I didn't know what to expect but damnit, it was a really good movie. Well as good as a Lord of the Rings meets Predator movie can be. Just the right amount of gore and humour, beautiful vistas (I guess they went from shooting in New Zealand to British Columbia to finally settling on Nova Scotia).

The creature effects were the real highlight. Part monster from Forbidden Planet, part monster from The Relic.

Oh and Ron Perlman.

This movie was really good! It's a shame it didn't get a proper theatrical
release. Acting and effects were both good. Solid entertainment.

B+

Disappointment filled with clichés.

D

I actually loved it. Mix of Lord of the Rings and Alien. I thought it was well written. A

B


I must say that after the crappy trailer my expectations were really low for this one and this probably helped a lot. I enjoyed this quite a bit. Then again, how much can you screw up by pitting vikings (most of them speaking a very strong British accent, heh) as well as a human-looking alien warrior against a dragon-like alien monster. However I also thought that putting Indians against Vikings in Pathfinder can't really suck either and yet director Marcus Nispel has proven me otherwise.

Anyway, in Outlander the pitch works and partly delivers. This is not a movie of much thought and depth, even though every now and then it tries to sell itself as being deep and thoughtful. Well, it's not. But it's actually a lot of fun, Jim Caviziel proves himself well in the action role and it's got Ron Perlman with two huge hammers! What more can you ask for? Well, there actually is something. When I saw the trailer I complained about the bad visual effects. Some blamed it on the low quality of the trailer, others on an unfinished product. Well truth is that these have barely improved in the actual movie. While most of the film actually manages not to look cheap (like the set designs and the vikings village), but alien design was probably when they somewhat ran out of money. Sometimes it looks alright, but at other times it looks like pre-Jurassic Park-quality CGI and considering how much you can make nowadays on a shoestring budget this was disappointing. I wish they had more money to work with that certainly would have helped. Of course there's a LOT of clunky dialogue too, but whoever goes into this film expecting something else...well, it's their fault.

These complaints aside, this is a pretty serviceable flick, somewhat in the vein of The 13th Warrior which I enjoyed as well. The action, when there is some, is pretty well done. Sophia Miles delivers nice eye candy and Caviziel as well as Jack Huston do well in the action parts. There's surprisingly lots of well-done blood 'n gore for a flick like this, so I definitely expect an R-rating when it's out. The movie's somewhat of a mixture of Reign of Fire, Predator and Pathfinder. It comes with its usual clichés (especially regarding the ending) and pitfalls, but also with a lot of fun, humor and action to boot. I admit that during the 114-minutes running time I wasn't bored once and found the main action scene actually to be exciting.