Asterix and the Vikings (2006)

I have known for a long time that France has its own animation industry, but I'd never seen examples of it before. I chose this movie to be my first look at "Franimation", because I am an Asterix fan - I've read almost all of the books, including the one this movie is based on.

Overall, I was pleased with this movie. First, the animation. While the animation may not quite match Disney theatrical movies, it comes close. The movement is fluid, the colors pop out of the screen, and the backgrounds are detailed.

As for the story, it was overall fine. The movie does follow the book about halfway through, then goes in its own direction. Probably this was a wise decision, because the second half of the book is mostly talk. In this movie, there is more action and slapstick in the second half, and it's more cinematic. The whole story zips along at a good pace and contains plenty of action and laughs.

My one criticism of the movie is that the characters of Asterix and Obelix - the principle characters of the books - become secondary characters here. It seems odd to have Asterix in the title of the movie. One other criticism other viewers might have is that, if they are unfamiliar with the books, some details may be a little puzzling.

Fmovies: After another raid in an empty village, the chief of the Vikings Timandahaf misunderstands the explanation of his adviser Cryptograf that "fear gives wings to the dwellers" and believes that fear actually makes the villagers fly. They decide to chase the champion of fear in Gaul to learn how to fly and make them invincible warriors. Meanwhile, the nephew of Vitalstatistix, Justforkix, is sent from Parisium to the Gaulish village to become a man and Asterix and Obelix are assigned to train the youngster. The stupid son of Cryptograf, Olaf, listens to a conversation of the coward Justforkix with Asterix and Obelix and kidnaps him. While returning to the Viking village, Justforkix meets Abba, the daughter of Timandahaf, and they fall in love for each other. But the Machiavellian and ambitious Cryptograf plan to marry his son Olaf with Abba and become powerful. In the end, Asterix realizes that it is not fear that gives wings, it is love.

When I was a teenager, Asterix was my favorite comic book and I read all the Goscinny and Uderzo stories. This feature film shows all the original elements and humor of the comics in a delicious and wonderful animation. The romance of Justforkix and the gorgeous Abba is delightful and the situations Asterix and Obelix get involved are hilarious. My vote is ten.

Title (Brazil): "Astérix e os Vikings" ("Astérix and the Vikings")

This film is a perfect example that a movie can not be successful with a high budget alone. It's obvious that there was a lot of time and effort dedicated into this: the animation is fluid, detailed and superb- the soundtrack isn't too memorable except for the ending song by Celine Dion (at least I think it was her). The musical score is powerful full orchestra material. Kudos to the animators and music composers! 9/10. However, the story and characters fall flat. It feels very 'been there, done that', predictable and plain uninteresting. The characters have distinct personalities but nothing too likable. They annoyed me to no end. I tried really hard to like this, but I didn't care about the story- it was cliché action-adventure plot. There were 'jokes' that weren't funny. It was vomit inducing predictable from start to end. The dialogue was cliché and awful- especially the last line "It's not ... that gives you wings, it's love!" Whatever it was, I remember cringing. I was wishing it would hurry up and finish. I wasn't the only one either- the people I went with thought it was boring. Please watch the Asterix and Obelix Cleopatra film if you're going to watch any. This was a waste of time.

Asterix and the Vikings fmovies. Having been a faithful Asterix fan all of my life, I have to say that "Asterix and the Vikings" is probably the most well done of all the Asterix films. Its got some very funny jokes in it and the animation is superb. As many people have pointed out, it doesn't really follow the plot of the comic ("Asterix and the Normans") very closely, but in many ways that's just as well, because that book stands out in my mind as one which poked a great deal of fun at the culture of the sixties, and much of it is very dated today.

What really rubbed me the wrong way, though, is how they incorporated a Disney-style plot into the film which took much of the focus away from Asterix and Obelix. We have a misunderstood boy who doesn't fit in, Justforkix. We have a tom-boy girl who doesn't fit in because she wants to be treated as equal to men, Abba. They meet and fall in love, but their love is threatened because boy is ashamed to be totally honest with girl, but in the end their love wins out. This has been the plot of so many Disney (and, be fair, other studios too) films that its not funny and the plot was old twenty years ago. I mean, they even gave Justforkix a whimsical animal sidekick.

Not only did I find this derivative and clichéd, but it really detracted from the story and left me dissatisfied.

I think that it speaks volumes about how superb the rest of the movie was that I still think very highly of it, despite the way the plot got hijacked.

I think it's the first time that I go inside a theater and go out so disappointed. There were two reasons why I went to see "Astérix et les Vikings": first as a film buff, and second as a big Astérix fan.

In the end, the film doesn't satisfy any request. It's simply a big animated mess and it proves that the Astérix franchise is going from bad to worse.

In fact, it has been this way since the death of first scenarist René Goscinny in 1977. His faithful collaborator, illustrator Albert Uderzo took his place, but the following books were clearly lacking of the quality that was present during the Goscinny years.

"Astérix et les Vikings" is based on the book "Astérix et les Normands", which was published during the Goscinny reign. The basic story is the same: Goudurix, Abraracourcix' nephew' arrives to the village and Astérix et Obélix must turn him into a real man, while the Vikings come to Gaul in order to discover what fear is, because it seems that fear gives wings.

The similarities end here. What follows in the book is a non-stop series of laughs, gags and hilarious dialog with the result that the Vikings do discover fear and they flee Gaul. The movie is silly, unfunny, fast-paced, corny... Well, just name a default and it has good chances of being applied...

The difference between the book and the movie could be more acceptable if the movie was good. But the new ideas simply crashes it in a bottomless pit. Even older Astérix movies such as "Astérix le Gaulois", which almost transferred the lines one by one without changing them are easily better.

Animation has the quality of other 21st century movies, but it has its faults and any film beginner could find the mistakes. The greatest example is the continuity mistake, where the day follows the night after a fraction of second, in the same sequence.

Imagine. They took animation studios from numerous countries and they still can't get adequate film-making.

The changes of the original story are simply unbearable. And they still could be even if there was no original story. Goudurix, in the movie, has a pet pigeon named SMS and who act as his cell phone (!). Grossebaf, the Viking chief, has a rebellious teen daughter named Abba (!) and she constantly defies her father's authority. There's also a stupid Viking wizard, his cartoonish dumb and muscular son, the faithful bride of Grossebaf who is obsessed with decoration (her name is Vikea!) and... well I can't stand that much longer.

We're far from the original gags from the original book. The biggest problem is the difficulty of transferring the images to the big screen, mainly because the greatest laughs in the books come from the verbal jokes and visual gags which do not have the same appeal on a theatre screen. I remember that the greatest moments in the book were Obélix laughing at the invaders' names (which all finish in 'af') and Goudurix tries to scare them in ridiculous ways.

And if everything wasn't enough, somebody in the publicity staff decided to write on the movie poster that there's an already existing Céline Dion song which would be featured in the final credits. If it was a new song, I could have understood. But using an old song is only another proof that the movie is so badly made that they're ready to do anything in order to attract film-goers.

The only good point for this movie is that it is so stupid and the

Based on Goscinny/Uderzo's "Astérix et les Normands" published in 1967, this movie roughly follows the plot of the cartoon book,but it introduces new characters :Grossebaf's daughter,Abba (a good innovation) ,a wicked viking and his muscle man half-wit offspring,and Goudurix's father.Another significant difference is that the album was called "Astérix ET (=and) Les Normands" and the heroes did not leave their village .Half of the flick takes place in the Vikings'land.The part of the bard ,Assurancetourix,which was prominent in the album , is reduced to the bare minimum,although it's finally he who...

It's pleasant to watch ,but it lacks the puns,the anachronisms,the word games ,in a nutshell,it lacks the magic the albums would bring when we used to read them in the sixties (the best Asterix albums were made in the sixties and early seventies) But the biggest mistake is the music:"eye of the tiger' is bad taste in that context ;the rest of the score is fake disco/funk and the last song and its "moral" so unbearable it's an insult to Goscinny's extraordinary sense of humor!Sorry but Elton John did much better with his "lion king" music.