These Vikings are crazy!

Adapted from Goscinny and Uderzo’s much loved comic book creation, Asterix and the Normans, this film is one of the best Asterix reel creations to hit the silver screen.

A French-Danish collaboration, this film, even though unassuming and old-fashioned in its anime art, is quite an Obelix full of laughs.

Justforkix (Sean Astin), Chief Vitalstatistix lazy nephew, is undergoing a ‘toughen-up’ training under the guidance of Asterix (Paul Giamatti) and Obelix (Brad Garrett). Mistaken for Champion of Fear who apparently has the secret of flight, Justforkix gets kidnapped and Asterix and Obelix have to rush in to save the day. The story has been expanded from the original with a few sub-plots.

A pigeon called SMS, the character of Abba, Justforkix’ pigeon cell phone, a Viking maiden, Ikea, with a taste for looting furniture and a hummable pop-rock score add contemporariness to the narrative. There are quite a few funny gags and the familiar character traits and tics (Cacophonix ear-splitting singing, Obelix’s over-eating, the ship that gets sunk again and again, and the Gauls’s attempt to hit the Romans out of orbit) also make for some robust humour.