I watched this wonderful film on Netflix and just had to write about it, it was so good.
It has subtitles, and I suspect it is in Swedish. I am not compensated for endorsing any movies or any place to see them but I felt this one deserved the attention. The film,while a monster movie, has very strong emotional and relational elements.
Here is a short review and synopsis of it.
Prologue: A Viking king and a troop of his stood at the edge of a lake at night. The tied a goat to a raft and sent it out across the water. A girl was trying to discourage him from whatever plan he had, but to no avail. She said, "Your greed will be our downfall." Moments later, there was a roar, from the eye-view of something huge rearing up, presumably out of the water, the king's frightened face tells it all. Then the screen went black.
Present day:
Sigurd is a single father of two, a widower who cannot let his wife go.
He is an archaeologist, as his late wife, Maren was. They both believed that the myth of Ragnorok was based on an actual event. They thought the markings on a burial site they found held clues to the story, but they did not have proof. All they had was some shells on the bottom of a boat that only exist much farther North than the people who made it were thought to have gone, in a place called Finnmark.
After Maren died, Sigurd had barely left his office. He continuously poured over the book of notes they had complied together.
Sigurd is introduced when he is grabbing a very fast breakfast. His son, Brage, reminded him that his daughter, Ragnhild, was singing at school at 3:30. He says "I will be there," as he ran out the door.
Ragnhild was in her early teens - the age when everything is the end of the world, and nothing is forgivable. It is usually the age when a girl most needs her mother.
Sigurd gave a presentation at work in order for their research grant to be continued, and it was a complete disaster. The donors laughed at his and his late wife's and withdrew their support for his research. Sigurd's boss advised him to apply for a tour guide position in the museum - the equivalent of a police officer being permanently assigned to the school crosswalk. A dream destroyed.
His dream in ruins, the partner who shared it in the grave, Sigurd sat in his car, still pouring over the notebook. That is, until he realized he was missing his daughter's performance.
He arrived at the school to find his daughter and son in an empty parking lot, waiting for him with sour expressions. "I had a meeting at work," Sigurd lied, "It took longer than I expected."
Sigurd's children wanted to go to Spain for vacation, he was planning on the cabin where they normally went. He said, "It has a lot of great memories," The children were not old enough to have remembered their mother that well. Ragnhild corrected him, "Memories for you, you mean."
Brage had created an account for his dad on a dating site. The kids were ready to move on, and wanted their father to move on as well.
That night, Sigurd's fellow researcher, Allan, came by with their first find from Finnmark. A stone with carvings in it. Sigurd set to work scraping away dirt and silt and found a familiar shape. They retrieved some display pieces from the museum. The pieces matched the shape carved in the rock. With both these pieces together, Sigurd realized it was a code breaker, and worked to decipher the message: "Asa erected this stone in memory of her father, the King of Vestfold, who arrogantly went to find the gods" or perhaps "Who went to find the power of the gods," They could not read the entire message, some of it had faded with time, but they could pick up "Three days march from this stone to the bottomless lake, the Eye of Odin." The stone was a map!
Sigurd's only chance to get to Finnmark was the family vacation. Ragnhild was furious, but she agreed to come peacefully if her father would give her his computer. "Absolutely, that's a deal," he said, holding his hands as if praying to her. It seems he had a bit of a roll reversal going with his daughter. She reminded him of things, made Brage's breakfast and tucked Brage in, and evidently had to approve or disapprove of vacation plans. Sigurd seemed like he was overwhelmed by the task of raising kids alone,especially Ragnhild. He was clearly very concerned about her, and at a loss how to relate to her without his wife to help. He obviously longed to be a good father and make his children happy, but nothing he did seemed to be working.
In Finnmark, Allan introduced his assistant, Elisabeth. Brage immediately started hoping she and his dad would start dating. Lief, the guide, demanded his advance payment as soon as he got out of the truck, and was generally disagreeable and rude.
While they hiked from where the stone was found, Brage was impressed that they were walking where the Vikings walked 1000 years ago. Ragnhild was annoyed that there is no cell signal.
Part way through the three day hike, they ran into the old Iron Curtain. The cold war over, they crossed the border and constantly found abandoned military bases with bunkers, and preparations for war everywhere - fortunately.
When Elisabeth helped Ragnhild with mosquito repellent, the beginnings of bonding between the two were clear. At last they find the Eye of Odin, a lake with a round island in the middle of it. When Sigurd whispered, "Okay, Maren," before proceeding to explore the island. Lief found a gun in one of the abandoned barracks. While Elisabeth and Sigurd began to discuss deeper things, Brage found a cavern.
The whole team entered the cavern with ropes and harnesses. They found a Viking helmet, and many, many swords, jewelry and other things. Sigurd's dream was beginning to come true... Until Leif pulled that gun on the whole company, demanding the priceless items. He threw down everyone's ropes as soon as he was out of the cavern and left everyone, including the kids, at the bottom of a deep cavern with no way out.
Ragnhild found a human skull and became hysterical.
Elisabeth climbed the cavern wall without ropes, set up a new line, and they finally escaped their prison. With the raft gone and their strength spent, they determined to spend the night in the abandoned soviet bunks and build a new raft in the morning.
Allan examined the skull Raghnild found. There was a gigantic tooth lodged in it. "We have to go back down," Allan and Sigurd returned to the cavern while Elisabeth and the children slept.
They found many, many more bodies, and all had the kind of same injury. They figured they must have been killed by something long since extinct. In the water, they found a dead Soviet soldier, almost, but not fully, decayed down to bone. "He died the same way the Vikings did."
"But they died 1000 years ago... He didn't."
The creature who wiped out a viking troop and perhaps as many Soviet soldiers was not extinct. It came into the cavern and they saw it pass by as they hid!
All Sigurd could think about was his children...
Brage had taken one of the monster's eggs from the cavern. I hatched in the barracks while all this was going on. It rattled and hissed all over the dark, unfamiliar structure, terrifying the children. Elisabeth trapped it in a steel box and then secured the box in a pack with tight straps - Brage's pack.
That barracks was connected to a cable, and could be carried across the water with the cable via some mechanisms, but the cable had long ago fallen into the water. The monster heard its baby crying, and pulled that cable, dragging the whole unit toward the lake.
The children and Elisabeth were trapped inside; the door was jammed.
Allan and Sigurd came out of the woods, and saw the building headed for the lake. They got broke open and got everyone out just before it entered the water. As Sigurd collapsed to the ground, he looked up, holding his weeping son, and saw the beast destroy the barracks like a tin can. They fled.
After they crossed the lake, Allan found the baby monster in Brage's pack, and chose to smuggle it back to civilization for study without telling the others. Unfortunately, these creatures were amphibious. The team learned the hard way after crossing to the other side of the lake. It came for them in their campsite, they ran into a bunker for protection, but the monster battered the door til it was nearly broken in! Only Allan knew it was looking for its baby. They were trapped.
Ragnhild lost control, she blamed her father for everything. They all believed they were just waiting to die. Sigurd clearly felt that he had failed his children utterly and that everything was all his fault.
Ragnhild calmed down and picked up her father's treasured notebook. She asked him what the runes meant. the first time she'd ever shown interest in her father's lifelong passion.
Sigurd said very slowly that what he thought was a map had been a warning. It told of a Viking king who had brought his people to this place, and "they all died because - because he did not understand that perhaps - perhaps they should not be here." Clearly, he felt he could relate, but someone found ventilation pipes then, and a way out. As they were exiting the bunker, Sigurd found the baby monster in Allan's pack. He knew the beast would pursue them to the ends of the earth, just as he would for Ragnhild or Brage. Allan was, at that moment, attacked by the creature and killed. Because the escape hatch was open, the monster got inside.
Brage came out of hiding too soon, shouting for his father and sister. Ragnhild shushed him, pulling him into the locker where she was hiding. The monster came very close but did not attack the lockers. When they thought it had left, they came out and the monster cornered them.They both screamed hysterically for their father.
Sigurd ran as fasts her could, bringing the monster's baby. He approached the beast, screaming and waving a torch til it turned away from his children and came toward him. Bravely, he approached it, face to face. It could hear its baby crying in Sigurd's luggage and did not eat him, but growled with rage, Sigurd held out the baby monster. The adult monster stopped and stared, then slowly approached Sigurd until the baby could crawl up onto its nose. Then it slunk away with a growl, its wrath appeased. Sigurd had saved his children.
After the family rescued Elisabeth, It was finally time to go home. Despite previously saying that family did not suite her, she seemed more willing to be "part of the family" now, much to Brage's delight.
There is more action, drama and intrigue than I mentioned here, this is just the gist of it. In this film, I see a powerful tribute to fatherhood and a message of hope, humility, and of healing coming from unexpected places. I also see encouragement and the promise that single-parenting need not be the end of the world. Highly recommended.
Godspeed.
~Mother Star
