Sightlines · reception

How The Last Viking was received

2025 · Anders Thomas Jensen · The Last Viking on Sightlines

The arc

Premiered out of competition at Venice 2025 to respectful-but-mixed reviews — critics abroad wobbled on its tonal whiplash — then went home and became a phenomenon: the biggest Danish live-action opening since 2018 and Anders Thomas Jensen's best-selling film ever in Denmark, topping 700,000 admissions.

What’s debated

The classic Jensen split, louder than ever: is the farce-to-brutality whiplash the whole point of his cinema or a formula finally straining — with international critics leaning 'strained' and the home crowd voting emphatically otherwise?

Its footprint

Mads Mikkelsen in round glasses and long hair, fully committed to being a Beatle, is the image everyone shares — a gift to Letterboxd reviewers who'd already made 'Mikkelsen in an Anders Thomas Jensen movie' a genre unto itself.

Where it stands

Too new for canon but pre-sold to a cult: the latest entry in the beloved Jensen–Mikkelsen–Lie Kaas run (Adam's Apples, Men & Chicken, Riders of Justice) that Nordic-cinema devotees treat as required viewing.

Did you know? Its opening weekend in Denmark (over 127,000 tickets) was the biggest for a Danish live-action film since 2018 — and Mads Mikkelsen's best-ever opening for a Danish production, beating his own record set by Riders of Justice.