Far North DVD: Review By Fallenlords

Saiva (Michelle Yeoh) and Anja (Michelle Krusiec) are scratching out a meagre existence in the frozen North. Keeping themselves to themselves they avoid contact with the outside world, due to their past experiences. Life is turned upside down when Saiva finds a half dead soldier Loki (Sean Bean) wandering on the ice. Against her better judgement and her own advice to Anja, chop off their head and then ask if they need help, she decides to help Loki. This act of kindness ends up turning the women’s world upside down.

This is a very slow film and it takes a bit of perseverance to see it through, is the end result worth it? Sort of .. ish. The story unfolds based on current events and past event flashbacks. Blink too quickly and you might start to wonder what is going on. I would term is a sedate story that does grip you to an extent, you want to see what happens, you just wish things would move along a bit quicker. The actual ending is good, a bit of a shock to say the least. There is no indication really about the ending that unfolds which actually to my mind made it worth watching. Others might just find this too slow. There is not that much that happens, a lot of snow, frozen lakes, hunting, skinning, eating - not a lot of action. But a reasonably well told story that is somewhat intriguing.

As there are only really three characters in this story, baring those in flashbacks and a few other scenes, Michelle Yeoh comes through as the one that holds your attention. She just seems interesting; you want to know what happened to her. You want to know what is going to happen. But a lot of the acting is really done through facial expression, looks, more so than dialogue. There is actually very little dialogue throughout the whole file.

This film is directed by Asif Kapadia and the screenplay is co-written by him based on a story written by Sara Maitland. I can't say I have seen much of his work, but I do remember seeing 'The Return' with Sarah Michelle Gellar which overall didn't impress me. I think he certainly has an eye for a nice scenic view but I am not sure he knows how to get the most out of the actors.

Visually the scenery is fine, there is not a lot happening it just flows along quite happily albeit a little slow. In a way it is forgivable to an extent, it is like the pace of life is wound down being in the frozen North. The scenes are done well and give you a good idea of how inhospitable the place is, how difficult it is to scratch out an existence.

This is a Drama, so will appeal to people who don't mind their stories taking a while to play out. There is certainly nothing to appeal to others unless they are real fans of Michelle Yeoh or Sean Bean. Even then this is not a typical role for either of them. This is a drama there are no real fight scenes or anything.

A slow film, that is watchable and has an interesting ending - but only if you can put up with it until then. Some might not last the distance.