Rent The Viking Wars (2019)

Low budget but full of passion. - The Viking Wars review by NP

Directed by Louisa Warren, (who brought us ‘Pagan Warrior’, ‘The Tooth Fairy’, ‘Scarecrow Rising’ and ‘The Ghosts of Borley Rectory’) this clearly low-budget venture has once more been written off by a number of online critics because … it’s a low-budget venture. With that in mind, one can either admire the ambition of such a production as this, featuring much physical conflict and extensive location filming, or moan about the occasionally stilted acting and tepid fight choreography from the performers.

I’m a big fan of low-budget films. Any lack of resource is often more than made up for by freedom of ideas and lack of pandering to high-flying producers (no pun intended – this is distributed by High Fliers films) and demographics.

I enjoyed this. There’s a good story being told, some impassioned performances and a genuine build up of tension as the tale progresses. There are some pacing issues, and some characters’ antics suffer from a certain repetition. Lead Ingrid (Darcie Rose) in particular, looks far too modern, as do some of the others, but is played well enough to excuse that. Darrell Griggs is especially good as the unhinged Gunner and Peter Cosgrove snorts and snarls nicely as Snorre. Technically, the production is faultless – great use is made of locations. Mr score is 7 out of 10.