Review of Troll (2022)

Moving picture, 101 minutes

Seen in 2024.

This is not the Norwegian Godzilla (1954) I was hoping for. The pickup-truck chase sequence is an effective spectacle, but the other sequences are not, and there is nothing else here. Whereas the original Godzilla had a symbolic level, all of the symbolic threads of Troll and all of its Todorovian-marvelous games of doubt and faith are weak, not to mention the acting and the Wilhelm screams. This is a shame, because the Norwegian petroleum industry of 2022 was a real-world “Omelas” (1973) and Roar Uthaug just ignored it as a source of kaijū hamartia.

moving picture fiction