The Norseman | |
---|---|
Directed by | Charles B. Pierce |
Written by | Charles B. Pierce |
Produced by | Charles B. Pierce |
Starring | Lee Majors Cornel Wilde Mel Ferrer Jack Elam |
Cinematography | Robert Bethard |
Edited by | Robert Bell Stephen Dunn Aladar Klein Shirak Kojayan Sarah Legon |
Music by | Jaime Mendoza-Nava |
Production companies | Charles B. Pierce Film Productions Fawcett-Majors Productions |
Distributed by | American International Pictures |
Release date | October 5, 1978 |
Running time | 90 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $3 million [1] |
Box office | $1 million [2] |
The Norseman is a 1978 American adventure film starring Lee Majors, directed, produced and written by Charles B. Pierce. [3]
An 11th-century Viking prince sails to North America to find his father, who on a previous voyage had been captured by Native Americans.
The film was a co production between Charles Pierce and Lee Majors with AIP doing the distribution. It was Pierce's first film with a major Hollywood studio. [1]
Majors said it "took a lot of guts" to play a Viking but was persuaded by a fee of $500,000 and 10% of the profits. [1] He later said, "I had a little time off, and they said, "It shoots in Florida, on the coast there, out of Tampa," and they had a bunch of Tampa Bay Buccaneers that were gonna play Vikings, so ... I don't know, I thought it'd be fun, so I did it." [4]
The film was shot in Tampa, Florida. Postproduction was done at Pierce's $2 million facility at Shreveport, Louisiana. [1]
"There is no character to develop here and hardly any dialogue," said Majors, "this is a formula film." [1]
The Los Angeles Times called it "tedious business". [5]
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