Valhalla Rising

We are definitely not in Kansas anymore on this one.  I had no idea of what was happening or where we were headed, yet I was still into this movie.  A religious gig throughout with some knarly fight scenes and just down and dirty dirty people.  One Eye (Mads Mikkelsen: Flame and Citron) is evidently a Christian who is captured and used as a gladiator by his chieftain master to win money by besting the the gladiators of other chieftains.   My only clue to his being a Christian is the disdain his "owners" have of him when they mention that he is from a clan that eats the flesh of their god and drinks his blood.  Charming, I would be a bit freaky on someone like that too; but dudes, you don't know the whole story!!!

Okay, so One Eye is really good at what he does but not too into it, so when he has the chance, he breaks his bonds and then the bones and skulls of those who have kept him captive.  The only survivor is a boy whom he takes along with him.  He falls into the company of a group of guys who are Christians and who are on their way to Jerusalem to fight for their God.  One Eye (who never says a word) is like, "Okay, cool, you gotta boat and aren't really into enslaving me?  Yeah, I can hang with you guys."  They embark on a voyage, land somewhere which isn't Jerusalem and where the leader says, "I am sick of the boat and if I can't reach Jerusalem, to heck with it, I will make 'New Jerusalem' and more or less kill anyone who is not with me in the worship of MY lord!"

Cinematography is great!  The script, well, yeah, it's okay, the directing and acting, yeah, but overall, I understood what the heck was going on in this film just about as much as I understrood what was going on in 1968's 2001: A Space Odyssey.