I’m in Love with Hans, The Troll Hunter

I kinda wish I’d found The Troll Hunter on demand at the end of the weekend instead of at the beginning. Reason being, it’s such a fun movie and, after getting the disappointing news I got last night, watching exploding trolls (and trolls turning to stone and crumbling) would’ve been a real pick-me-up.

It’s not like I can just re-watch it and get the same effect. Unexpected exploding trolls when I’m in a decent mood is awesome. Expected exploding trolls when I’m in a downward funk will only yield gloomy observations like this:

“That’s what that email did to my hopes.”

Or:

“That’s pretty much what’s happening to my soul. Every day. Every day my soul turns to stone and crumbles. It doesn’t even reassemble. The pieces just crumble further until they’re dust disintegrating into nothing.”

I’m totally fun to be around today.

So.

The Troll Hunter. Don’t let my current attitude deter you: The Troll Hunter is an awesomely fun movie. You may hear that the style – a found footage type of film in the vein of The Blair Witch Project or Cloverfield – has been done before. Sure, it has. But, it works here. You may find that some of the cultural references go over your head, it being Nowegian and all . Well, that’s what the internet is for: better understanding of other cultures for a more fulfilling movie watching experience.

The footage presented is a project by some students at Volda College. They’re looking into some strange bear events nearby and are led to Hans, a gruff, burly guy who is believed to be a bear poacher. Of course, he’s not. Hans is a troll hunter employed by the Norwegian government, specifically the ultra-secret Troll Security Service.

Hans is my vocational soul mate. He does this job that civilized folk don’t understand. His supervisor is a micro-managing bureaucratic twit. He files paperwork that no one probably looks at. He’s not satisfied in his job, but doesn’t know how to do anything else and has been ruined for all other employment.

I feel your pain, Hans. Let’s run away together and open conspiracy bake shop. I’ll bake scones with a conspiracy theory prize inside and you can putter around in your Fair Isle cardigan, making the place safe from trolls. Sure, no once will come in because it’s lit with UV light and stinks of troll musk, but at least we’ll have each other as our soul dust disintegrates.

I’m not sweeping that up, BTW. So, I hope you have a Dust Buster.

Let’s do it, Hans. Before the American remake comes out (which is really happening).

So, watch The Troll Hunter in the original Norwegian before it gets all Americanized and Hans gets recast as The Rock or Brendan Fraser or someone. It’s on VOD right now and will be in theaters on June 10th.

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