Review of Valhalla Rising (2009) by Jason A — 09 Apr 2011

I feel like Valhalla Rising was made by two different directors. One of them is a genius. The other is a hack.

The first 20-30 minutes are outstanding in every regard. The action is raw and as unflinching as I'd care to see, and for the first half there is hardly a wasted shot.

Then come the long, pretentious sequences that accomplish almost nothing. The boat sequence, although it had a point to make about the long and harrowing journey, feels unnecessarily drawn out and repetitive. I pity the editor who must have stared at these tedious shots for hours upon hours, slowly losing his/her mind. Don't even get me started on how long walks to loud rock music isn't nearly as impressive as this movie thinks.

Valhalla Rising seems to think that the viewer automatically accepts long shots of silent men as profound. I understand exactly what feeling Refn wanted to convey, but I think there is a difference between surrealist imagery being a story in itself and just editing together grainy shots of the beautiful landscape.

I love the idea that Valhalla Rising went for- the sequencing of surreal images and a soundtrack/audio flair that makes the viewer both immersed and invested in the film. The problem is that this is maddeningly slow and probably not nearly as important as it pretends to be.

The art direction is some of the best to ever grace my television. The cinematography is tremendous. Too bad this film can't strike the proper balance- otherwise we'd have a modern masterwork.