Troll Hunter

That's no Bjørn at all!

"You'll believe it when you see it!"

Hello everyone! Welcome back all you Tagline readers! Today I'm going to talk about another Netflix movie today, one that I've been meaning to watch for a long time, but hadn't gotten around to. That movie is Troll Hunter, and it is more or less exactly what it sounds like. As has been so popular to do, the movie is filmed in a "found footage" style, following three college students as they attempt to interview a man they believe to be a bear poacher. Of course, this man is not, in fact, hunting bears, nor is he a poacher. Instead we discover that he is hunting trolls, and that he is in the employ of the government. Through the experiences of the would be film makers we discover that Norway has all kinds of trolls in it, some of them very large. They normally keep to themselves, but for some reason the trolls are getting restless, and so Hans (the hunter) has had his hands full hunting the errant ones. You see some trolls are relatively small. Others are... quite large. Like giant large. Bigger than trees even.

The intrepid crew of troll hunters.

The movie also tells us a little bit about the trolls. For instance, following the tradition of Norwegian folklore, the trolls are divided up between mountain and woodland trolls, and then from there further divided into subspecies. The movie describes the trolls as being a mammalian race, and also makes a cursory pass at explaining some of their more bizarre traits, such as their tendency to grow extra heads, and to turn to stone/explode when they're exposed to sunlight or intense UV rays. Also following folklore, the trolls often eat rocks, but enjoy meat and can eat people, and can smell the blood of Christians (which is relevant to the plot and also very amusing when it comes up). As you would expect if you have any experience with troll lore, the trolls are depicted generally as big and strong, but also slow and extremely dumb. Also really gross. 

He uses Christian blood and 3 goats to lure this troll out
from under its bridge.

While certain aspects of the movie are horrific, and there is certainly the potential for some scares, the movie is more darkly humorous than anything else. I wasn't aware of it at the time, but apparently a number of the actors in the film are known Norwegian comedians, which no doubt changes the tone of scenes they are in. Even without special knowledge of Norway or its actors however, there are still ample humorous elements to appreciate. The ridiculous, flimsy manner in which the Norwegian government covers up scenes of troll attacks is pretty good for starters (they blame it all on bears, and use makeshift bear footprint makers to try and make it look authentic. Hans' matter-of-fact, weary attitude towards his job, his irritation towards the Norwegian bureaucracy, and how he has to fill out an elaborate form every time he kills a troll. Add on to this the goofy, fairy tale like appearance of the trolls, and the UV gun Hans uses to hunt them, and what you have is a darkly funny movie about a guy who is just sick of being paid crap to hunt trolls.

I just hate it when trolls knock over my car.

So is it worth your time? Absolutely! I can heartily recommend this movie to anyone who enjoys movies from the fantasy genre, or even horror movies, though as I mentioned before it is lighter on horror than it is on comedy, though admittedly a dark kind of humor. The movie naturally requires a tolerance for subtitles as it is a foreign language film (I mean unless you speak Norwegian in which case congratulations! You won't need to read the subtitles I guess) but other than that it is definitely the kind of movie that you can relax and enjoy. It isn't too stressful (like some more serious horror) and it isn't a super thoughtful movie, allowing you to just kind of enjoy the ride. Sometimes that's just what you want.

That's it for today! Join me again next week for possibly the Wolverine?