The Northman

WHEN HE FIRST spoke to Empire about the film in 2021, director and co-writer Robert Eggers promised us that The Northman would be “a true epic” — and he certainly delivered. Inspired by the old Icelandic sagas, it is a muddy, bloody, brutal tale of revenge that frequently bludgeons all hell out of you. Here, Eggers unpacks his ferocious beast of a movie.

A PSYCHEDELIC COMING-OF-AGE

A few minutes into The Northman, the magnificently titled King Aurvandil War-raven (Ethan Hawke) gifts his young son Amleth (Oscar Novak) a ritualistic journey into manhood, courtesy of royal jester Heimir (Willem Dafoe)… and the psychedelic plant henbane, which soon has them on all fours, barking like dogs, burping and farting. “That was a ritual that [Icelandic co-writer] Sjón invented, that we then retroactively infused with more research,” says Eggers. As for the various bodily squelches… it seemed rude not to. “Bruegel and Cervantes and Shakespeare, who Sjón and I can never reach to do anything but kiss the hem of their robes, they’re not afraid to use scatological humour, so why shouldn’t we?”

THE ULTIMATE VIKING RAID

When we meet the adult Amleth (Alexander Skarsgård), he has lost his way, forgetting the oath he made to avenge his father, who has been beheaded by Aurvandil’s treacherous, queenstealing brother Fjölnir (Claes Bang). Now a merciless berserker, we witness Amleth and his cohorts rip their way through a village, in a bravado bit of filmmaking. “That was something we wanted to do from the very beginning,” says Eggers. “We spent the most time in prep on that sequence, because it’s the most complex. And, while very difficult, it was also one of the most satisfying. It became very close to how I imagined it.”

CONTACT SPORT

Undercover as a slave, having infiltrated his unsuspecting uncle’s community, Amleth is forced into a deadly game of Knattleikr. This involves a bunch of burly men, a terrifyingly hard ball, and heads being caved in. “Knattleikr is all over the place in sagas, and is something that was really important to Sjón, that I really didn’t want to do,” says Eggers. “I’m not interested in sports, and I was concerned that I wasn’t going to have the passion to shoot it. Sjón convinced me of its importance. And then

I had to convince Jarin [Blaschke], my cinematographer, to care about it because he hated sports too. I said, ‘Look, dude, I know you and I got picked on and beat up by jocks, but we’ve got to grow up and figure this out.’” The result is painful — to see it is to shudder.

TRUE LOVE

As he begins his mission, Amleth meets Olga (Anya Taylor-joy), a white witch who claims she has the power to break men’s minds. She melts Amleth’s heart. Again, this — a love story —

was Sjón’s idea, and again, Eggers came round to his way of thinking. “I’m just allergic to cheese,” Eggers explains of his reluctance to get romantic. “Though there’s plenty of cheese in this movie, in some readings of it. When you’re doing something big and earnest, you’re always walking the line, you’re always dancing with and around cheese. So you try to limit your intake so you don’t get constipated.”

AMLETH’S REVENGE

Finally, with his sword at the ready, Amleth brings the carnage — and not without flourish. His oppressors get dispatched extravagantly, particularly when he affixes some newly separated body-parts to the front of a hut. “I don’t really like super-gory things,” says Eggers. “I made this movie, so maybe I’m blind to the level of gore that I have gone in for.” Yet he will admit to having enjoyed writing and directing these moments. “Does that make me sound like a villain? I don’t know. But sure, it’s fun. The first killing has often been described as an art installation. So there you go.”

O MOTHER, WHERE ART THOU?

As the bodycount rises, Amleth prepares to free his kidnapped mother, Queen Gudrún (Nicole Kidman), who claims that her murdered husband was a rapist, that she always hated him, loves Fjölnir, and seems to detest Amleth. Yet even that doesn’t sway him too much: he’s still hellbent on offing his uncle. “Well, he has to,” says Eggers. “That’s a Viking code of honour. So he says, ‘My mother is as evil as Fjölnir. I will become a hailstorm of fire and steel and burn their world to the ground.’” And so he does, his killing spree ramping up. Let the intestines spill.

A VOLCANIC CLIMAX

The Northman concludes with Amleth and Fjölnir having a naked swordfight on an erupting volcano; a visit to Iceland a few years ago inspired Eggers, and the end came first. “Those landscapes made me think, ‘A naked swordfight on a volcano needs to be the end of a Viking movie if I make one, because there is nothing more elemental than that.’ One of the first things I said to Sjón when we met was, ‘Is this a stupid American Hollywood ending?’ And he said, ‘No, it’s clearly coming from someplace that’s not just commercialism. I think this could be cool. Let’s figure it out.’” There was little room for subtlety.

AN UNHAPPY ENDING?

Both men die at the end, the bloodthirsty Amleth leaving Olga to raise their as-yet unborn children on her own. Yet, having completed his mission, thus, he believes, protecting his kids from Fjölnir, he seems happy. Eggers doesn’t want to give away his take on this bloody mess. “I wouldn’t want to say, because I’d like the audience to be able to take with it what works for them,” he says. “As a filmmaker trying to tell Amleth’s story,

I had to be able to understand how it’s a happy ending for him. But that doesn’t mean I see it as a happy ending.” Okay, but hey — it hardly warms the cockles. “Well... now I guess I am saying it but... it is hard not to see it as a waste,” he concedes. Indeed. Stupid men. Stupid naked men.

THE NORTHMAN IS OUT NOW ON DVD AND BLU-RAY