CERT: 15 / PLATFORM: DIGITAL, DVD /  RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

Norwegian director André Øvredal has been impressing mainstream audiences with movies such as Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, though STARBURST readers will remember him from the 2010 cult-smash Trollhunter, which took Norwegian mythology and dragged it into the modern era.

Mortal is a return to form for Øvredal. This is a story set in Norway that leans heavily on the old myths and beliefs for its inspiration. The plot revolves around Eric (Nat Wolff) a young American whose holiday to Scandinavia has ended in disaster. We find Eric homeless and afraid, following a house fire of which he is the sole survivor. Every time Eric is in danger, strange phenomena occurs and tragedy follows.

Eric is arrested and ends up bonding with psychologist Christine (Iben Akerlie), and the pair attempt to figure out where Eric’s power is coming from, whilst evading the authorities as well as a shadowy American agency. This is a supernatural horror thriller, similar in style to The Omen or The Medusa Touch, but dressed up a gritty superhero story such as Brightburn or Chronicle.

Mortal’s main issue is its central character. Eric spends so much of his time yelling, screaming and curling up into a ball that it becomes hard to empathise with him. Wolff does such a good job of playing an out-of-his-depth weirdo that we don’t care too much about him. It also suffers from Trollhunter‘s problem in that the conclusion of the movie promises a much more interesting follow up story that we’ll likely never see. Mortal is an antidote to the superhero blockbuster, but it could have been so much more.