The Blood Pumping Action of Robert Eggers’ The Northman
Last week, I was lucky enough to attend an advance press screening of my most anticipated film of this early decade, Robert Eggers’ Viking epic, The Northman. Working with a massively increased budget and expansive cast, Eggers and Icelandic poet and novelist, Sjón, adapt the inspiration of Shakespeare’s Hamlet into a throttling and brutal story of revenge. After his father’s betrayal and murder, young Prince Amleth flees his kingdom so thirsty for vengeance and blood he joins a primeval version of the Nazi battalion in Come and See.
When we meet adult Amleth, it’s in the hard body and soft eyes of a never better Alexander Skarsgård, here a beast of a man with the heart of a wounded orphan, who leads the charge into a Russian village, howling and flailing, to capture slaves to trade across the oceans. The film approaches Viking history with brave frankness, never skimping on the carnality, prompting reactions all along the emotional spectrum, from excitement to pure dread. The tonal mastery, especially for a true blue blockbuster, is commendable, and it largely works due to the developed emotional interiors of its characters, on either side of the conflict.
But those emotional takeaways aren’t why I wanted to write about The Northman. I want to talk about the ass kicking.
When I sat down and [Nicole Kidman voice] the lights began to dim, I hadn’t even seen the film’s trailer, but instead went in on faith that Eggers, Blaschke and co. would deliver another winner along the lines of their previous knockout collaborations, The Witch and the Oscar-nominated The Lighthouse. I was extremely curious to see how the big budget would evolve their approach, especially in lieu of late reshoots and frustrating studio interference. What I was maybe not expecting was how HARD this movie RIPS. We come to this place for bloodshed. And The Northman does not disappoint.
Naturally, the film includes many surrealistic flourishes, the sort of visual poetry one should expect from Eggers’ third feature. It is also a work of copiously researched history, another strong period recreation, another strong adaptation of literature with an intelligent understanding of its source material’s intertextual relationship with Shakespeare. But alongside all that is a blood pumping and blood spurting action thriller that shows off a new prowess for action choreography and intricate blocking, bruised knuckle beatdowns that don’t sacrifice the imagery, mood or the directors’ established style. It’s a strange cocktail, and I’m not sure how hard general audience members will fall for it when it goes wide, but the snarling excitement of its best moments is undeniable.
All of this action excellence circulates around Skarsgård, whose physique looks like one tensed bundle of muscles. He is the rare star whose stoicism, punctuated by bouts of feral rage, inspires fear and awe. That he is the protagonist of the film in no way takes away from his Michael Myers-like tenacity to leave no one in his path breathing. He’s fierce and massive, an implacable force of furious vengeance. Others, notably Nicole Kidman, give great turns as well, but it’s Skarsgård’s show, and to his credit, he owns every moment of it.
And critically, for all that, he also eats a fair amount of shit! As you may know from the trailers and premise, Amleth ditches his raiding berserkers, poses as a slave, to enact his long gestating avunculicide. After swaggering around Russia, effortlessly dodging all manner of spears, arrows, swords and axes, he wades into enemy territory where the stakes are higher, the fights harder. Amleth still dodges blows, and he takes many others straight to the face. It’s a stunning bit of heightened realism, movie violence that seems as live and in-the-moment unpredictable as a UFC fight. And in a tale as well known and frequently adapted as this, that freshness is integral to keeping the experience engaging.
For those who have not seen, I’ll spare you the details of specific fights, though suffice it to say, Amleth is pitted against big foes, numerous foes, an entire host of rousing combat. He fights in rags, he fights in the nude, with a magic sword and with his own teeth. Bones are snapped, and the film’s violent quest is strung along miles of spilled entrails.
With Blaschke’s moody lighting and set against gloomy, rainy Romania where the film was shot, it’s a breathtaking and strange spectacle. It at once feels of a piece with last year’s (I would argue, Eggers-inspired) A24 Brit-lit adaptations, The Green Knight and The Tragedy of Macbeth, while significantly upping the ante as crowd pleasing entertainment. Eggers’ prowess with both sides of the blade is intoxicating, and it means I will anticipate his fourth film just as much as I anticipated this one.
