Platicsco Good story, Not enough for a whole film

BroadcastChic Excellent, a Must See

TeenzTen An action-packed slog

Roy Hart If you're interested in the topic at hand, you should just watch it and judge yourself because the reviews have gone very biased by people that didn't even watch it and just hate (or love) the creator. I liked it, it was well written, narrated, and directed and it was about a topic that interests me.

Comeuppance Reviews Set in the Iceland of medieval times, The Viking Sagas tells the story of Kjartan (Moeller), a lone Viking trying to find his way in a very confusing and constantly-changing world. In order to take on and defeat his rivals, he needs a mystical weapon called The Ghost Sword. But even then he is not trained in the ways of battle, so a more experienced Viking, Gunnar (Thorsen) agrees to train him. Making his quest a lot more pleasant is the beautiful maiden Gudrun (Stefansdottir). The forces of darkness are represented by Ketil (Olafsson), and Kjartan, Gudrun and Gunnar must defend their honor, their land, and their freedom, as Kjartan also avenges the death of his father. Will they succeed? It's "Brakus The Viking" as Ralf Moeller treks across Iceland in a chain mail vest in this so-so period piece. The locations are visually interesting, and they're shot well, and Sven-Ole Thorsen is perfectly cast in the role he was truly born to play, but The Viking Sagas lacks coherence. The decision to use a narrator who is constantly naming characters and events doesn't help the confusing factor. The "battle violence" is decent, but it can't patch over some of the more plain and mediocre aspects of the overall film. There's a certain earnestness about the whole project, which seems like a misplaced tone. There should have been a bit more verve.The fact that the movie was directed by Michael Chapman, who is an Academy Award nominee for best cinematography for Raging Bull (1980), among others, and that the film was released on VHS by New Line with a bunch of trailers for more mainstream material such as The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996) and Last Man Standing (1996), seems a bit odd. The Viking Sagas seems like it would have been released by Vestron, Academy or Continental in 1989. We're guessing Harvey Weinstein isn't constantly name-checking The Viking Sagas at his high-level Hollywood meetings. But, it presaged Game Of Thrones by many years, so maybe there should be some pride there.Was there a huge demand for Viking-based Sagas in the 90's? This particular Saga hits all the bullet points of what should be involved, such as a beautiful maiden, axe battles, snow, etc., but it's unlikely to inspire viewers. That being said, the end credits are amazing. We've never highlighted that before (nor has any other movie reviewer, probably) - Just watching them, you see a dizzying myriad of crazy letter combinations, accent marks, letters not in English mixed in, and credits such as Robert "Bloodaxe" Brakey - where else are you going to see that? (He was a first assistant editor, by the by). That must be one seriously badass Editor. We're guessing he edits film with an axe.The Viking Sagas is completely hit or miss. There are some great moments, but they're mixed in to an overall project which is...mixed. Fans of this historical period may want to check it out. For others, it's probably not worth going out of your way for.

Popcorn42 I was stunned to read some of the positive reviews about this movie. Not to be a fly in the ointment but this movie was absolutely horrendous. The director, Michael Chapman, tries to follow the script of the Icelandic sagas, which is an impossible task to achieve without thoroughly boring an audience, so the characters are left spouting meaningless lines like "I am..(pause for dramatic effect) Gunnar" instead of the more realistic (but infinitely more boring) "I am so-and-so, son of Eilif, grandson of Torkjell, 2nd cousin to Hallgeir Bloody Tooth, 4th brother-in-law twice removed to Helgi the Red, who defeated your great-grandmother in battle." Chapman goes out of his way to employ a largely Icelandic cast but then fails to get any advice from them on how to pronounce the character's names, which doesn't help the intended realism.Okay, so maybe sticking to the Eddas and the Sagas wouldn't make for exciting cinema but instead of fleshing out the characters and making them people we can relate to Chapman makes them stereotypical and one-dimensional. The audience is led to believe the Vikings are overly macho brutes who take killing very lightly and seldom think of anything other than upholding their honor and obtaining bloody revenge.The hero, Kjartan (Ralf "Terminator" Moeller), mostly grunts, flexes his muscles and speaks in a strong German accent about how he's going to "awenge his fatter". The training scene with Gunnar is another perfect example of the hideous dialogue throughout the movie. "Go ahead and kill me," is Gunnar's introduction to their first swordfighting lesson. "I don't vant to kill you," answers Arnold (er, Kjartan) and the two predictably end up bonding after Gunnar's spear nearly shaves several inches off our hero's manhood.There are some redeeming moments in the film: the Icelandic scenery is stunning and there are several scenes where the characters chase each other over raging streams on 5-ft. tall Shetland ponies. Ingebjorg Stefansdottir's breasts are stunning and for a "virgin" she wastes no time in showing our hero how grateful she is by climbing on top of him, which she does frequently and gratuitously throughout the movie. The two have sex wherever they can find a warm, hot spring and manage to fall deeply in love without ever having to enter into any conversation.The final battle scene though is the movie's shining moment in time: the Icelandic minstrels start playing Scottish bagpipe brogues and Kjartan mistakenly grabs the wrong prop - a circular Roman shield from the "Gladiator" set and embraces Ketil in a struggle to the death. Our hero emerges victorious when the evil villain's axe bounces off his chest and he shouts out the memorable and oft-repeated line "Vatter, I have awenged you!" Not to be outdone (his union contract called for him to have the final say), Ketil continues to egg on his enemy for a full 5 seconds after being decapitated before realizing he lacks vocal cords.

joeydrago I cannot believe that anyone interested in this type of genre would not indeed love this film. To start with yes there are inconsistencies, but so what! I see that type of thing in just about every movie or book... The music for this film is fantastic... if you are not moved by this music you are indeed void of any emotion. The story is a simple one. A father wishes a better life for his son and then his son is dragged into a life the father wanted no part of. The son meets an ally of the father and this ally took another road to further the correctness of the father's decision. The hero then meets a family going through much the same thing as he and his family and they are faced with the same dilema. Then it is the clash of good vs. evil. With good winning out in the end! Besides great music, the costumes are truly awesome ( different from any other of these types of movies)the sets are gorgeous, the acting is never over the top and there are no stupid one liners!! I really didn't care too much for the swords...the leading lady was someone that you could believe people would fight for she was very beautiful and sexy.I recommend this movie to everyone I talk to that is into this type of genre. I wish that there was a continuation of the story.

winter-29 This movie is one of the worst movies I've ever seen. A boy (Moeller) was supposed to take revenge for his father, in order to do so he had to master sword fighting and so on. Here come the dumb parts, he couldn't do sword fighting, but he taught some other boy to do it. Next dumb thing, he always got hurt even he didn't fight that much, he got hurt twice in the movie! Last dumb thing which is the dumbest, he got hurt by arrow while making love. Hey, a warrior was supposed to be good, especially after that sort of training from the master himself! He was supposed to be aware of his surroundings even if he was in the middle of a steamy affair. This movie is not worth seeing, it's wasting your money.