RyothChatty ridiculous rating

Tacticalin An absolute waste of money

Zlatica One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Sarita Rafferty There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

merklekranz First off, Christopher Lambert just vaulted to near the top of my least favorite actors list. Here as the hero, Lambert is just plain boring. All actors not named Caan or Young turn in performances that can only be described as awful. The story of a land grab has been done over and over in uncountable westerns. The editing is puzzling to say the least, with large moments of time obviously missing on the cutting room floor. Finally, the ending is so scattered, it almost seems like the director was unsure when to yell cut. There are only two reasons to endure the mercifully short 89 minutes of "North Star". James Caan turns in a wonderfully bizarre performance as the heavy, and the snowy landscapes provide a nice backdrop and diversion from the sub par script and acting. - MERK

Leofwine_draca NORTH STAR is a virtual reprise of the 1981 Charles Bronson vehicle DEATH HUNT, which saw a posse headed by Lee Marvin searching the icy wastes for a fleeing trapper played by the DEATH WISH actor. NORTH STAR sets its story in Alaska and features James Caan as the hunter and Christopher Lambert as his quarry.Despite a decent pacing and some good set-dressing - you never question the setting for a moment - this film has little to recommend it. Lambert fans (are there any?) will be let down by their star's performance, which is wooden even by Lambert standards; little he says or does rings true, and he's almost entirely lacking in star presence. There's a hollowness in the middle of the film which a proper actor should be filling with charisma, wit and heroism.James Caan is much better as the arrogant villain, a role he also played to the hilt in ERASER. He chews the scenery and shares a decent rapport with Burt Young, playing a fellow bad guy for a change and doing well with it. Catherine McCormack is once again wasted as a love interest, though, leaving 28 WEEKS LATER the only film I've seen that actually makes use of her acting talents.The pace is good and the outdoor wilderness scenes look fantastic, really bringing the chilly wasteland to life. Scenes of the participants sledging through snowdrifts on their husky-drawn sleighs are a lot of fun. It's just a shame that there's no real meat on the bones, and that the ending is lacklustre to say the least. NORTH STAR fizzles instead of bangs, and that's why this wintry western has been long since forgotten.

jcohen1 Sorry friends this is a frozen turkey; just it's an interesting turkey courtesy of Caan & Young. Years back they made two superior films- The Gambler & The Killer Elite. It's nice to seem them looking so good 25 years later even considering the material.When the movie starts I started to think of Jimmy Stewart & Walter Brennan in The Far Country. Afterwards, Valdez is Coming. By the end it just freezes to death of its own weight. It's supposed to showcaset this Highlander guy but he doesn't even rise to the level of Steven Seagal.I laughed and enjoyed Caan as a ruthless businessman turned psycho killer but somewhere Sonny Corleone is shaking his head. John McIntire too.

Keith F. Hatcher From the erstwhile afamed "spaghetti westerns" by Sergio Leone, filmed here in Almería, Spain, naturally, we pass on to a new variety which might be called "northern" rather than "western".Totally filmed in Norway, the land of smorgasbord breakfasts, not in Alaska, we have here a typical sort of copy-Hollywood style of those westerns of yore, adopting similar recipes and formulas, but without anything even nearing the result.Lovely scenery, but most of this film goes to the dogs; by which I mean that the best of this film are the huskies and other dogs making up the sled-teams in this rather contrived effort to emulate what was once an admired cinematographic subject matter. My personal smorgasbord breakfast was in Stavanger, after having slept on the floor in the breakfast room, as our night-flight from London arrived around four o'clock in the morning. I woke up amidst hotel guests' legs wandering about sampling the relishing feast of what is a genuine Norwegian product: smorgasbord.This film is not a genuine product of any kind. I am now awaiting impatiently a Chinese "western", an Egyptian version of "Dallas" or even a U.S. version of "Fanny och Alexandr" (sic) not to mention a British version of "Hable con Ella".Apart from that I have always loved Norway: perhaps because it was my first foreign country (1962), but especially because the people are so kind, friendly, civilized. My mountain trip walking in the Jotenheimen still remain clear in my memory all these years later - and it even snowed on my birthday (August)!I think I will go and listen to some music by Edvard Grieg ......... as this film is not worth the trouble.