While this movie was filmed at incredible looking locations (go Alberta!) and the costume department deserves a big A+, giving the movie an aesthetic that is unique and very pleasing to look at, the narrative and worldbuilding were utterly neglected. The cast is promising and their characters have potential as well, but the plot is a myriad of plot lines that end up a giant mess with a lot of loose ends that never get tied up. This story just doesn't seem to know what it's supposed to be, there is no proper explanation for conflict and no true resolution, leaving a viewer quite dissatisfied. Had the characters, and especially their pasts and goals, been more fleshed out, this movie might have worked out, but a lack of details (which is not inherently bad) in the right places just makes this story confusing instead of deep. On top of that, a lot of bad clichés are used that could have been avoided easily. The female lead can literally be replaced with a sexy lamp, and the plot would not suffer for it at all, not to mention romance without proper emotional setup, familial revelations á la George Lucas and kids losing parents which added nothing to the story. The lead character is nothing but more than a broody generic white guy, while the ethnic mix in the supporting cast is lovely, but the contrast between those two gives it a mighty-whitey vs exotic beauties feeling. I was fortunate enough to witness an interview with the creator afterwards, who described himself as an 'old soul' and mentioned wanting to emphatize with 'real people' (with a futuristic primitive story with a chosen one and fight scenes every other minute?), so suddenly it all became clear. I do have to say that I loved the idea of stories being etched or formed in people's skin, with even a sort of soul mate system behind it, but this was never explained or worked out, so that was sad. According to the professional reviews the message of the film was the difference between feeling and instinct, because 'to feel is to live', and while I can see it now that it has been brought to my attention, they abandoned this for tropes that were useless. Had this been more fleshed out or even more explicit it might have worked, but the story got tangled up. I'd say, drop the cliché action movie tropes, make it a peaceful but enduring quest for lost civilization/feeling and a goal to work towards a better future for real, (hire a screenwriter), and it might've been something. My advice is watch it for the visuals, but make sure it's muted.
Review of The Northlander
