The 13th Warrior

Could the previews be more exciting? I love Enigma's music anyway, but the trailers for this put it to fantastic use. And they knew exactly which scenes to put into the ads to get you all hyped for it. Originally this was supposed to open on Friday, August 13th. You'd think they could have done a little more with it in the extra couple of weeks they took...
The premise of the movie is great: in a Saudi-style country, an Islamic poet is banished for lusting after the Sultan's wife. Through happenstance, he encounters an encampment of Vikings (in Saudi?) and is "volunteered" for a suicide mission to fight demons which are demolishing a kingdom in the land of the Norse warriors. He makes the trek overland, learning Norwegian along the way (I didn't realize they spoke it anywhere but Minnesota!) and attempting to teach the leader how to read and write Arabic. When they arrive, they are immediately tested by the mysterious horde and begin to drop like flies. Eventually, they learn the foes are actually men and chase the legions back to their home lair. The movie ends just after a final battle scene and is more than a little anti-climactic in many ways.
There are some good battle scenes in this flick, and the cinematography is fine, but some of the plot is sketchy like it was thrown in as a feeble excuse to change the direction of the story line. Its best value is either as a good campaign idea for role playing gamers or as a fantasy movie with a semi-somber area that fits snugly between the attitudes of the Conan movies.
I would recommend this be a matinee or a cheap theatre movie, and don't forget to leave some of your common sense behind so you can forget some of the worse plot points.

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