Another’s description of this as a ‘bipolar New World’ is not inaccurate. Possessing little dialogue, but it doesn’t need words at the start – evocatively photographed on-location, sonically piercing a meditation on the age of the barbarian, with the formidable Mikkelsen being but the brooding face of this. Between these introductory and also climactic scenes, however, it otherwise descends into a merely meandering, Crusade-based allegory, neither really convincing in its philosophy nor as a stylistic piece, lacking much cogency – all the more clear in light of Refn’s conversely triumphant Drive, or even Malick’s majestic aforementioned exploration. Perceivably little more than sophomoric as a consequence.