Robert Eggers’ critically-acclaimed The Northman was 2022’s biggest box office injustice. Despite favorable reviews and a talented cast, The Northman failed to earn back its $70-$90 budget, grossing $69.6 million worldwide. When Focus Features backed the Viking revenge epic, director and writer Robert Eggers had two indie successes under his belt, The Witch and The Lighthouse. Both films were distributed by A24 and considered box office successes compared to their modest budgets of $4 million and $11 million. The Northman was Eggers’ first foray into studio filmmaking and the poor box office may signal it is his last for a long time.
Based on The Legend of Amleth by Saxo Grammaticus, The Northman follows the Viking prince Amleth on a quest to avenge his father. Considering the legend of Amleth inspired William Shakespeare to write one of his greatest plays The Tragedy of Hamlet, Eggers and co-writer Icelandic poet Sjón had a strong foundation for The Northman. Additionally, Alexander Skarsgård led a star-studded cast with amazing performances from Nicole Kidman, Claes Bang, Anya Taylor-Joy, Ethan Hawke, Björk, and Willem Dafoe. With Eggers’ previous successes and the promise of a visionary epic, The Northman should’ve and perhaps, at a different time, would’ve been a box office hit.
The Northman Deserved Better At 2022’s Box Office
Putting the box office numbers aside, The Northman succeeds on almost every level: visually, sonically, and narratively. While Eggers’ The Witch and The Lighthouse have proved he is a genius behind the camera, The Northman also shows Eggers is capable of handling an epic narrative. At a 2-hour-plus running time, the film is paced so well that the hours fly by. None of the A-list actors are wasted and each gets their moment to shine. Additionally, Eggers’ brilliant visual instinct reaches a scale that his smaller films could not achieve.
With a larger budget, Eggers was able to create gorgeous sets and take his strange imagery to another level. What sets The Northman apart from other historical epics and even other Hamlet adaptations is how unique it feels, despite the story being based on an ancient legend. In this day and age, films like The Northman that blend striking visuals, intense emotion, and engaging action are harder to come by. Despite being cultivated for the theater-going experience, The Northman’s box office failure isn’t a good sign for the future of genre-blending epics.
Why The Northman Was A Box Office Flop
While some of The Northman’s box office failure can be blamed on the marketing, such as posters in New York subways failing to feature the film’s title, the real issue is bigger than a marketing mishap. Unfortunately, any film that is not an IP-based blockbuster or a franchise venture is hard to sell to the general public. The pandemic added insult to injury and nearly killed the theater-going experience altogether. With the rise of ticket prices along with a large amount of content released on streaming platforms, it becomes harder to justify spending money on a movie where the experience is entirely new.
While historical epics aren’t new to Hollywood and used to be blockbuster hits, like Gladiator and Braveheart, The Northman and Ridley Scott’s The Last Duel’s poor box office shows that audiences no longer shell out for historically-based tales. However, The Northman did find an audience in VOD and was considered financially successful by Focus Features’ president of production and acquisitions, Kiska Higgs. Even though The Northman was enjoyed in the comfort of people’s homes, it is still a tragedy, albeit not a Shakespearean one, that Eggers’ dedication to creating a cinematic blockbuster was overlooked in theaters.
