• Jul 28
• Interview with VALHALLA RISING director Nicolas Refn
• Posted by Deljhp - 28/07/10 at 06:23 PM

A few years ago, Nicolas Winding Refn was not a name many were familiar with. Some were lucky enough to have caught 'Pusher' back when first it came out, but for most of us, it wasn’t until his film 'Bronson' came along that everything changed. Refn’s film about one of Britain’s most notorious (and fascinating) criminals made waves all over the movie sites populating the internet, thanks to some amazing visuals and an outstanding performance by lead actor Tom Hardy. Now Refn is back with a new film, Valhalla Rising, in which the director proves himself as one of the world’s best. Hypnotic, violent and atmospheric, Rising is like some sort of minimalist acid trip about a mute warrior who escapes captivity to join a crew of Vikings on their way to Jerusalem to fight, but end up somewhere far from where they expected. It’s one of them best films we’ve seen so far this year. Refn took some time to talk to our very own regular 24Frames contributor Richard aka ‘Adgy’ about the film, his career and why it’s not just a Viking film.

24FPS: Thanks for taking the time to talk to us! How’s it going?

NWR: I’m not used to working in Hollywood, where they give you a list of actors and you always think “Oh my god, oh my god” and then they say “no, yes, no, no, has-been, not really, not interested, can’t do it anymore, no, he’s not available, rehab…” Anyway, I needed to go through that. Sorry.

24FPS: Hah! No, no, that’s quite alright.

NWR: So, Valhalla Rising.

24FPS: Yeah, I watched the movie last night and I thought it was amazing.

NWR: Thank you.

24FPS: I’m kind of curious about the genesis of the film. Were you intending to do a Viking movie from the start?

NWR: Well, I’ve had the idea since I was 15 or 16. Basically, the whole origin of me wanting to do a Viking film started from when I heard this documentary program, like a National Geographic, on the radio and it was about a rune stone that was discovered in Delaware, Washington in the 30’s, which was a great puzzlement because people were very surprised that, you know, a lot of Americans wouldn’t accept that people had been to America before Columbus. So it was dismissed as a hoax. And it wasn’t until many years later that it became apparent that there were settlers in Newfoundland and they found the Viking settlements that, you know, changed the acceptance of the idea that the Vikings had been to America before. The sagas talked about the wine country, which was America for them, but the question was still ‘how can a ship like theirs get so far down south from Newfoundland [to Delaware], because it’s quite far, and because they were only there for a very short time. And so historians have kind of speculated that what had happened was that a ship had of course sailed out, but went south and that the east coast had been more fertile, like Florida further up, and the rivers had gone in and out of the country much more and they had sailed into a river and gotten almost lost inside America. And then a war between them and the Indians started. Because the rune stone was a warning sign for the Vikings. And I was thinking “Oh my god, that’s a great action film” and ever since then, I wanted to do this Viking film... Continue reading here