Search - A Viking Saga: Son of Thor on DVD

A look at "Viking Sagas"

Douglas Herring | Redmond, WA | 12/22/2008

(1 out of 5 stars)

"Within the space of a couple of days I watched both "A Viking Saga: Son of Thor" and "The Viking Sagas". Two very different films despite their similar titles. I am a fan and supporter of low budget historical films and these two films have a lot in common and yet at the same time, are very different. "A Viking Saga: Son of Thor" was done more as a minor educational film, they use that term "educational" a lot in their advertisements and after watching it, it seems more like something funded by a museum than a sincere attempt to do justice to the subject as a full-on adventure film. The film is centered around a longhouse recreation, perhaps the museum I suspect this was done for, and a small group of Viking re-enactors. Amazon's brief description is the whole movie; it is a very simple plot, with constant flashbacks to the attack on the young boy's village as the only major action in the film. The longships on the cover are not in the film, there are only two much smaller ships used for trading. The story is basically a Swedish one, with an emphasis on trading and the river routes down into what was later to be known as Russia. It is a very interesting aspect of Viking history, but unfortunately, it is handled in the most simplistic of ways. Even a die hard Viking fan like me will be hard pressed to appreciate this movie. The concept is excellent from a historical point of view; the execution however seemed to be done very simply and cheaply. I honestly cannot recommend this movie.

"The Viking Sagas" is very different. Not a big budget Hollywood historical epic, it still has a lot going for it. Shot entirely in Iceland, where the story takes place, it is a classic tale of revenge and reversal. The plot is very atypical and has some interesting and complex turns, and much of those are based on an actual history and on the Icelandic judicial system that does indeed go back to the Viking colonial days. I quickly found myself curious how it would play out, though there was no doubt our hero would triumph. The scenery is beautiful and stark and knowing a bit about Viking horses, the Icelandic ponies were a nice refreshing historical touch. The star is Ralf Moeller and he is fairly wooden and too muscle-bound for the untrained warrior he is supposed to be, but I can let that slide. To me, the "name" in this movie is Sven-Ole Thorsen, the "Swedish Champion" from Sam Raimi's "The Quick and the Dead". He shows up as a minor character or stunt actor in enough movies that he almost seems like a new Alan Hale Senior to me. His character is the archetypical "martial arts master" but he too has an interesting twist to him plot wise. This film is not epic, has some B-movie qualities, but if you like adventure films like that, then I suspect you will like this one.
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Horrid horrid piece of cinema

Teddy Ralph Robertson III | 03/23/2010

(1 out of 5 stars)

"I was smart enough to watch this film on Netflix before making the mistake of purchasing it. It was truly terrible, and amateurish in the extreme.

The film obviously had no budget. The acting was poor through out. The early childhood scenes were truly painful to watch. The attempts at special effects reminded me of something you'd see on Youtube with some one using a home video camera and little else. The costuming was crude. I got the impression that they were afraid to get blood on the garb for fear of loosing their rental deposit. The combat choreography was awful. The cinematography was awful. The writing was no winner either.

Given there seemed to be no resources available to the producers, this still could have been a decent film. But the handling of the story itself was painful. At one point a group of cabaret belly dancers came running out. I could only think WTF? This is sad. And what was the thinking behind the christian monk that wandered in and out of the story for no apparent reason? Even the characters that made sense were two dimensional in their handling.

The only redeeming parts of the movie were the sequences that were obviously shot at some living history event. Suddenly the costuming and kits got better, people seemed a bit more natural, and the fighting looked at little like fighting. It was sad that the supposed king and central villein wasn't even kitted out as well as half the living history folks fighting in some of these sequences. And you could easily tell when they switched back and forth between footage, because the lighting and color was obviously different.

I've seen better product from first year film students. Avoid this one. It wasn't even good enough to be 'craptastic'."