In this sequel to 2017's fun and charming The Ash Lad: In the Hall of the Mountain King, titular hero Espen (Vebjorn Enger) and his love Princess Kristin (Eili Harboe) are back and taking another adventure. This time, they have to rescue their sidekick friends Per (Mads Sjogard Pettersen) and Pal Elias Holmen Sorenson) who've been falsely accused of poisoning the king and queen and are now imprisoned in a dungeon awaiting their execution. Espen and Kristin must now find the mythical Soria Moria palace, home to the so-called "water of life" which can save her parents, and from there reveal who was really responsible for the crime.
The Ash Lad: In Search of the Golden Castle is darker than its predecessor, but that's about the only new thing I noticed here. Returning director Mikkaele Braenne Sandemose just doesn't infuse the narrative, based on an eighteenth-century Norwegian fairy tale again, with quite the same rollicking pace and exuberance the second time around and the result, therefore, was something of a buzzkill for me. Also, Enger doesn't give as much of an enthusiastic turn this time in the lead and there are a couple of scenes that feel almost jarringly like references to ones in earlier, Hollywood adventure flicks, namely one that invokes comparisons to the laughing over dinner scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark and the score is too heavy-handed in places.
The visuals are once again beautiful especially for a very low-budget fantasy flick, and as I said the tone is somewhat darker in this sequel. But that one change could not mask the lack of changes elsewhere or the comparative lack of zest alongside the first film. A third is reportedly planned; let's hope it's a return to form for Sandemose after this misstep. 6/10.
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