Draug (2018) User Reviews

I was a bit confused.

[midnightmosesuk · 6/10 · 3 February 2020]

I'll admit that I'm not sharpest knife in the cutlery draw but, then again, I'm not exactly stupid either. That being said, I was lost when the end to this film eventually came into view. I think it was the last 20-30 minutes where I started to realise that I had very little idea of what exactly was going on. I'm still wondering now.

The locations are suitably bleak and moody and the acting was good. The film was a mystery tour, I enjoyed the journey, but I have no idea where it was we ended up.

I am a sucker for Swedish film but...

[airsnob-18715 · 5/10 · 4 November 2019]

Have you ever watched an Asian film that wasn't meant to be marketed to English audiences , and you thought it was edited really badly because stuff just didn't make sense or wasn't explained enough? And it jumped from scene to scene without so much as a story to propel it? Yeah sort of what happens here although I'm 100% sure it makes way more sense to a Swede. Something does get lost in translation. And it wouldn't matter so much except that the entire story line - this happens to. Yeah in the end it makes sense , but getting there is difficult and it is such a good movie in other respects that you really want this movie to tell the entire story and you want the explanation. You want the back story. You want it all to come together clean. This movie could have been one of the best indie movies of this genre - if it had done that. But instead it has characters that don't make too much sense ( why are they there and why does it matter and how do they connect to this?) and you have a loose at best story..... that for English listeners doesn't make sense- a story about an old lady who got buried and they had to cut her head off. A girl who enters your body- and takes over .... but it's the old ladies curse. But then - that's not the story. Actually at the very end - there was a homestead. And they cursed the land. Ok.... but so much could have been cool there that was wasted .... and I'm not sure if it was the translation or a bad script or just culturally implications that I missed - is it worth a rental? Sure. Is it mind blowing ? No. Seemingly up to standard production value also. Not a B film.

Not terrible, but flawed, slow, and hard to believe. Just your run of the mill Swedish zombie movie

[Mike_T-Little_Mtn_Sound_Archive · 4/10 · 13 January 2020]

I LOVE Nordic films that deal with actual lore. Doesn't matter whether it's Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish, Icelandic...I enjoy them all. Especially when they're in the native language. I won't offer a synopsis, as the summary tells you what you need to know.

The positive:

• some really beautiful scenery, as nearly the entire film takes place in some pretty remote, wooded areas
• interesting story. Certainly nothing prophetic, but falls in line with historical dealings
• some interesting sound fx and scoring (see negatives)
• film quality and sound were pretty darn good considering

The negatives:

• the acting is only "okay." There are several parts when it is questionable at best, which affects believability, flow of the film, and overall character personae.
• the special effects are not good. While there is not a ton of blood, CGI is used for the majority of larger wounds or battle pieces, and it's just not good.
• one of the believability issues I overlooked the least was the costuming. Every single person wore clothes that not only had NO DIRT or stains, but appeared brand new. Even the travelers. It goes without saying that living the 11th century, especially in areas that were not yet developed in to cities, was extremely dirty. These people walked around with brand new looking colorful clothes & leather, brushed hair, visible makeup, and perfectly white teeth. This problem is not unique to the film, but really stuck out, and for some reason really bothered me.
• overall production of the film. As mentioned, there is some stunning scenery, but the direction and acting was inconsistent and lacked a cohesive flow. Use of filters was actually a bit overused for my taste. It's standard fare for many Nordic or Scandanavian films to be shot using dark or bleak filters, and often times really adds to the ambience of the project. This is also true with the Draug, but at times it felt overused and saturated.
• the music and sound Fx were not consistent. At times it was not bad, but at other times it was flat-out annoying. It's actually difficult to refer to the accompaniment as a "score," as there is no thematic music, but only a series of sounds assembled in a way that has musical qualities. Otherwise, it's just a mishmash of orchestrated sounds in order to provide tension. It's not until the very end that actual melody is heard. I'm fine with no musical score, but sometimes it got plain annoying.
• there is very little violence, no real gore of any kind, and limited intense scenes. If it wasn't one thematic element being present (that of "zombies") I wouldn't call this a horror movie at all.
• the ending

I dunno...I wanted to like this sooooooo bad, but it just didn't happen. Like I said initially, it's not a terrible film, but it lacks significantly in nearly every aspect. I probably would NOT recommend watching it unless you are a) Swedish & in to dark movies (both in color and thematic material), and b) dying to watch a Swedish movie.

Flawed but watchable

[danielkarlsson-59736 · 5/10 · 10 September 2022]

The Good: The plot is fairly straightforward and makes for good horror/mystery.

Sets and surroundings are very good. The use of Swedish summer wilderness saves a lot of money and provides a suitable mood.

FX are servicable, but only barely so.

The Bad: Suffers from a lot of problems with pacing The use of filters to simulate night time/darkness is a bit overdone.

The actors tend to overact, as is often the case with Swedish actors in my experience.

A little bit more exposition would have made things easier to follow.

Summary: All in all it is, as is so often the case with low-budget productions, a film of unused potential.

Still, the effort was valiant and the choice of topics was comparatively inventive.

Expect no masterpiece because this is not it. Nonetheless, if you're into (late) viking era stuff and horror and norse mythlogy, it can provide you with some entertainment.

Utter garbage

[asylum5000 · 2/10 · 16 October 2019]

The set design and the locations are very good but the acting and the story is absolutely terrible. It's rare I dont finish the film and i had only 10 mins left

Very well executed with the means at their disposal

[kristinaohrman · 7/10 · 13 December 2019]

An entertaining film that was quite a bit scary in parts. The ending was a twist, but not a good one. If you like Vikings and Scandinavian lore you will enjoy this film. Would like to see a film with a good budget from the same directors!

Reviewers need to finally let go of the fear to admit that a movie confused them.

[fedor8 · 8 September 2020]

Good soundtrack and visually very solid, but confusing. Especially the last third leaves a lot of questions unanswered. Instead of answers, or at least hints, there is vague imagery, "clues" of what happened in the past - as weak substitutes for an actual story. Certainly the characters didn't tell us much, only vague things here and there, i.e. mutually distant dots that we're somehow supposed to connect into a comprehensive story. We, however, are neither witches nor magicians.

All I understood is that the girl Nanna is the one that was supposedly killed by Hakon, and that she went back to her place of origin. What she knew, how much she "felt" she knew", whose side she was on, whether she became a ghost or had been one, what she has to do with the zombies, who the zombies are - none of these things are answerable. Whoever claims that they are needs to let go of their glue supplies.

Some of the action in that last section is unclear; who is doing where and what to whom. So the direction is a bit sloppy in that sense too. The "conclusion" is basically just a bunch of scenes strung together, not much better than randomly.

I suppose 99% of the audiences won't understand what the hell went on exactly, and I'm one of them. (The other 1% buy glue regularly.) Perhaps it's one of those "you need to be acquainted with the folklore" things, but there's no way in hell this, or any other, movie will get me to study Wikipedia pages on Scandinavian witches or whatever. Anyway, even a vast knowledge in Swedish folklore can't possibly explain some of the plot holes. But if the movie really was made solely for the 150 Swedes who know this stuff, then the movie needs to suffer the consequences of such misjudgment.

In fact, the pre-supernatural part of the movie was better, which is kind of unusual. It is not a great movie by any stretch of the imagination, but it was refreshing with its different setting and approach. As much as I'm not a big fan of "historical" films. The female lead is very average-looking and fairly boring.

On the road again

[kosmasp · 7/10 · 15 March 2021]

Anything that can be tagged with a Vikings label, will be tagged as a Vikings inspired movie. The tv show had a lot to do with that. But this is more mystical, rather than anything else. You have a group of people, who have the strangest encounter ... and one that is not from this world.

Not that the group does recognize that danger. Rather denies it partially to say the least. But for a low budget movie, the effects are good, the costumes are fine and the acting is good too. This may not be enough to make you happy, but for anyone who loves a movie with a few flaws that tries to go above and beyond with some mythical and mystical notions ... this will be enough

A complete summary and review. Hopefully to clear up the confusion some are having about this film.

[havenceles · 8/10 · 6 February 2021]

I've noticed quite a bit of confusion about this film and what was going on. First I am going to touch on the film itself. It's beautifully shot and the acting is great. It stays very truthful to the time period it was based in and with folklore. I found it to be a very good and entertaining watch.

Now on to where people are getting confused. I hope this clears things up for those that are feeling completely lost with the last part of the film. I will now break down the entire movie and hopefully explain what happened and why for all of those that are confused.

Complete and total spoilers ahead:

Definition of "Draugr" - From Wikipedia - The draugr or draug is an undead creature from the Scandinavian saga literature and folktale. Commentators extend theterm draugr to the undead in medieval literature, even if it is never explicitly referred to as that in the text, and designated them rather as a haugbúi or an aptrganga, literally "again-walker"

This story takes place in a time when Christianity was beginning to sweep through Scandanavia. When this happened, a purging of "pagan" traditions began, and those that started to follow the Christian faith tended to handle their pagan neighbors with a very heavy hand.

Two of the main characters, Kettil and Hakon, were part of this purging. They had in their past taken a local witch and her husband, hung them and then burned the bodies. After which they discovered their child, Nanna. Instead of killing her, Hakon took her on as his foster daughter and raised her in the Christian faith. During these years Nanna has "visions" which are actually flashbacks to when she was a child and to her family before they were murdered.

Fast forward about 18 years (this is an educated guess as they don't actually give a time reference in the movie). A friend of Hakon and Kettil disappears in a local forest while escorting a Christian missionary. This is the same forest where Nanna's family had lived and were killed. The locals shun part of this forest because they believe that it is cursed and that an evil lives within in it. Hakon, Kettil and Nanna get a group together and travel to this forest in search of the missing group. Here they areambushed and they make a run into the area that is known to be cursed.

This is where they encounter the Draugr. The Draugr are the result of a blood curse that was created when Nanna's family was murdered. As the story develops Nanna begins to remember more from her childhood including a ritual that her mother performed and where she kept her magickal tools. During this time Kettil is convinced that Nanna has to die in order for the curse to end and tries killing her only to fail and become a prisoner to Nanna and their remaining two companions.

Nanna performs the ritual she remembers which brings her consciousness into Hel where she then learns about the blood curse and realizes that to make it end that she must kill Kettil as he is the last of the ones that murdered her family. Before she regains consciousness, the Draugr attack again. An unconscious Nanna is carried to the boat that was found by the remains of her families cabin, where Kettil and Kol jump into the boat and try to escape as their last companion is killed by the Draugr.

Just as Nanna begins to awaken, Kettil knocks Kol unconscious with the boat oar and attacks Nanna. The two fight it out, ending up in the river and being swept downstream. Upon reaching the shore, Nanna realizes that she has no chance of killing Kettil while she is still alive and shackles herself to him. Before he can strangle her to death, she throws the key into the river. The act being witnessed by the Draugr of her sister (I believe it's her sister anyway. It's another child, but they don't make it clear as to who she is exactly). As the life leaves her body, Kettil believes he has ended the curse by killing her, only to look up to find that she is now a Draugr and is there to kill him, thus ending the curse.

Kol awakens, alone, in the the now swamped boat. He slowly rises and looks around, instinctively knowing that the forest is different. It's brighter, clearer and the look/feeling of dread is gone. He then swims to shore. The End.

So she let herself die because she knew that is what she had to do in order to kill Kettil. Thus bringing an end the curse for her family and to finally allow their souls to rest in peace.

Fear of caves before? Well add "zombie" vikings in the mix..

[zyrial · 7/10 · 13 December 2019]

The movie starts of slow and the acting is poor, but after a while it picks up. The end could have been better and so could the acting from "Nanna" but overall its a fine movie and I enjoyed watching it!

Great atmospheric spooky Swedish horror

[chilversedward · 8/10 · 4 October 2019]

Although I got the impression the budget may have been tight, the makers of this film got everything out of it. The atmosphere of the forest was dark and the sense of foreboding it lent went along way towards making the movies low budget work well. The acting was good and the fact I knew none of them seemed to make it better. I was happy to stumble upon this film and would recommend it as a good watch if you like horror/supernatural films.

This hit everything almost perfectly

[pryorla · 9/10 · 12 November 2019]

It is the story of an area in 11th century Sweden which had been converted to christianity and where some local folks had been too hard on some of the pagan remnants. When a missionary disappears in this forested area, a village deputy gets a "posse" together to go onto the forest to retrieve him and his companions. The searchers are attacked by bandits at the edge of the forest and then, as they get further in, they are attacked by something else. These are the Draug.

As a historical movie it is very accurate; nothing anachronistic to distract in the dialogue, costuming, or sets. The acting was very good and the scenery was exceptional. Both used to advantage in telling a spooky story based on Norse mythical creatures. We loved it

If you understand the lore, you will love this movie.

[donancricchiasaverio · 10/10 · 15 November 2019]

As a practicing Heathen, I loved the accuracy of this movie. Outside of it being a horror movie with a revenge undertone, it depicts the goddess Hel, Niphelheim, The Seidr, and the Runes accurately. Most Americans won't like this film cause they don't understand the lore or pagan practices, but if you do, you can appreciate it.

Enjoyed it

[johannamuller · 8/10 · 25 August 2020]

As a huge fan of Scandanavian lore, I really enjoyed this film.

Great fun

[sonofgondolin · 8/10 · 6 January 2020]

The historical authenticity they gave this film was great and lent a hand in shaping the horror. The actors were well chosen and I enjoyed their characters. The special effects were not AAA but it got the point across and was done in such a way you would have to really scrutinize scenes to notice. So watch this film and enjoy a good time period horror movie.