The Vikings | |
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![]() Theatrical release poster by Reynold Brown | |
Directed by | Richard Fleischer |
Written by | Calder Willingham (screenplay) Dale Wasserman (adaptation) |
Based on | The Viking by Edison Marshall |
Produced by | Jerry Bresler |
Starring | Kirk Douglas Tony Curtis Janet Leigh Ernest Borgnine James Donald Alexander Knox Frank Thring |
Narrated by | Orson Welles |
Cinematography | Jack Cardiff |
Edited by | Elmo Williams |
Music by | Mario Nascimbene |
Production companies | |
Distributed by | United Artists |
Release date |
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Running time | 116 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $3.5 million [2] |
Box office | $6.2 million (US and Canada rentals) [3] $7 million (overseas rentals) [4] |
The Vikings is a 1958 American epic [5] historical fiction swashbuckling film directed by Richard Fleischer, filmed in Technirama, and printed in Technicolor. It was produced by Jerry Bresler and stars Kirk Douglas. It is based on the 1951 novel The Viking by Edison Marshall, which in turn is based on material from the sagas of Ragnar Lodbrok and his sons. Other starring roles were taken by then husband-and-wife Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh as well as Ernest Borgnine. The film made notable use of natural locations in Norway. It was mostly filmed in Maurangerfjorden and Maurangsnes, captured on film by cinematographer Jack Cardiff, although Aella's castle was the real Fort-la-Latte in north-east Brittany in France.
Despite being derisively called a "Norse Opera" by New York Times critic Bosley Crowther, the film proved a major box office success and spawned the television series Tales of the Vikings , directed by the film's editor, Elmo Williams, which included none of the original cast or characters.
The King of Northumbria is killed during a Viking raid led by the fearsome King Ragnar Lodbrok. Because the king had died childless, his cousin Aella takes the throne. The king's widow, however, is pregnant with Ragnar's child. To protect the infant from her cousin-in-law's ambitions, she sends him off to Italy. By a twist of fate, the ship is intercepted by the Vikings, who are unaware of the child's kinship and enslave him.
The boy grows into a young man named Eric. His parentage is finally discovered by Lord Egbert, a Northumbrian nobleman opposed to Aella. When Aella accuses him of treason, Egbert finds sanctuary with Ragnar in Norway. Egbert recognises the pommel stone of the Northumbrian royal sword Requiter on an amulet around Eric's neck, placed there by Eric's mother when he was a child, but tells no one.
Eric incurs the wrath of his half-brother Einar, Ragnar's legitimate son and heir, after the former orders his falcon to attack Einar, taking out one of his eyes. Eric is saved from immediate execution when the royal court Völva Kitala (who loves Eric as a son) warns that Odin will curse whoever kills him. He is left in a tidal pool to drown with the rising tide by Ragnar's decree to avoid the curse, but after Eric calls out to Odin, the wind shifts and forces the water away, saving him. Lord Egbert then claims him as his slave property to protect his rights, before Einar, keenly aware of the weather shift, can return and finish him. Egbert hopes to find an opportunity to take advantage of Eric's unknown claim to the Northumbrian kingdom.
The enmity between Eric and Einar is exacerbated when they both fall in love with the Welsh Christian princess Morgana, who was to marry King Aella but is captured in a raid suggested by Egbert, to demand ransom and bring shame and political unpopularity pressure upon the Northumbrian monarch. During a drunken feast in the "great hall", Einar confesses his feelings to Ragnar, who tells Einar that women often need to be taken by force and grants his son to take the prisoner as his. Einar throws the guards off the ship Morgana is being held on, and begins to rape her — defying his expectations and hope for resistance, she offers none, denying him his wish to take her by aggressive force. Before things can go any further, Eric grabs Einar from behind and knocks him out, then takes Morgana away on a small ship he had constructed for Egbert.
Eric and Morgana flee to England, along with Sandpiper (Eric's friend and fellow slave), Kitala and Morgana's maid Bridget. Einar regains consciousness and gives the alarm, and several pursuing longships quickly gain on the fugitives. In thick fog, Ragnar's longship hits a rock and sinks, while Eric's boat is guided safely by a primitive compass, a piece of magnetite in the shape of a fish that Sandpiper obtained in a distant land. Einar, in another longship, believes Ragnar to be dead and grudgingly abandons the chase. Ragnar, however, is rescued by Eric and taken prisoner to Aella. Eric and Morgana become lovers during the trip, and she agrees to seek release from her pledge to marry Aella.
Aella orders Ragnar bound and thrown into a pit filled with starved wolves. To give Ragnar a Viking's death (so that he can enter Valhalla), Eric, who is granted the honour of forcing him into the pit, cuts the prisoner's bonds and gives him his sword. Laughing, Ragnar jumps to his death. In response to Eric's "treason", Aella cuts off his left hand, puts him back on his ship and casts him adrift. Eric returns to Einar's settlement, and tells his half-brother how his father died, and what had been Aella's reward for allowing Ragnar to die a Viking's death. With this revelation, and the promise that Eric will guide their ships through the fog (thus making a surprise attack possible), Einar is finally able to persuade the other Vikings to mount an invasion of Northumbria. Putting their mutual hatred aside for the moment, Einar and Eric sail for England.
The dragon longships land, and the Vikings begin to move inland in force. The alarm is sounded, and the castle defenders assemble to repel the Vikings' assault. In a bold move, Einar has several Vikings throw axes at the closed drawbridge that bars entrance to the castle's keep. Several of the axe-throwers are killed, but enough survive to throw their axes that a "ladder" is created for Einar to climb after he leaps across the moat to the drawbridge. He gains entry to the keep and lowers the drawbridge so that the other Vikings can overwhelm the outnumbered English. Eric and Einar both set off in search of Morgana. Eric encounters Aella instead and shoves him into the wolf pit.
Einar finds Morgana in the chapel in the highest tower of the keep and accosts her, telling her she will be his Queen. When Morgana tells Einar that she loves Eric, Einar drags her outside and calls Eric to their long-delayed battle. The two bitter rivals engage in a sword fight on top of the tower. Eric is defeated, his sword broken, but as Einar prepares to deliver the killing blow, he hesitates, having learned the truth from Morgana, and suddenly seeing Ragnar in Eric's defiant face. This gives Eric (who does not yet know they are brothers) the opportunity to fatally stab Einar with his sword's broken blade. Echoing the scene with Ragnar, Eric gives Einar a sword so that he too can enter Valhalla. In the final scene, Einar is given a Viking funeral: his body is placed on a longship, which is set on fire by flaming arrows.
The film had a dual premiere at the Astor Theatre and Victoria Theatre on Broadway in New York City on June 11, 1958. [1] [6]
The film was a hit in the US and overseas, earning $6.2 million in the US and Canada [3] (from a gross of $15 million [7] ) and $7 million overseas, [4] including being the 3rd most popular film at the British box office in 1958. [8] Kirk Douglas took no salary for the film in return for 60% of the profits, and was estimated to have earned $3 million from the film. [4]
Bosley Crowther of The New York Times wrote, "The sight of those sleek Viking barges sweeping across the slate gray seas, loaded with bearded, brawny oarsmen, is something exciting to see, particularly in the wide-screen and color that are used very well in this film." However, Crowther was disappointed "that it follows a frank commercial format without any evident attempt to break new ground. Given the story of the Norsemen and the majestic adventures they surely had in carrying their explorations and colonizing the empty northern seas, it does seem that something more heroic and impressive could have been conceived than this copy of a Western, with standard varmints dressed up in shaggy skins." [9] Variety called it "spectacular, rousing and colorful," adding, "Douglas, doing a bangup, free-wheeling job as the ferocious and disfigured Viking fighter, fits the part splendidly." [10] Philip K. Scheuer of the Los Angeles Times wrote, "As drama and in emotional content the picture is so elementary, so exaggerated, that it can hardly be taken seriously by the discriminating cinemagoer. A kind of 'Prince Valiant' without the prince, it is filled with pell-mell action that the adult eye will follow with a mixture of amusement and disbelief." Scheuer also thought the film's "assorted beatings, brutalities and beheadings" made it too violent for children. [11] Leo Sullivan of The Washington Post stated, "Produced lavishly and filmed with magnificent beauty by that master, Jack Cardiff, 'The Vikings' is so splendid it can't be classed as a dud. But the picture's simple storyline can't escape being a bore." [12] John McCarten of The New Yorker wrote, "It's terrible stuff, but some of the views of the fiords are impressive." [13] The Monthly Film Bulletin said, "There is nothing here to take seriously; yet, in its straightforward sentimental way, concentrating on some of the oldest elements in story-telling, this film creates a colourful fairy-tale world which is often entrancing, and suffers only from a rather wandering middle section." [14]
The film holds a score of 76% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 21 reviews. [15]
Mario Nascimbene's score was the first music published through Kirk Douglas' music publishing company, Peter Vincent Music Corporation (named after his son Peter Vincent Douglas), a subsidiary of Bryna Productions. [16] The soundtrack long play was initially announced for release by Dot Records, but was ultimately released by United Artists Records in a double-fold (gatefold) cover packaging in early June 1958. [16] [17]
Kirk Douglas's Bryna Productions produced a 1959 television series Tales of the Vikings . This picture is considered the "trigger film" for other contemporary Viking films including Mario Bava's Erik the Conqueror and several other Italian made Viking films as well as Jack Cardiff's (cinematographer on The Vikings) The Long Ships . [18]
Year 865 (DCCCLXV) was a common year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar.
Ragnar Lodbrok, according to legends, was a Viking hero and a Swedish and Danish king.
Sigurd Ring according to legend was a king of the Swedes, being mentioned in many old Scandinavian sagas. According to these sources he was granted rulership over Sweden as a vassal king under his uncle Harald Wartooth. Later he would take up arms against his uncle Harald in a bid to overthrow him and take the crown of Denmark, a conflict which Sigurd eventually won after the legendary Battle of the Brávellir, where it is said that Odin himself intervened and killed Harald. In the Sagas, Sigurd is also known for being the father of the Norse Viking hero and legendary king of Denmark and Sweden, Ragnar Lodbrok. According to Bósa saga ok Herrauds, there was once a saga on Sigurd Ring, but this saga is now lost.
Björn Ironside, according to Norse legends, was a Norse Viking chief and Swedish king. According to the 12th- and 13th-century Scandinavian histories, he was the son of notorious Viking king Ragnar Lodbrok and lived in the 9th century, between 855 and 858. Björn Ironside is said to have been the first ruler of the Swedish Munsö dynasty. In the early 18th century, a barrow on the island of Munsö was claimed by antiquarians to be Björn Järnsidas hög or Björn Ironside's barrow.
Eysteinn Beli or Eysteinn hinn illráði, Swedish: Östen Illråde (ill-ruler) or Östen Beli, was a semi-legendary king of Sweden who would have ruled in the late 8th century.
Ivar the Boneless, also known as Ivar Ragnarsson, was a Viking leader who invaded England and Ireland. According to the Tale of Ragnar Lodbrok, he was the son of Ragnar Loðbrok and his wife Aslaug, as his brothers Björn Ironside, Hvitserk, Sigurd Snake-in-the-Eye and Ubba. However, this is not sure to be historically accurate. Ivar is probably the same person as Ímar, a Viking king of Dublin between 870 and 873. He might’ve been born in Uppsala, Sweden in about 787.
Sigurd Snake-in-the-eye or Sigurd Áslaugsson was a semi-legendary Viking warrior and Danish king active from the mid to late 9th century. According to multiple saga sources and Scandinavian histories from the 12th century and later, he is one of the sons of the legendary Viking Ragnar Lodbrok and Áslaug. His historical prototype might have been the Danish King Sigfred who ruled briefly in the 870s. Norwegian kings' genealogies of the Middle Ages name him as an ancestor of Harald Fairhair and used his mother's supposed ancestry the Völsung to create an ancestry between Harald and his descendants and Odin.
Halfdan Ragnarsson was a Viking leader and a commander of the Great Heathen Army which invaded the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England, starting in 865.
The blood eagle was a method of ritually executing a chosen member as detailed in late skaldic poetry. According to the two instances mentioned in the sagas, the victims were placed in a prone position, their ribs severed from the spine with a sharp tool, and their lungs pulled through the opening to create a pair of "wings". There has been continuing debate about whether the rite was a literary invention, a mistranslation of the original texts, or an authentic historical practice.
Ælla was King of Northumbria, a kingdom in medieval England, during the middle of the 9th century. Sources on Northumbrian history in this period are limited, and so Ælla's ancestry is not known, and the dating of the beginning of his reign is questionable.
Harthacnut or Cnut I was a semi-legendary King of Denmark. The old Norse story Ragnarssona þáttr makes Harthacnut son of the semi-mythic viking chieftain Sigurd Snake-in-the-Eye, himself one of the sons of the legendary Ragnar Lodbrok. The saga in turn makes Harthacnut the father of the historical king, Gorm. It has been suggested he is to be identified with the Hardegon of Northmannia whose early-10th century conquest of Denmark was related by Adam of Bremen.
This timeline summarises significant events in the history of Northumbria and Northumberland.
The Great Heathen Army, also known as the Viking Great Army, was a coalition of Scandinavian warriors who invaded England in AD 865. Since the late 8th century, the Vikings had been engaging in raids on centres of wealth, such as monasteries. The Great Heathen Army was much larger and aimed to conquer and occupy the four kingdoms of East Anglia, Northumbria, Mercia and Wessex.
Osberht was king of Northumbria in the middle of the 9th century. Sources on Northumbrian history in this period are limited. Osberht's descent is not known and the dating of his reign is problematic.
The Tale of Ragnar's sons is an Old Norse story about Ragnar Lodbrok and his sons.
The Hook is a 1963 Korean War war film directed by George Seaton based on the 1957 novel L'Hameçon by Vahé Katcha. The film's title comes from the translation of the title of the original novel rather than the Battle of the Hook. The film was shot off Santa Catalina Island, California.
The Tartars/I Tartari is a 1961 Italian-Yugoslavian epic historical Technicolor film directed by Richard Thorpe and starring Victor Mature and Orson Welles. It is one of the sword-and-sandal genre films made in Italy in the 1950s and early 1960s.
The Tale of Ragnarr loðbrók is an Icelandic legendary saga of the 13th century about the Viking ruler Ragnarr loðbrók. It is first found in the same manuscript as Vǫlsunga saga, which it immediately follows. The tale covers the origin of Áslaug, Ragnarr's quest for the hand of Þóra borgarhjǫrtr, his later marriage to Áslaug, the deeds of their sons in battle, and Ragnarr's death at the hands of king Ælla of Northumbria.
The Battle of York was fought between the Vikings of the Great Heathen Army and the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Northumbria on 21 March 867 in the city of York.
Ragnar "Lothbrok" Sigurdsson is a main character in the historical drama series Vikings, created by Canadian network History. He is portrayed by Travis Fimmel and is based on Ragnar Lodbrok, a 9th-century Viking farmer and warrior who raided Anglo-Saxon villages in England.
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