Uli Edel

Lots of this is unfortunately quite bland, and most of the more exciting or interesting aspects of Cæsar's life are glossed over or ignored entirely to fit his life into two 90 minute episodes, but the miniseries at least does address the pivotal dictatorship of Sulla during Cæsar's youth. It would have been interesting to see the ramifications of this explored in depth both for Cæsar internally and for Roman society externally throughout the story (which is taking such huge liberties show more with actual history in any case, such speculation would certainly not have been a problem), but alas, it is mostly rendered as subtext at best.
All in all a reasonably entertaining miniseries, with a decent pace and impressive visuals, but I suspect it falls between two chairs as it is likely not engaging enough to be likely to win over someone not already interested in the historical figure of Cæsar, and not historically accurate enough to please those audiences already invested. show less

An interesting, if somewhat loose adaptation of “Ring of the Nibelung” saga and the legend of Siegfried and Brunhild. The story incorporates the main story beats from the legend with the young Siegfried (Benno Fürmann) becoming a hero in the Kingdom of Burgundy after slaying the dragon Fafnir and claiming the golden horde and the cursed Ring of the Nibelung. Siegfried is in love the warrior Queen of Iceland, Brunhild (Kristanna Loken), but before the lovers are be reunited the jealous show more Kriemhild (Alicia Witt) tricks Siegfried into drinking a love potion that makes him fall in love with her and forget Brunhild, leading to dark and deadly consequences. I watched this multi-national co-production under the title “Sword of Xanten”, one of the many titles it has gone under. Although there are a number of nice cinematic touches the production retains a made-for-television feel throughout and it is obviously limited by its budget. Director Uli Edel wisely focuses in on the characters rather than delivering an effects spectacular – that said Fafnir is nicely realised and works quite well. The pacing is decent with little time to dwell on particular plot points as the action skips from one dramatic development to the next. Kristanna Loken is beautiful and powerful as Brunhild with Alicia Witt, unfortunately, portraying Kriemhild as overly sappy. Benno Fürmann gives an eccentric, one-dimensional performance as Siegfried, with his inflected accent giving his line-readings an odd air and his overall approach appearing overly detached. For many this will be a poor central performance, but I rather enjoyed the cold, distant oddness of it. Ilan Eshkeri delivers a majestic and heroic score that integrates well with the overall feel of the film. There are many elements in “Sword of Xanten” that are poor and don’t really work, but that said it is a delightfully engaging effort, delivered with a certain sense of style within what is an obviously constrained budget. show less

En klassiker av en film som omhandler narkotikamisbruk og prostitusjon for å finansiere misbruket. En film alle som var ungdommer på 80-tallet har et forhold til.

2018