In a mythical fantasy realm of marionettes, young Hal (the voice of a then-unknown James McAvoy in the English-language version) is the son of a recently murdered ruler who leaves his comfortable home to set out on a journey to find his father's killer and avenge his death, but inevitably in the process he comes to discover the secret truth behind the longstanding feud between the two clans. Then, of course, war breaks out between them and Hal must step up and lead his people in Arthurian fashion.
Yes, that is all the narrative of Strings. It's deliberately derivative (the characters' awareness of their being marionettes notwithstanding), but that's not the point. The characters all being puppets is, and co-writer/director Anders Ronnow Klarlund deserves praise for hatching and applying that concept to it. But I'm afraid for me, like a piece of chewing gum, that concept's novelty lost its flavour quite soon, and the super-conventional plot, insipid dialogue and lack of humour only compounded my indifference once that happened. Maybe I'm simply too old for it, but I was bored for the bulk of this Danish saga. It's nowhere near as entertaining or thrilling as Norway's The Ash Lad: In the Hall of the Mountain King, which was stuffed with charm, wit, energy and an awareness of its archaicness.
Strings does have good visual design and musical style, but for me that could not mask the storytelling shortcomings and misguided self-perception underneath. Its characters are somehow less wooden than the film containing them.
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