Violent motion picture about a brutal army of warriors invading Scandinavia . This is the first and classic version well directed by Nils Gaup in 1988, winning several prizes. Circa the year 1000 AD warlike people, the so-called "tjudes," roam in a strange land , in northern Scandinavia . There a boy , Aigin : Mikkel Gaup , living with his native family , is hunting . But merciless, ambitious and cruel barbarians suddenly appear and they are cruelly murdered . The starring observes the massacre from a distance and he manages to flee these murderers and reaches a village with other Natives whose inhabitants are worried if he has been able to hide his leads. Afraid of the violent savage warriors , they decide to flee to the coast . Meanwhile , the protagonist falls in love with a charming Native. The young stays alone to revenge his families killers but he gets captured by the invading people . Unfortunately , they get him before he can do anything and force him to lead them to the other natives , threatening to kill a friend , when Aigin sees this he dashes forward, and says he will guide them . He guides them and agrees to lead to the hiding place of his fellow villagers but he has a scheme to destroy the cutthroats barbarians before reach the camp.It's the first version based on ancient folk-tale from Lapland, this classy adaptation is an exciting picture plenty of action, thrills, chills, roller-coaster ride, violence and breathtaking fights . The plot is plain and simple , some violent stranger warriors capture a young man and they want him to guide them to the coast, and start torturing him , then , things go wrong . As the intelligent starring , Mikkel Gaup , will fight for his freedom and his people as well as he'll take off a nasty villain , performed by Helgi Skúlason who doesn't say a word the entire film . The brutal invaders dresssed in black pelts deliver the goods, their appearance is spectacular and creepy . Furthermore , the astonishing killings are gruesome executed and grisly graphic. The atmospheric photography by Erling Andersen with a sort of never-ending dawn is truly awesome. It's a kind of light mingled in a moody and foggy atmosphere. Stirring and evocative musical score by three Scandinavian composers . Stunning and gripping realization by Nils Gaup . He was born in 1955 in Kautokeino, Norway. Gaup is a director and actor, who has made a few but acceptable films , being especially known for Pathfinder (1987), , Misery harbour (1989) , Above Water (1993) , North star (1996) , Journey to the Christmas Star (2012) and The last King (2017) . Gaup turned down offers to direct No without my daughter (1991) with Sally Field, RoboCop (1987) and many others. He began to direct Waterworld (1995), but he thought the budget was blown up and the project too difficult to handle.It had a remake titled ¨Pathfinder¨ in 2007 by Marcus Nispel. It stars Karl Urban, Clancy Brown, and special mention to Russell Means , he was born Lakota Sioux, a good actor Native American, he along with Graham Greene, Rodney A Grant, Tantoo cardinal, Eric Schweitz and Wes Studi appear in all movies about Indian themes and it deals with a viking child raised by Native Americans, to take on the invaders Vikings .

The villains were looking for nothing other than some prime sami villages to plunder. However, they didn't take into account the Steven Segal of the North. He managed to out run them on one ski, and this made the maniac leader of the tsjude bad men really annoyed. I think his face would scare anyone half to death.So in between this and the end, we see that the samis are a spiritual folk, with great respect for nature. They are starved, and have to kill a bear to get through winter. The man who killed him, gets a magical aura around himself, and his tribe mates can look at him only through a metal ring.By now, the villains, are interested in getting to the large sami sijdda (village) by the coast. However, they have no GPS system, so the steven segal-sami-man offers to show them the way. His girlfriend waits for him at the coast, but she does not believe that he is a traitor. But can she know for sure? The climax scene involves no violence, in stead we get a huge avalanche killing all the raiders, leaving them buried under tons of ice, snow and rock. And Steven Segal was the man who led them into it. He sacrificed his life so that the other samis could live.In the dying moments of the film, as the samis ponder the great sacrifice a creature moves outside the lavvo, and the young, handsome ofelas (pathfinder) enters. The girl smiles.

The first time I saw this film was in the early Nineties on Spanish TV, and I absolutely loved it. It took many years before I got a video copy that I still have, but in recent years I never could find it in DVD here in Britain, which is a shame. I understand that the film was not widely released in cinemas in its time and remains mostly unknown to the general public, which is another shame. "Ofelas" is remarkable for its use of locations, the cinematography and the neat ambiance sounds that fill each shot, making it a real treat to the spectator who almost can feel the snow crunching under his feet and the icy cold air blowing in his face. The Norwegians made a beautiful film that surpasses in storytelling and historical detail Hollywood blockbusters such as "White Fang" or "Robin Hood" (Kevin Costner), made with multi-million budgets and big stars and enjoying expensive publicity campaigns. Mikkel Gaupp is excellent on his role. Both his boyish looks and the naiveté of the character at the beginning of the story make his performance solidly credible as a nobody turned overnight into a hero for his own survival. He weeps when seeing the carnage of his family, then panics when discovered by the killers and then runs desperately for his life without performing any astonishing stunts with the special effects that we have seen so often in Hollywood movies with similar plots. In 82 minutes we get a story that is poetic and full of action and suspense. And a breathtaking catalogue of views of real Lapland, with the Aurora Borealis included, instead of a studio fake with synthetic snow and background shots or plain CGI crap.

This movie was remade in 2006 as "Pathfinder" in America. I watched this movie before I rented the remake. The director from the original intended to shoot the movie on 65mm, but didn't have the money to do so. So he did three blow-ups on 70mm of the film. One of these copies was shown in Karlsruhe and I watched it! I can only recommend to watch it that way! The story is quite simple and can be read here at IMDb. What is quite amazing is the complex story/character arc of the main person. Of course there are still some flaws in the storytelling and the usual holes in the plot ... or that's how you could interpret them. Because those flaws (maybe they are more character flaws?) are pushing this movie into another level (imo). Just don't expect (Hollywood) Blockbuster action here ...