THE PATHFINDER
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1990 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: A thousand-year-old Lapp legend is the basis of this short, entertaining, occasionally bloody children's film from Lapland that will be entertaining for adults also. How often do you get mystical legends in films from Lapland? Rating: high +1.
The plot has been done many times before, often but not usually as well. But this time there is a good reason for the well-worn plot. This time it is an adaptation of a millennium-old legend from Lapland. In the Tenth Century the story was considerably newer.
Aigin, a teenager, returns from hunting one day to see his family's camp overrun by marauding invaders, the Tchudes. His parents and his young sister have been murdered. There are about eighteen of these Tchudes, all dressed in black and armed to the teeth with crossbows: the leader's crossbow is decorated with snarling fangs. There is no doubt these are pretty nasty dudes. One slip and Aigin is running for his life through the frozen landscape. He runs for help to a nearby village but rather than help Aigin they seem more anxious to pack up and run than to fight back. So Aigin decides he must fight the Tchudes himself.
The attraction of THE PATHFINDER is not in the storyline, which would be as easily fit to a post-Holocaust society and has been many times from ROAD WARRIOR on. Where THE PATHFINDER stands out is its depiction of Tenth Century Lapp culture. We get little hints of Lapp mysticism and culture. We learn superstitions, such as the belief that once you have killed a bear your gaze is deadly for three days. The entire story is framed in a mystical context in which each person has a totem reindeer who appears at pivotal moments in a person's life.
This is basically a children's film with a little violence. That is more acceptable for children's films in other cultures than it is in ours. Still, it is a well-constructed and filmed children's story, and one that adults would enjoy also. I would rate it a high +1. At 88 minutes it is a trifle short, but it is enjoyable.
Mark R. Leeper
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