The Viking Trilogy (Hrafn Gunnlaugsson, 1984-1991)

[Tommaso]

A film that was my lying on my shelf for quite a few months now after having bought it during my summer trip to Iceland was "The Raven flies" (1984) by Hrafn Gunnlaugsson, known to US audiences under the silly title "Revenge of the Barbarians". I had never heard anything about the film or its director, but just bought it because of a lot of press quotes, including some praise by Ingmar Bergman, printed on the dvd cover. And folks, finally watching it now, this was GREAT! Imagine a mix of a Sergio Leone western with some medieval Bergman (à la "Virgin Spring") and some gory Chambara style revenge story (although they fight with daggers here), and you get a rough idea. All based on an ancient Icelandic saga, this is set in Viking times and it very faithfully recreates this mythical world with images as powerful as they are haunting, not to speak of the glorious images of the Icelandic landscape. A masterful film, I really wonder why this wasn't released on dvd outside Iceland (although there once was a Swedish dvd of it, without english subs). But what really watered my mouth were two featurettes on the dvd about two other films by the same director which form parts two and three of this Viking trilogy, "The shadow of the Raven" (1988) and "The White Viking" (1991). The first seems to be an adaptation of the Tristan and Iseult legend, the second seems to be about the forced Christianization of Iceland in the 10th century, and the few excerpts from that latter film absolutely blew me away with its crusader-like looking 'Christians' torturing and killing the 'heathens', with images seeming to come straight out of Eisenstein's "Nevsky". The cinematography, judging from these excerpts, looked absolutely stunning.

So, has anyone here seen these films? What do you think of them? Are they available anywhere in the world on dvd with English or other Central European language subs?

[Gordon]

I have been interested in seeing these films for a few years now, but they were also out of reach and as you say, the Swedish DVD didn't have subs. This Icelandic release definitely has english subs, then? I have searched for an english-friendly Icelandic wbsite, but I have yet to find one.

Peter Cowie's essay on Scandanavian Cinema on the Criterion website mentions Gunnlaugsson's films.

[Gordon]

It is available HERE but I can't be bothered wiring €40, which is extortionate. Why don't they have Paypal at least?!

[Tommaso]

Yes, it's ridiculously expensive, as everything else in Iceland. This is the dvd I got while being there, it's available in every tourist shop there for about 30 Euros. It's not much of a beauty (analog sourced, and taken from a theatrical print, a good one though, but slightly faded colours and too much compression visible), but remains acceptable. There's a lot of extras on it: three different languages, and subs in many languages including English; the shorter, international version (94 min. as opposed to 103 min) in English as an addition, readings of the original saga story in Icelandic and English, two featurettes, and best of all, an audio commentary by the director. The two featurettes are about parts two and three, and they announce that they will also be released on dvd soon (whatever that means, as the dvd is from 2005). I guess we will find out via the director's own site, which is at Viking Films.

Well, as that film is so rare obviously and in my view an extraordinary piece of filmmaking, I would still recommend this Icelandic dvd to anyone despite the high prices, and at least in Europe this bank transfer thing they offer should cause no problems. Stupid for anyone else, though.

[Lino]

I seem to have stumbled onto a cheaper DVD version of this movie.

[Tommaso]

ahm... whatever you stumbled upon there, it's not Gunnlaugsson's film. This is a film by Michael Chapman with a totally different cast. Don't think it's in any way related (but would be nice to see as a comparison)

[Lino]

Oops, I guess you're right. I jumped the gun, yet again. Still, it was also made in Iceland which is interesting. Maybe this is a remake of some sort?

[Tommaso]

Don't know, really. Looking at the only review of that dvd I could find, at DVD Talk, this seems as well to be a 'realistic' film, trying to recreate the Icelandic life at that time. Interesting is that the director was the cinematographer of "Taxi Driver", so I suppose it might be quite good visually. But everything else seems to be pretty conventional and somewhat 'trashy', so I can't imagine it would come anywhere near that masterful Gunnlaugsson film. The plot is definitely different.

Wouldn't the Gunnlaugsson trilogy be an interesting release for the new Eclipse line? After all, he says somewhere on the DVD that he has personally regained the rights for the American market now, so they could simply ask him. I guess he would even do a commentary for free....

[martin]

I recently got 2 versions of White Viking from nammi.is.

It's two seperate releases: One is the 90 min. Director's Cut; the other is the full 5 hour version.

Each version is on one disc, and both releases have English subs (removable). I was a little concerned about the quality of the +5 hour version, since its all on one single-sided disc (dvd-9), but the quality seems fine with good compression. The image AR is c. 1.33:1 - unfortunately with some with some black borders around the image (quite a lot, actually, on the director's cut).

The releases look "cheap", and the covers look like somthing that was printed off a PC printer but I'm quite sure that these are genuine pressed discs. Maybe I'll post some screenshots when I've watched the films.

But beware: Not every release on that site is of a high standard. I also ordered Hrafn Gunlagsson's The sacred mound which turned out to be a quite inferior vhs transfer.

I haven't watched the White Viking films yet, as I'm still waiting for the first film of the trilogy (ordered from Sweden where it's released by Sandrew Metronome). I have the 2nd film of the trilogy in the Sandrew Metronome edition (not English friendly).

[Tommaso]

I think those dvds all come directly from Gunnlaugsson, and he just put on disc what he happened to have, transferwise. I've seen a few of them: the short version of "White Viking" looks quite good, and so do "Middle Ages now" and "My father's estate", IIRC. The popular (relatively speaking) "When the raven flies", however, is certainly only VHS quality. But all these are very fine films from a filmmaker with a rather individual style, so if you need English subs, there aren't any real alternatives around.

[Forrest Taft]

Thanks for bumping this thread, Martin, and reminding of this series. Turns out there is a Norwegian DVD release containing the first two parts of the trilogy, which I just ordered. I seem to recall The Raven Flies being described as a remake of Yojimbo/Fistful. How closely does it follow the plot?

[martin]

I probably wouldn't have thought of Yojimbo if you hadn't mentioned it. Maybe I'm wrong but I don't think the samurai of Yojimbo (Mifune's charachter) had any personal motives to stir things up. In that respect the protagonist of The Raven Flies seems like a much more conventional avenger - rather like Bronson's charachter in Once Upon a Time in the West. And the tone and the mood of the film is also very unlike Yojimbo. It's grim, relentless. But the film also shares some obvious similarities with Yojimbo.

When he was a kid in Ireland, Gest, the hero of The Raven Flies, saw two vikings, Erik and Thord, kill his parents and take his sister as a slave. Gest is seeking revenge, and after serching "all over the world" for 20 years he finds his sister in Iceland, now married to Thord. Realizing he has no chance against the Vikings, Gest starts his own scheme of plots and double-crosses to set Erik and Thord up against each other. And this is very much like what's going on in Yojimbo. No doubt about it!

It's a good film with fantastic locations (it would of course look even more stunning if it wasn't such a murky transfer). The film is quite brutal but it also has something to say about violence. It's also a very elliptic film, skipping the 20 years of search in order to focus on the events on Iceland instead. Brillant.