I will avenge you, father! I will save you, mother! I will kill you, Fjölnir!
The words of young Amleth as he escapes his island home that was sacked by his Uncle Fjölnir (Claes Bang). Amleth had to watch his uncle murder his father and carry his mother off screaming. He vowed to make right the wrongs he witnessed.
A few years ago, and still, to this day, there are these things called men’s retreats, where men go back to trying to reclaim their masculinity. There is some interesting research on the declining testosterone rates of the modern man. At the retreat, these men wrestle in mud, they eat raw food, they howl at the moon, they want to be powerful warriors.
I think those types of guys would like this film, but I think for the wrong reasons.
We next see older Amleth (a hulking and in serious need of a chiropractor, Alexander Skarsgard) in full wolf mode. He has embraced his animal nature and howls and barks alongside his fellow warriors before they raid a somewhat peaceful village.
Along with this new tribe, he commits atrocities on this village similar to what he experienced in his own village all those years ago. When he finds out that some of the villages, now enslaved people, are going to be sold to his uncle, he disguises himself (it doesn’t work since he is twice the size of everyone else, how do you confuse him for anyone else?) himself as an enslaved person and he goes to seek his revenge.
Amleth starts to build up a relationship with Olga (Anya Taylor-Joy, a favourite of director Robert Eggers; they have worked together on his previous, equally dark The VVitch) and this relationship starts to soften his gruff and animalistic demeanour. Amleth finds the weapon he will use to achieve his mission and attempts to disrupt and terrorize his uncle’s kingdom.
He finally gets to his mother (Nicole Kidman, in all her horribleness) and attempts to free her, only to learn some horrible information that changes his whole mission. You would be forgiven to think this was all very Shakespearean but apparently, this old nordic story was partly an inspiration for Hamlet.
With this new revelation, Amleth has to reconsider his choices and has to make a decision between a life with his new love or following the mission he has held so dear for all these years. Does he choose a life of love, or be driven by the energy of hate?
Watching this film through a modern lens might misconstrue the choices some of the characters make. Amleth’s father King Aurvandill War-Raven (Ethan Hawke) talked about wanting to die in battle, not from an infection or in old age in his bed. He wanted to die being useful.
I personally didn’t like the ending of the film. I guess I like comedies, where the character learns something and changes, rather than tragedies, where the character doesn’t learn and grow and suffers.
The men that go to those retreats probably enjoy the ending of this film, but I think for the wrong reasons.
15th May 2022
Luke McMeeken-Ruscoe