It could've have been a lot more than it ended up being, if it had included a little bit more exposition and a little less - somewhat forced - symbolism. The cinematography was of a very high standard only matched by some scenes of a striking brutality. Mads Mikkelsen did a very good job of portraying the eerily silent main protagonist. For all its shortfalls, this movie won't leave you indifferent.

Overall Enjoyment: 10/40, Plot/Themes: 5/20, Cinematography/Direction: 10/20, Acting/Writing: 5/20 This movie was incredibly boring and had only the minor semblance of a background plot stringing together the randomly dispersed scenes of aimless wandering and equally pointless violence.

incredibly dull and dark + exteremely violent (spilling guts, cut heads, etc) couldt watch more than 40 minutes...

Like a feature length version of the killing of Col. Kurtz. Interesting idea which unfortunately doesn't work. There's simply too little narrativity to justify it's running time.

Boring!

Amazing. It's unlike anything I've ever seen. The plot is subtle and mysterious. It takes until the end of the film for you to piece it together. The sound design is highly innovative. It made it feel as though I was watching one long montage. The visual style is absolutely perfect. The sky looks awesome and menacing. The landscape and the vegetation look incredibly harsh and untamed. This film is great. I'm so pleased that with the right vision, films like this are still possible.

The first couple minutes are pretty cool.

Bizarre and compelling. Beautifully shot story that felt like a parable ... even if I couldn't figure out what the point was. Gorgeous soundtrack.

Sucked me in, chewed me up, and spit me out...then beat me to a bloody pulp, cut me into ribbons, and left me to die on a boat in the middle of a noisome mist. And I loved every minute of it.

Hypnotic and amazing.

as yet another person versed in herzog's works i immediately related this to aguirre, yet somehow i feel the the actual intent of this movie, hate me if you will, is more intellectual. the setting is more ambiguous, and the real point of it, the only thing we have to go after is the flora. how many movies give you only that?

Essentially Aguirre: The Wrath of God minus the substance of its predecessor. While I'm not impartial to films with slow pacing, Valhalla Rising's drags out way too much for way too little in its 90-minute duration. That being said, the remarkable digital cinematography along with the ambient soundtrack establish an undeniably haunting atmosphere. I just wish there was more depth to this than "Vikings wander into uncharted territory, go crazy, and brood pensively about it for a while."

Kind of boring, no?

Refn makes his art out of testosterone. If he made sculptures instead of films they would be made from blood, cum, metal and mud. Some people would like that, but majority would go like 'Oh, I see what you did there, you pretentious SOB lol'. Same with his movies; they have something that attracts attention, but not enough of substance to maintain it. At least this one is better than Bronson.

Disappointing after having enjoyed Refn's two more famous films. Where some people seem to see an exploration of violence and nature I just experienced tedium and pretension. Room for interpretation is all well and good, but this felt like a projection of a basic moral message through the ultimate bad-ass (TM) protagonist who never utters a word. Essentially this is a primal, much less entertaining precursor to Drive.

All Refn does is putting on lots of air and mimicking the effect of infinitely better films (namely Aguirre and Stalker).

The main character doesn't say a single word the entire film. Take that as you will.

It's a departure for NWR. It's very audio-visual, concerned with mood and constructed like a dark fairytale. There is little dialogue. But it's also a typical macho fantasy film. A stoic, mute superman, One-Eye is the teenage or henpecked male's self-ideal: Everyone in his bullshit world respects him out of fear and he needn't bother making a single verbal or facial expression. Besides being a vicious killer, he is unhampered by trifles like a personality or a biography.

atmospheric, sparse viking movie with little dialogue or action

An amazing space journey in Viking times (!) by Danish cult-director Nicolas Winding Refn (Pusher 1-3, Bronson, Drive). I'm very biased here. Firstly I'm a fellow-Dane. Secondly I'm a huge fan of Refn's work regardless of nationality. I literally like all his movies, although Bleeder might be the weakest of the bunch. Valhalla draws on inspiration from classic, in lack of a better word, ambient-exploration-films like Solaris, Aguirre, Apocalypse Now, 2001: A Space Odyssey and more. Be open!!!

Extremely atmospheric. Hypnotic to watch. Cinematography is mostly fantastic, although the digital photography look feels a bit overdone at times. The plot, and its subtext, is a bit too opaque, but the more I think about it the better it gets.

A constantly evocative take on the inextricable link between violence and civilization. Even the lingering moments, and oh there are many, consist of an infinity of contingent possibilities of bloodshed. So thematically concise and well realized that I cannot help but love it. Perhaps it garners from me a higher score than it deserves. Alas.

Nihilistic yet enriching. Feels less like watching a film than like taking a good long look at a really powerful painting. The music is great too, especially toward the end when it builds to a chilling storm of noise as the characters realize they're doomed and begin to act accordingly. The only flaw that matters to me is the trendy spurts of bright red blood, the kind of thing added in post to stuff like 300 and Game of Thrones. Who thought that was a good idea for something like this?

Men (only men) wander about the countryside, interspersing their perambulations with occasional gruesome violence. Some heavily-filtered landscape photography and some jabs at crusading Christians were not capable of convincing this viewer that behind the butchery and strolling around there lies much of significance. The addition of a boy who speaks often of wanting to "go home" fails to add any emotion to this monotonous affair.

Like in Aguirre, the Wrath of God (its most obvious influence), nature dominates the characters, reducing them to an infinitesimal presence against a harsh and unforgiving backdrop. But this isn't just a retread, and Refn's ambiguous and allegorical treatment of religious themes - along with his stunning digital cinematography - make this a haunting film in its own right.

*yawn*

SLOW BURN: The movie.

Gorgeous photography, shocking violence, heavy-handed religious symbolism that ultimately doesn't really go anywhere. Maybe. Should probably rewatch.

In the beginning there was man and nature. Which is dominant, which is more barbaric? Can they be distinguished at all? Set against the otherworldly mists of the Scottish highlands, Valhalla Rising's are men at their most primal state. The religious overtones are interesting. Refn scoffs tribal notions of holiness, but doesn't reject some sort of spiritual enlightenment.

Strange movie that gets better and better the more you start thinking about the symbolism used in it.

Much too esoteric for mainstream audiences, and exceedingly ponderous for just about everyone else, this film's interesting premise is blown with an over-reliance on slow motion and flat characters endlessly predicting a horrible fate. Those with an in on the conflict between Christian and Norse theologies will most likely recognize the level of symbolism being reached for by Refn, but enduring the journey is an exercise in stamina Odin himself would find difficult to complete.

Although the film's strongest asset is its incredibly captivating cinematography (digital done RIGHT, like Antichrist), there IS a lot more here, constantly boiling under the surface. The plot unfolds through the cinematography (maybe a bit too subtly, judging by reactions here), and combined with the soundtrack and Mads, it is absurdly compelling. One Eye, who comes from elsewhere, will lead the Christians to a fate greater than their quest, and a test of their faith they may not be ready for.

How can a movie about Vikings be intolerably dull? Here's how: give it almost no dialogue, and acting that isn't particularly evocative. Pack in at least 10 minutes worth of footage of people staring. Provide no character development. This film shares a lot of traits with super-interesting films like Aguirre Der Zorn Gottes and The Quest for Fire, but unlike them, this is a lot of sound (well, not that much sound) and fury signifying nothing.

It reminds me of Herzog's Aguirre, but that's all. Fell asleep halfway, managed to see the other half with my eyes taped open. There was something there, but Nicolas lost it halfway.

Contemplative and berserk.

Valhalla Rising does a few things right; there's some beautiful, arresting imagery on display here, and while the characters, setting and story are all certainly intriguing, they are presented in a particularly opaque manner. There's next to no dialogue, long periods of brooding silence accompanied by a droning, martial-industrial soundtrack, but it's the pace, or sheer lack of it, that really lets Valhalla Rising down, and while I enjoyed the experience, it's not a film I could easily reccomend

Yes, yes, it's very artful and gritty, I get it. The scenery is beautiful and the overall emotion of the movie is that of forlorn darkness, but to hell with all of that when I was so bored, I was ready to claw my own eyes out. I don't require endless action from a movie to like it, but at least some kind of a plot to keep me awake is usually preferred.

Magnifique !

What a treat for eyes and mind! One of the few pieces of art that leaves you with way more open questions than answers it provide if you can see not just watch that is. Yet this is not your usual action movie, or better way to say it not your usual movie for it is slow paced and symbolic to the bone. One eyed man who sees more than the others, young boy who knows better than old men, a travel to somebody's hell and somebody's holy land. Worth seeing but not recommendable to everyone.

A beautifully shot film with artful ambitions (or should that be pretentions?) I didn't mind the slow pacing, it suited the mood of the film. But lovely cinematography alone does not a good film make and in the end it is badly let down by the lack of character development and a narrative arc.

The directing and the style was something odd and beautiful same time. The story was told as you were there; it was nicely cryptic. But the latter half did not give what the beginning promised and evidently it thumbled it's own feet.

I simply could not bond with this one..

A dull pseudo-artsy mess.

Nothing more than an appropriation of cinematic styles. Violent mysticism in great scenery. The Dark Ages made digital.

Pff.

2 interesting movies in one. The action parts are violent and brutal. The dreamy travel sequences are slow and visually impressive. But when they are combined in this film, the pacing is uneven as the plot grinds to a crawl in the middle.

23 Ekim 09. 19:00. emek sinemasi, filmekimi09 berkantla &

Aguirre directed by a mute - and maybe a bit trashy - Malick, or a mute - and cheesy - Tarkovsky. Not as good as it sounds like, but not that bad either, pretty fun at times.

Hauntingly beautiful and extremely brutal, but riddled with uneven pacing and a screenplay too cryptic for it's own good.

Amazing.