Review #310: 'Troll Hunter' (2010)

Despite the fact that The Blair Witch Project (1999) was made over 10 years ago, the "found footage" style film making is still used (and is possibly moving towards overuse). Of course this is not completely new. In 1980 Cannibal Holocaust's main narrative drive revolved around the idea of found footage, but this style has evolved slightly, in part due to the change in television production. Only recently there have been several examples of this trend, such as Diary of the Dead (2007), REC (2007), Cloverfield (2008), Paranormal Activity (2007), to name just a few.

So this brings us to Troll Hunter, Andre Ovredal's take on an old Norwegian folk tale of the mythical trolls found in native countryside. The story is very similar to Blair Witch in the sense that the film focuses on a group of students who are making a film. The group track down Hans (Otto Jespersen) who is a lone hunter. After a series of killings (thought to be by bears) in the local area, the group try to follow Hans as he hunts the bears. Obviously Hans turns out to be a government employed troll hunter, working secretly, as the government would like to keep the mythic creatures under wraps.

As previously stated, this film is of the found footage variety, and therefore the camera work is purposefully of an amateur quality. This said, the film works very well, introducing the viewer to the various variety of trolls. The special effects are of a high quality for such a small budgeted film, and some of the performances (Particularly from Otto as the troll hunter) are very suitable to the story. It may well be a fact that this style of film making is becoming over used to the point of nausea, but the film is exciting enough to justify it's pretentions.


Directed by: André Øvredal
Starring: Otto Jespersen, Hans Morten Hansen, Tomas Alf Larsen
Country: Norway

Rating: ***

Marc Ivamy