Jurassic Park's Creator Wrote A Medieval Box Office Flop — Now Is The Perfect Time To Remake It

Sometimes, a movie is a victim of its production and the time in which it was made, and few movies fit that bill as well as "The 13th Warrior." John McTiernan's critically-derided film was a box office flop back when it premiered back in 1999 despite being based on a book by "Jurassic Park" author Michael Crichton and starring heartthrob Antonio Banderas. There are a whole bunch of reasons why the film didn't work, from its inflated budget to the general lack of interest in historical epics near the turn of the millennium, but "The 13th Warrior" isn't a bad movie, per se. It's just a film in perfect shape for a remake. 

Crichton wrote the screenplay for "The 13th Warrior" based on his novel "Eaters of the Dead," and while there are a few things that could use tweaking, it mostly works as a sort of "Seven Samurai" meets "Beowulf" story that's one seriously cool take on vikings. There are some genuinely inspired moments in the film, including a sequence that shows the Arabic-speaking Ahmed ibn Fahdlan (Banderas) learning Norse just by being immersed in it, and the audience only hears words in English as he learns them. It's brutal and bloody stuff that feels right at home alongside something like Robert Eggers's "The Northman" or even "Game of Thrones." If ever there were a perfect time for a fresh re-imagining of "13th Warrior," it's now.

"The 13th Warrior" follows court poet Ahmed ibn Fahdlan of Baghdad, who gets sent on an assignment to the Volga Bulgars (in what is modern-day Russia) after he's caught having a tryst with a nobleman's wife. He then ends up being saved by Tatar raiders by a group of Norsemen and accompanies them as they go on a journey, their leader Buliwyf (Vladimir Kulich) having been summoned by King Hrothgar (Sven Wollter) to help slay the cannibalistic "wendol." Those of you with English literature degrees might recognize all of this from "Beowulf," but "The 13th Warrior" does take a few additional little twists and turns that separate it from its inspiration, tethering it to reality and history instead of myth. 

Shows like "Vikings" have gotten people more interested in this topic than they were back in the 1990s, and there's definitely more patience for moody, violent period pieces than there was back then. It's the kind of movie that could be done well with almost a shot-for-shot remake or with something that deviates more, because there are so many great bits and pieces to choose from. "The 13th Warrior" has some memorable scenes and truly excellent production design, and while it's a shame that it flopped back in '99, maybe we can get a remake that people go berserk for in the 2020s.