Live-action role-playing gets out of hand in director Alexandre Franchi's The Wild Hunt.

Ambitious film The Wild Hunt journeys into the world of medieval role-players to show us that nerds are people too. Sometimes very, very bad people.

Though this captivating Canadian indie movie centers on live-action role-players, or LARPers, The Wild Hunt is no mere safari into geekdom. A triptych of doleful drama, nerd-skewering comedy and electrifying thriller, its diverse elements hinge on the journey of Erik Magnusson (played by Ricky Mabe), an overburdened and prematurely world-weary twenty-something.

Erik lives with his father, a native of Iceland so stricken with dementia that he has reverted entirely to his native tongue. Despite being Nordic-looking to the point of albinism, Erik doesn’t know Icelandic, and communication is nil. Between hauling his uncomprehending old man onto the crapper and toiling at a dead-end job, Erik’s life unambiguously sucks. Then his girlfriend dumps him for a wizard who drives a minivan.

Director Alexandre Franchi co-wrote The Wild Hunt, his first feature-length project, with actor Mark A. Krupa, who plays Erik’s nutty older brother Bjorn, one of the main characters. Both Franchi and Krupa grew up playing Dungeons & Dragons, and a line that describes LARPers as “the fun losers” might be self-referential.

Their opus is akin to the popular documentary Darkon, which follows LARPers as they alternate between the gleaming breastplates of adventure and the ragged sweatpants of banality. The subjects of Darkon take the term “weekend warrior” too literally, but get a healthy release from suspending their mundane stresses. The Wild Hunt, by contrast, is a blunt but captivating melodrama, reminding us that wading too far into fantasy can be a most dangerous game.

Bjorn Magnusson, played by Mark Krupa, takes LARPing to extremes in The Wild Hunt.

Like Darkon, the focus of The Wild Hunt switches back and forth between its characters’ daily existence and the realms of the unreal. The filmmakers tapped a community of real-life LARPers, who served as extras and granted access to their faux medieval village (populated by the usual Tolkien-inspired suspects: winged sprites, elves with Spock ears and surly pikemen).

As the movie opens, Erik is horrified to learn that his girlfriend, Evelyn (played by Tiio Horn), has been sneaking off to a forest kingdom inhabited (on weekends mostly) by obsessive LARPers, including Bjorn.

Bjorn seems to live at the LARPing compound full-time, and it was he who lured Evelyn into role-playing. Both are refugees from Erik’s dingy apartment and the misery of elder care. Bjorn plays a Viking warrior with wacky gusto and a he-man wig, while Evelyn becomes Princess Evelynia, hottest damsel in LARPland.

Princess Evelynia (Tiio Horn) is the LARPers' love interest.Photos courtesy Animist Films

Just moments after she confesses to Erik that she has been LARPing, the very creepy Shaman Murtag rolls up in his minivan of doom and absconds with her. Inside the compound, Princess Evelynia is in the shaman’s hands, figuratively and literally. In a bid to win back his woman, Erik reluctantly dons a tunic and joins the game, enlisting Bjorn as his guide.

Erik’s epic quest to recover Evelyn transpires in the shadow of the LARPers’ big annual battle, patterned on an ancient Indo-European myth known as the Wild Hunt. Whoever has the (apparently) magical Princess Evelynia shall triumph, but should Erik succeed, the hunt will lose its “Valkyrie.” By threatening the players’ cherished fantasy, Erik ignites a primal struggle that practically leaps off the celluloid.

In a departure from the handicam vérité you might expect from a non-Hollywood newcomer, director Franchi shot The Wild Hunt on 35mm cameras. For the most part, his insistence on analog pays off. The soft edges and warmth of film give the characters an idealized look suited to the mythic storyline. The downside is some shaky camerawork that would have been redone if the filmmakers had instant digital playback.

Franchi took another risk by shooting many night sequences during the day, an old-fashioned technique that employs filters and special film stock to darken the print. The final product is sometimes murky, but the lack of detail helps us enter the LARPers’ fantasy, which would be tough if we could see every strip of duct tape on their foam-rubber swords.

A huge cast of extras lends a touch of cinematic grandeur, populating teeming battle scenes reminiscent of Spartacus. A strong performance by actor Mabe clinches the epic vibe, imbuing Erik, the film’s tragic hero, with the perfect mix of courage and fatalism.

The movie itself has been on an epic journey. It won accolades at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2009, but was not released to a wide audience. As of Tuesday, The Wild Hunt is available on demand through a large number of cable companies, plus iTunes, Vudu and other web platforms. The DVD comes out June 7.

It will be interesting to see what category the The Wild Hunt ends up in on the movie sites. The opening is naturalistic, full of heartbreak and hilarity, with eerie foreshadowing to let us know evil is near. And then the plot turns to melodrama, an echo of the bleak Norse sagas that were part of its inspiration.

In less capable hands, the competing elements might have caused a train wreck. But stylish cinematography holds the viewer close, and the characters are so quirky and lifelike that we forget their journey is foretold.

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