Do you want to see ‘Valhalla Rising’?

Add to Netflix

Valhalla Rising (2009)

tomatometer

All Critics
Top Critics

Average Rating: 6.5/10
Reviews Counted: 55
Fresh: 39 | Rotten: 16

No consensus yet.

Average Rating: 6.2/10
Critic Reviews: 11
Fresh: 7 | Rotten: 4

No consensus yet.

audience

liked it
Average Rating: 2.9/5
User Ratings: 14,543

My Rating

Added to your Facebook Timeline. — undo

Movie Info

For years, the fearsome figure known only as One Eye (Mads Mikkelsen - PUSHER, FLAME & CITRON, CASINO ROYALE) has defeated everyone he's encountered, but he's treated more like an animal than a warrior. The only person he has any relationship with is the young boy who brings him food and water daily. Constantly caged and shackled, One Eye has drawn the attention of a new force now sweeping the countryside and displacing the society's leaders: Christians.-- (C) IFC Films

Unrated, 1 hr. 30 min.

Action & Adventure

Directed By: Nicolas Winding Refn

In Theaters: Jul 16, 2010 Wide

On DVD: Nov 30, 2010

Box Office:$27.7k

IFC Films

Valhalla Rising Trailer & Photos

More Photos (10)

Cast

Critic Reviews for Valhalla Rising

All Critics (55) | Top Critics (11) | Fresh (39) | Rotten (16)

It's a chilly, often slow, uncompromisingly harsh film, but Refn's images will sear your retinas.

November 4, 2010 Full Review Source: Minneapolis Star Tribune

| Comment

Colin Covert

Minneapolis Star Tribune

Top Critic

If only the pieces added up to an experience that sticks and that didn't finally succumb to a shrug of entropy.

July 29, 2010 Full Review Source: Boston Globe

| Comment

Ty Burr

Boston Globe

Top Critic

You sometimes wish Refn's gift for Ridley Scott-level mayhem had won the battle over his much iffier Werner Herzog leanings.

July 23, 2010 Comment

Robert Abele

Los Angeles Times

Top Critic

It's a trip into a primordial world and primeval sensibilities, and if you're looking to shake off the mall-movie blahs, there are few better places to look.

July 22, 2010 Full Review Source: Wall Street Journal

| Comments (2)

John Anderson

Wall Street Journal

Top Critic

Mr. Refn, who can pull off stylish brutality (in the Pusher films and Bronson), shows no knack for the kind of visionary, hallucinatory image making that would render Valhalla Rising memorable.

July 16, 2010 Full Review Source: New York Times

| Comment

Mike Hale

New York Times

Top Critic

Lots of movies about the Middle Ages can do the mud and blood -- though we sure see a lot of both here -- but in this movie it's like Refn has ripped you out of time and dropped you there.

July 16, 2010 Full Review Source: Salon.com

| Comments (3)

Andrew O'Hehir

Salon.com

Top Critic

Mikkelsen verifies that, even without saying a word, he's an unnervingly unhinged presence.

May 31, 2011 Full Review Source: Lessons of Darkness

| Comment

Nick Schager

Lessons of Darkness

Filled with brutality.

December 26, 2010 Full Review Source: Ozus' World Movie Reviews

| Comment

Dennis Schwartz

Ozus' World Movie Reviews

A mad meditation on the primeval nature of man, faith and survival, this is Apocalypse Then, and then some.

December 22, 2010 Full Review Source: LarsenOnFilm

| Comment

Josh Larsen

LarsenOnFilm

Directed in moody and portentous strokes by Nicolas Winding Refn, this is the most abstract Viking movie you'll ever see...

December 3, 2010 Full Review Source: Seanax.com

| Comment

Sean Axmaker

Seanax.com

Less Braveheart than Aguirre, The Wrath of God, this evocative Viking tone poem contemplates the convergence between violence and religion.

December 1, 2010 Full Review Source: Sarasota Herald-Tribune

| Comment

Christopher Lloyd

Sarasota Herald-Tribune Source: Sarasota Herald-Tribune

A Nordic odyssey straight down to Jerusalem

September 20, 2010 Full Review Source: Metro Times (Detroit, MI)

| Comment

Paul Knoll

Metro Times (Detroit, MI)

I appreciate Refn for pushing against conventions of rhythm, photography, subject, color, and form, and I don't mind that Valhalla Rising lacks a story so much as I question its reliance on enigmatic hints of some grand, over-arching abstraction.

September 4, 2010 Full Review Source: Nick's Flick Picks

| Comment

Nick Davis

Nick's Flick Picks

It's like a gorgeous graphic novel with a protagonist and story that vanish utterly from the mind as soon as the last page is turned.

August 19, 2010 Full Review Source: Oregonian

| Comment

Shawn Levy

Oregonian

Aguirre as conceptualized by Jim Jarmusch and executed by Terrence Malick.

August 11, 2010 Full Review Source: Film Freak Central

| Comment (1)

Walter Chaw

Film Freak Central

This is Aguirre, the Wrath of God, with the despondency jacked to 11.

July 29, 2010 Full Review Source: Boston Phoenix

| Comments (3)

Shaula Clark

Boston Phoenix

For an ugly, brutish, �berviolent Viking epic, Valhalla Rising is gorgeous, each frame a haunting work of art. Refn's style, though, is unsustainable at feature length.

July 24, 2010 Full Review Source: Moving Pictures Magazine

| Comment

Annlee Ellingson

Moving Pictures Magazine

In the mood for a slower-than-molasses viking movie inspired by spaghetti westerns and samurai swordplay epics. Have we got the flick for YOU!

July 23, 2010 Full Review Source: Back Stage

| Comments (7)

Pete Hammond

Back Stage

so formless and arbitrary in meaning that it all borders on pretentiousness

July 23, 2010 Full Review Source: Cinema Writer

| Comments (9)

Jay Antani

Cinema Writer

a viking-adventure-cum-acid-trip

July 22, 2010 Full Review Source: Filmcritic.com

| Comment

Chris Cabin

Filmcritic.com

Like a John Milius film reduced to its pure, masculine essence and shot through one of Alejandro Jodorowsky's lens filters.

July 22, 2010 Full Review Source: AV Club

| Comment

Scott Tobias

AV Club

The visual beauty is exceeded only by the gruesomeness of some of the violence...

July 22, 2010 Full Review Source: Brand X

| Comment

Andy Klein

Brand X

More Critic Reviews

Audience Reviews for Valhalla Rising

View All

How could it be? How could one man, Nicolas Refn, direct the best English-language film of 2011 so far ("Drive") and the worst English-language film of 2009 ("Valhalla Rising")? It does not compute. But there you have it. The crazy world of art. "Valhalla Rising" is a laughable stinker. I howled with laughter on at

November 5, 2011

William Dunmyer

Super Reviewer

An ultra-stylish, dark, moody and intensely brutal epic of bone-chilling power. An impressive, stunning and amazing feast for the eyes and ears that truly stays with you long after it's over. A viking acid-trip that showcases man vs. man, nature, and religon. It's a cool, visually arresting and exhilarating

November 25, 2010

Al S

Super Reviewer

Valhalla Rising Quotes

View All

1. The Boy: You need a name, and you've only got one eye.
– Submitted by First L (8 months ago)
1. Barde: They eat their own god, eat his flesh, drink his blood, abominable.
– Submitted by Tahlia O (12 months ago)
1. Eirik: God brought us out of that mist for a reason. We claim this land in His name.
– Submitted by Chris P (13 months ago)
1. Kare: I am going to show them that a man of God has arrived.
– Submitted by Chris P (13 months ago)

Character	Quote
	Enter quote here...	Delete

DVD

Top Rentals

29%	The Vow
93%	Mission: Impossible Ghost Protoc...
87%	The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
28%	Underworld Awakening
85%	Chronicle

More…

New On DVD This Week

85%	Chronicle
79%	The Grey
7%	The Devil Inside
2%	One for the Money
76%	Rampart

More…

Movies Like Valhalla Rising

Black Death

Bronson

Centurion

View All

Latest News for Valhalla Rising

September 15, 2011:

Ryan Gosling On Drive: This Is My Superhero Movie
In Drive, director Nicolas Winding Refn's (Pusher, Bronson, Valhalla Rising) neo-noir thriller in...

July 16, 2010:

Critics Consensus: Inception Is Certified Fresh
This week at the movies, we've got a mind-bending dreamworld (Inception, starring Leonardo DiCaprio...

View All