Simply Perfect

Just perfect...

I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

"Beowulf meets Predator" boasts the enthusiastic critic blurb on the poster of one of my favourite sci fi genre benders, Outlander. It's pure outlandish fun, and better yet it knows it is and therefore doesn't feel any need to spend a bunch of time on grasping exposition to convince you of any shred of authenticity. It simply hums along on a pure rush of unchecked adventure, always aiming to please and for the very most part, doing so wonderfully. Jim Caviesel stars, and he's an unassuming Ken doll of an actor who has more intensity than anyone gives him credit for, which always makes me spring to attention when he's in the driver's seat. Here he plays Kainen, a voyager from a far away galaxy who has crash landed his spacecraft on earth way back in the time of the Vikings, stranded and in need of refuge. Only problem is, he's been on the run for some time from a large, hideous and very dangerous creature from his home planet called Moorwen. Moorwen has a very personal and deadly vendetta against Kainen, one which threatens the Viking tribe who give him shelter, led by noble king Hrothgar (John Hurt). Kainen comes from a planet with technology and civilization far advanced from Earth at that time, which makes him a hit with the tribesmen and even more so with Hrothgar's daughter (Sophia Myles). Moorwen threatens their way of life in its rampage against Kainen, causing tragic collateral damage to a rival clan led by Gunnar (Ron Perlman makes heartbreaking and stone tough work of what is essentially an extended cameo). It's an awesome movie no matter what anyone says. Any film about an astronaut from a far off galaxy who bands together with friggin vikings to battle a fluorescent space dragon is just automatically a winner. In all seriousness though, this one really is something special,and almost seems like a Dennis Quaid vehicle if it were made in the 80's. Fun, thrilling and never too serious, it knows it's place and owns the genre shelf it sits on.

I've been watching movies for over 30 years and I'd humbly consider myself a movie buff with a penchant for perfectionism. I tend to pick out plot holes that others don't see, although I'm not infallible.I've tried to find a plot hole in this movie, but I can't. It certainly stretches the limit of the unknown, unique, and absurd, but it does it extremely intelligently. It does an excellent job of laying out the plot within the confines of its own making. As simple as that sounds, there are innumerous movies that fail this.The monster itself was thought up by creative genius. It has the similarities of most monsters in most movies - the big teeth, the intelligence, and the brutality. But this one is something altogether legendary. It is not only intelligent, it is calculated in its actions to ensure that fear is spread as wide as possible. And while most monsters hunt with darkness, this one does the opposite!After a wild ride of intense action, humor, connection, and sadness, a single blink-and-you-miss-it scene leaves a significant thought-provoking idea - who really was the monster? That's for you to decide.

Well, I don't know if it can be called a "sci-fi" movie. You have at most 5 minutes of science fiction in the almost two hours that I lost by watching this movie. Also, it is not that exact historic if I put it that way. I'm not sure if these filmmakers know how real vikings looked like ? To recap, real vikings lived in Scandinavia, in subarctic climate (where it's damn cold). This movie shows us vikings in an unrealistic environment with volcanoes and lava, in an almost Mediterranean environment. The vikings walk with short sleeves, look like Americans, behave like Americans and have almost nothing in common with vikings, except few viking shields and a viking village. Come on, the filmmakers could do better than that. At least some effort would make the movie much more realistic. And I haven't seen one viking that is naturally blond or at least to look like one. Most of them have brown or black hair with some hair parts that are colored to blond. I mean everybody knows that the Scandinavian people are blond with pale skin (due to low levels of Melanin because they are not exposed to sun). It's because they live in winter lands :) Except these simple geographic and scientific facts that have nothing to do with this (not science, but more of a fiction) movie, it also lack creativity. It's full of plot holes. The story is undeveloped, so at least to say, and it has no twist at all. Action scenes have not much creativity in it and the whole idea of the movie ends where it has started: at the beginning. I won't recommend it to anyone.

As it so often happens, I came by this movie by accident. It captivated me from the start, so I watched it to the end. And so should you. The setup is interesting enough, with an alien monster, a time traveller and old Vikings. Though the movie is not the greatest, it delivers what it promises: good entertainment, good action and a nice story.After watching it, I had that feeling you have when you've seen something before. For a while, I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but then it hit me: this is the exact same story as in The Ghost and the Darkness... So much so, that I really feel the writers should have acknowledged it. Not having found any such reference, I thought I'd point it out myself.In all, good movie, good entertainment, but only different from the Val Kilmer film in its setting.