Valhalla Rising blindsided me like a out-of-control Mac truck plowing through a crowded cafe. It’s that good. A brutal yet beautifully elegiac ode to the death of paganism and the rise of a new and equally violent faith, Valhalla Rising is a a sad, mournful film that takes no joy in its relentless violence. Nicolas Winding Refn’s punch to the gut follow-up to his masterful Bronson does not harbor one gratuitous scene. Valhalla Rising is so stripped of any romanticism that I could only stumble out of its presence in a punch-drunk melancholy, much in the same way I reacted to No Country For Old Men. Indeed, this Viking tale of horror and treachery could very well be a prequel of sorts to that film, as they certainly touch upon similar themes. A dismal tide, indeed.

The opening scene is all business. Our unnamed mute “hero” One Eye (Mads Mikkelsen, who does the Man with No Name routine with undeniable panache) is fighting for his life. In the blistery hills of Scandinavia, One Eye is tied to a post and forced to fight warriors so his captors can place wagers. It’s all very well he’s tied to the post, as his day job has transformed him into a feral beast who only knows survival. But One Eye is not resigned to his fate. He intends to escape, and escape he does in a singularly gruesome and efficient manner. If you’re looking for some balls to wall medieval combat, Valhalla Rising is your movie.

One Eye and his sidekick kid (a surprisingly charming Maarten Stevenson, acting as One Eye’s voice) set off for their life of freedom, and run into Eirik (a superb Ewan Stewart), who is leading a group of Crusaders hell bent on finding salvation, glory, and riches in Jerusalem. The sheer absurdity of Vikings traveling to the Holy Land for God knows what is the perfect frame for this film. Valhalla Rising does not bandy in common sense or compassion; there is only forward movement, violence, and madness. Eirik and his merry band represent the old school version of Christianity, which involves slaughtering infidels who would dare defy the Prince of Peace. But to One Eye, it’s all the same: They’re all bloody men in a bloody world, and which god you pray to is beside the point.

Valhalla Rising is divided into six chapters that are not only signposts guiding you to the Heart of Darkness. They represent the logical flow of theology and fanaticism, and perhaps what lies in store for the Viking people. The psychedelic sequences and occasional hallucinations blend smoothly. The film skillfully blurs the dream state and reality until they are one. One Eye and his companions do reach a Holy Land of sorts, and you could say everyone found what they were looking for.

Every performance in this film is powerful and rings true, to the resigned glare of One Eye to the grinning madness of Eirik. Walter Chaw suggests that One Eye harkens to Aguirre Wrath of God, but I say One Eye dives even deeper into our dark hearts, beyond avarice and religion. Whatever trappings you put on life, there is a primordial stew within all of us that makes any belief we harbor senseless and self-deluding. Christians are blasphemous heathens who eat their God, not out of reverence, but to create a simulacrum of life’s true nature. One Eye is these Crusaders’ Lord, and so the last chapter is aptly named Sacrifice. See Valhalla Rising with someone you love.

Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans is a loaded movie. With mad director Werner Herzog and King of Camp Nicolas Cage involved, it’s impossible to dive into this film without certain expectations. For all that, Bad Lieutenant is a surprisingly stately, straightforward film, all things considered. Herzog’s grand experiment this time is not only creating a police procedural, but making a straight-to-video sequel/remake that is NOT a straight-to-video flick sequel/remake, a cinematic conundrum to aggravate and torment critics. (Herzog has stated his film bore no relation to Abel Ferrara’s 1992 classic with Harvey Keitel, but who are we fucking kidding?)

This Bad Lieutenant follows the trials and tribulations of newly minted Lieutenant Terrance McDonagh (an unhinged Cage, so it’s par for the course), a coked-up, relentlessly corrupt cop who robs people of their drugs, helps himself to the goodies in the police evidence room, and has a prostitute for a girlfriend. (the lovely and affectionate Eve Mendes, who revels in Terrance’s drugged up existence). As in all his films, Cage is either about to explode, exploding, or drifting in a dazed zombie-esque shuffle. Herzog uses the Three Faces of Cage to full effect; The Bad Lieutenant careens about with Cage’s manic-depressive moods to the point that the hallucinations (one involving iguanas, another a breakdancing soul) are merely afterthoughts. He also smokes his crack in a “lucky crack pipe.” Lieutenant McDonagh a bona fide piece of work.

Terrance is investigating a massacre of a Senegalese family of illegal immigrants. His investigation leads him to track down a drug dealer named Big Fate (a cool and professional Xzibit), who has two cohorts named “Midget” and “G”. (Terrance never fails to guffaw and smirk at the unoriginality of the latter street name). Terrance’s investigative methods can be rather brutal; he pulls out the tubes from an old woman’s ventilator so her caretaker will reveal the whereabouts of a witness. After he gets the information he needs, he tells the two women, “You drop dead you selfish cunt. You ever think about your kids? Your grandkids? Suck it up their inheritance through that oxygen tube? And Bennie’s fucking intensive care. I hate you, I hate you both. Right now, I should’ve fucking kill you. You’re the fucking reason this country going down to drain.”

Ironically, Terrance’s rough treatment of the women gets him demoted to clerking the evidence room, which is the last place you’d want to place this drug-addled cop. Pissed off that the police department had the gall to demote him, Terrance decides to team up with Big Faith so he raise money to pay off his mounting gambling debts. Terrance teaming up with the man responsible for the massacre of the Senegalese family completes his arc of the Anti-hero. Terrance and Big Faith nonchalantly discuss waterside real estate as Big Faith’s cohorts dump a body into the bay.

The film is filled with those incomparable Herzogian touches, such as wonderful scene involving a crocodile’s eye view of a car accident. And comparisons between Cage and Klaus Kinski are inevitable. Herzog has perhaps found the man that can match Kinski’s frantic madness, and Cage does well with the bizarre lines and the mounting absurdity of the film. Herzog also makes oblique reference to the violent, chaotic nature of American culture, draping the background of one scene with enormous wide-screens of American sports.

Cage carries the whole film, naturally, and he finally becomes the “Chemical Superfreak” he once claimed to be. Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans is a fine film, and fairly accessible as far as Herzog films go. Care for a bump?