarrassing, like watching some dark souls cutscene or something. I'm surprised that didn't end up on the cutting room floor.

He'd best nail his next one or he's off the christmas card list. It better have at least 5 witches in it.

Noodle Lizard

Quote from: JaDanketies on May 19, 2022, 12:36:02 PMSome of the music reminded me of Wardruna who are quite trippy

I had to look up whether or not Heilung had done any work on the diagetic music (they hadn't, but they were used for the Vikings TV show).

Glebe

Quote from: ImmaculateClump on May 19, 2022, 09:00:18 PMYeah, it's just so flat and pointless. Like that bit at the end where you think

Spoiler alert
"oh, he's gonna realise that all this revenge lark is a big waste of time and he's got it out of his system now, and he's gonna live out the rest of his days bonking witchy Anya in the woods and raising kids with a big smile on his face", and then he's like "muh revenge!" and dives into the sea. Stupid prick.
[close]

Bit like De Niro turning the car around to back to go and get the double-crossing psycho guy near the end of Heat!

zomgmouse

Quote from: ImmaculateClump on May 19, 2022, 09:00:18 PMReally embarrassing, like watching some dark souls cutscene or something.

was thinking the entire opening section was like a video game cut-scene. many others later as well

Ha, yeah, now you mention it.

Head Gardener


Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth

I saw this the other day. Maybe it was just lowered expectations, but I liked it overall, despite agreeing with many of the criticisms here.

Quote from: dead-ced-dead on May 10, 2022, 04:39:36 PMI, too, feel that Skarsgard is a really good actor, I just think he's never been able to find that one "breakout" role that will change the public's consciousness of him, and thus has remained comparatively underrated.

... I know True Blood was huge, but I think it being from 2008-14 just pulls it outside people's consciousness limit for most viewers.
I think Game of Thrones stole True Blood's thunder and his with it. Maybe he's perfectly happy not being a movie star. I just started watching On Becoming a God in Central Florida in which he does a pretty deft comic turn, playing against type.

Quote from: ImmaculateClump on May 19, 2022, 09:00:18 PMYeah, it's just so flat and pointless. Like that bit at the end where you think

Spoiler alert
"oh, he's gonna realise that all this revenge lark is a big waste of time and he's got it out of his system now, and he's gonna live out the rest of his days bonking witchy Anya in the woods and raising kids with a big smile on his face", and then he's like "muh revenge!" and dives into the sea. Stupid prick.
[close]
If I'm remembering rightly,
Spoiler alert
he did want to walk away. He changed his mind when he found out she was pregnant because he feared his children would be targets for further retribution. Quite how Uncle Fiona could ever find them, I don't know.
[close]

The scene with Amleth and his mum reuniting was pretty subversive, but definitely felt like something that was reined in by the studio.

dead-ced-dead

Quote from: Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth on May 28, 2022, 09:47:50 PMI saw this the other day. Maybe it was just lowered expectations, but I liked it overall, despite agreeing with many of the criticisms here.
I think Game of Thrones stole True Blood's thunder and his with it. Maybe he's perfectly happy not being a movie star. I just started watching On Becoming a God in Central Florida in which he does a pretty deft comic turn, playing against type.

Also, Long Shot, playing a dweeby Justin Trudeau-esque Canadian prime minister. Very funny in that.

Mister Six

Quote from: Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth on May 28, 2022, 09:47:50 PMI saw this the other day. Maybe it was just lowered expectations, but I liked it overall, despite agreeing with many of the criticisms here.
I think Game of Thrones stole True Blood's thunder and his with it. Maybe he's perfectly happy not being a movie star. I just started watching On Becoming a God in Central Florida in which he does a pretty deft comic turn, playing against type.
If I'm remembering rightly,
Spoiler alert
he did want to walk away. He changed his mind when he found out she was pregnant because he feared his children would be targets for further retribution. Quite how Uncle Fiona could ever find them, I don't know.
[close]

Given that he'd just (nearly) completed his own incredibly-unlikely-but-guided-by-the-gods mission of revenge, it doesn't seem too unreasonable for him to think the same might happen with his uncle. Plus, it was all foretold by a spooky Icelandic experimental musician.

Spoiler alert
Yeah, but it just felt a bit "shit, it says in the script that I have to fight him in silhouette next to a volcano in the final scene! I'd best be off, love! Valhalla, here I come!" Sploosh!
[close]

Inspector Norse

Watched this last night and quite liked it, but it's a hard one to really get a handle on.

The way I read it was as a comment on the lust for power and on typical narratives of vengeance: it slowly becomes clear that Skarsgård's character is a total melt, twisted by years of exile into a psycho bent on destruction and not listening to anything anyone says that might interfere with his own hatred and anger. The fact that all that's really at stake is a few huts and some grass, the way most of the mystical and spooky stuff is undercut by silliness or its being so small-scale and irrelevant, that suggests this too.
And yet for some reason I get the impression that Eggers wanted it to be genuinely epic and meaningful rather than a subversion of that. The daftness that worked really well with the mad intensity of The Lighthouse creeps in here too, but is it his intention to have that undermine the po-faced dialogue and plotting?

Still, it looks very good and the actors all chew just the right amount of scenery without going too far over the top. That short lad who gets his nose sliced off was definitely played by Dexter Fletcher, whatever nonsense name the credits might give him.

greenman

Quote from: Inspector Norse on May 21, 2023, 06:51:21 PMWatched this last night and quite liked it, but it's a hard one to really get a handle on.

The way I read it was as a comment on the lust for power and on typical narratives of vengeance: it slowly becomes clear that Skarsgård's character is a total melt, twisted by years of exile into a psycho bent on destruction and not listening to anything anyone says that might interfere with his own hatred and anger. The fact that all that's really at stake is a few huts and some grass, the way most of the mystical and spooky stuff is undercut by silliness or its being so small-scale and irrelevant, that suggests this too.
And yet for some reason I get the impression that Eggers wanted it to be genuinely epic and meaningful rather than a subversion of that. The daftness that worked really well with the mad intensity of The Lighthouse creeps in here too, but is it his intention to have that undermine the po-faced dialogue and plotting?

Still, it looks very good and the actors all chew just the right amount of scenery without going too far over the top. That short lad who gets his nose sliced off was definitely played by Dexter Fletcher, whatever nonsense name the credits might give him.

Yeah I'd pretty much agree with that, it did seem around 2/3rds in it might be building towards something a bit more interesting but ultimately ends up a bit of a generic heroic vengeance story. Honestly I did kind of feel the same way about The VVitch, well made in period detail but seemed almost willfully lacking in substance.

The obvious alternative for me as well would be Lowery's The Green Knight from a year earlier, same kind of obsession with period detail(even if its fantastical) and somewhat querky atmosphere but felt like it had a bit more to say with Dev Patal's Gawain sutrggling against that kind of traditional heroism based on "legacy".

Glebe

Yeah the big action face-off finale was definitely a bit of a let down.

Minami Minegishi

For someone so preoccupied by period detail I did think it was odd that he cast Kidman and her specifically 21st Century LA face. She's a great actor - one of my favourites, but I could not immerse myself in this story at all. The Lighthouse, on the other hand, I was bought in from the first frame.