A group of Vikings who had been driven from their homeland were shipwrecked off the Scottish coast in 873. Arriving ashore alive but with almost no equipment, the northerners immediately kidnap the daughter of the local king Dunchaid. However, when he does not pay the hoped-for ransom, but sends a group of elite warriors known as the “wolf pack” after them, a merciless chase begins. With the help of a warlike monk, the Vikings are attempting to break through to Scandinavian-controlled territory in England. However, only a few of them finally reach the supposedly saving coast, where the final fight against the leaders of the wolf pack awaits them…
‘Northmen’, an English-language film by Swiss director Claudio Fäh, is a failed attempt to capitalize on the current enthusiasm for the Viking Age – fueled in part by the TV series . Vikings As is often the case, however, the Viking Age serves primarily as the backdrop to a poorly connected collection of brutal battle scenes. The fact that the setting is basically interchangeable is shown by the fact that the film was not shot in Scotland but actually in South Africa. In addition, no value was placed on historicity, as can be seen from the consistently ridiculous costumes.
But the screenplay itself is extremely unimaginative and the outcome of the story is predictable from the start. The characters – from the clairvoyant princess to the belligerent monk to the noble Viking leader – as well as all the dialogue are extremely flat and full of stereotypes copied from other Viking films (of course, all the Norse people constantly shout “Valhalla”). However, while in some films good acting can make up for a bad script to some extent, “Northmen” is quite the opposite: the actors seem so unbelievable in their roles that they ruin even the slightest hint of suspense in this film. Since there is also no comedy (neither intentional nor involuntary) to be found, the entertainment value of the whole thing is close to zero. If there were an award for the worst Viking film of the decade so far, “Northmen” would have deserved it.
