The Northman Is a Dark and Brutal Viking Revenge Tale

In 2022’s The Northman, Robert Eggers made pretty much exactly the type of Viking movie you’d expect him to. His previous pictures, The Witch and The Lighthouse, were brilliantly dark and surrealist depictions of historical horror. This one is very much in that same camp, perhaps even more straightforwardly than the others. The result is a film about revenge within Viking tribes that works as both a brutal action epic and a contemplation of existentialism.

Alexander Skarsgård stars as Amleth in The Northman. Aidan Monaghan/© 2021 Focus Features, LLC

Amleth (played as a child by Oscar Novak and as an adult by Alexander Skarsgård) is a prince of one tribe, the heir of King War-Raven (Ethan Hawke). His father teaches him everything he needs to know about the ruling, from kindness among his people to animalistic rage among men. Amleth also learns about lineage in a trippy and transcendent vision that so happens to come amid a ceremony where he is expected to eat and act like a dog, and everything is relayed through a devilishly joyous Willem Dafoe.

But the prince’s future is upended by the rebellion of War-Raven’s brother, Fjölnir (Claes Bang). With his village overthrown, Almeth vows to devote his life to avenging and restoring his legacy. He grows up to become a fierce warrior whose wait for revenge is one of great cruelty and hardening.

Nicole Kidman as Queen Gudrún. Aidan Monaghan/© 2021 Focus Features, LLC

Almeth’s quest for satisfaction is one of brooding violence and cerebral introspection. He is a man consumed by avenging his father, adopting the simplistic goals of manhood and legacy. His hardened life makes him seemingly unquestioning of his path until it comes back to bite him. For his entire life, he has believed his mother, Queen Gudrún (Nicole Kidman), will love him for freeing her from Fjölnir’s bondage, but he may not have considered the greater structures that erode love within the society of Vikings. This creates darkness in him that makes his quest seem more futile the further he goes in slaughtering what he deems to be the violent invaders of his family.

The brightest light in his life is the enslaved Olga (Anya Taylor-Joy). While Almeth tries to remain subservient in his undercover operation to infiltrate the tribe, Olga displays great rebellion in the face of her aggressors. She’s aware that it doesn’t take too much to fight off the advances of Fjölnir, against whom mere period blood can serve as a weapon. For her bravery, Almeth aims to make her both an ally and his queen for the kingdom he feels he is owed. Within her, he finds the future of his family—but perhaps not one he may live to see.

Aidan Monaghan/© 2022 Focus Features, LLC

The film dabbles in the supernatural, though in a more low-key manner than Eggers’s previous films. Here, it comes as warnings for Almeth from the dead. He seeks a magical sword and finds himself fighting the dead to attain it for his vengeance; the sword itself is bound by the rules of night, only able to be drawn when the moon rises. There are also visions of Valhalla, as Almeth is given previews that he is not long for this world and is bound for a better one as a Valkyrie will guide him to the paradise of warriors.

What isn’t low key is Eggers’s penchant for violence. This is an incredibly brutal film with plenty of blood, guts, and gore. Almeth has quite the calling card for his kills, which get creative in everything from the stringing of entrails to the dicing up of body parts into odd shapes. The vicious climax packs a punch even after so many grotesque fight scenes. All of it is staged in a draining manner, harping on how the nature of man being violent ultimately leads down messy roads of total annihilation of the self, even if legacy remains.

Amleth and Olga (Anya Taylor-Joy). Aidan Monaghan/© 2021 Focus Features, LLC

The Northman is perhaps the easiest to digest of Robert Eggers’s growing filmography. Its simple writing doesn’t leave much ambiguity about what he’s trying to say about the nature of man in a period setting, and its heavier favoring of action over horror means it’s less surreal than previous works. That being said, it’s still a deeply chilling picture that manages to tap into a great sensation of existentialist brooding, making for one heck of a Viking movie.