THE NORTHMAN
When I try to choose a favorite film genre, I usually find it difficult to commit to just one. Yet whenever I think about the movie that has impressed me the most in recent years, my mind always returns to Robert Eggers’ THE NORTHMAN. I first saw it in a cinema right after the COVID lockdowns, and the experience felt strangely emotional. It was as if I was rediscovering something I had forgotten I loved. Sitting in the dark, watching images of a volcano explode across a massive screen, with overwhelming sound design and voiceover, it reminded me of the unique power of cinema - something no home setup can truly replace.
I thought: “This is what cinema is meant to do.” I’ve always admired when a director steps into a larger-budget film and uses the new scale not to commercially dilute their vision but to amplify it. Eggers manages exactly that. The battle scenes are breathtaking, the long-take fight sequences feel mythic, and the psychedelic, poetic elements give the story a haunting inner life.
Even though THE VVITCH is still my favorite of his films, I’m fascinated by how Eggers brings his idiosyncratic, non-mainstream sensibility into mainstream cinema without losing any of his unusual voice. I believe that challenging the audience is one of the most important tasks an artist can take on.
For me, THE NORTHMAN remains a visually stunning, emotionally raw, and interpretation-rich journey, one that reminds me why I love film in the first place.
Lauris Ābele