The Ash Lad In the Hall of the Mountain King (2017)

The Ash Lad In the Hall of the Mountain King (2017) Full Recap

Far away in the mountains of Norway, past every blue ridge and a little farther, stands a huge mountain that nobody dares to go near. An ancient legend says that deep inside it sleeps a terrible troll called the mountain king. According to the old songs, only one thing can wake him up. If the princess of the kingdom is still not married by her 18th birthday, the troll will come and take her.

So, for hundreds of years, every king has made sure to find his daughter, a husband in time. Now, it's Princess Kristine's turn. Her birthday is just days away, and her father has found her a match. Prince Frederick of Denmark arrives at the castle in his fanciest clothes and makes a long, flowery speech that nobody really understands.

At dinner, he tells the guests how a giant bear once charged at him and he wrestled it with his bare hands until it fell over dead. Everybody claps. Kristen rolls her eyes so hard it almost hurts. She has heard this story about 10 times already, and each time there are more bears.

Later, the king loses his temper. He orders Kristen to marry Frederick because he's the king, and the king's word is law. Kristen shouts back that he doesn't understand anything. She doesn't want to marry anyone. That night, the king's guards knock on her door, but her room is empty.

Kristen has climbed out the window, jumped on her horse, and galloped off into the night. The next morning, in a quiet valley, a red-haired farm boy named Espen is walking home from the market. As he crosses an old wooden bridge, a rider comes racing toward him, and Espen has to jump out of the way, straight into the river. The rider is a girl in a hooded cloak.

She pulls him out and they sit by the water and share her food. Espen talks non-stop about how silly handshakes are and why people don't stand on one leg instead. The girl laughs and asks if he always talks this much. Only after near-death experiences, he says. Then she climbs back on her horse and leaves without ever telling him her name.

Espen gets home to his family's tiny farm, which is basically a few wooden huts and a field where his older brothers, Purr and Pal, have been working since sunrise. Their father isn't happy either. The birds have eaten half the crops because putting up a scarecrow was Espen's job, and he forgot. Espen tries to tell them about the girl on the bridge, and nobody believes a word.

Since there's nothing left to eat, the father and the two brothers grab their bows and head out to hunt. Espen asks if he can come. The answer is no. He has to stay home, watch the house, and not touch anything. Herrer adds that he should go sit in the ashes by the fire as usual since that's the only thing he's good for.

That night, Espen sits alone by the fireplace, poking at the ashes. Then he hears heavy footsteps outside. Something big is circling the house. Espen grabs a burning stick from the fire and shouts that he isn't afraid of any troll. He runs out into the dark, swinging the torch at the shadows.

The torch catches the roof. Within minutes, the whole farm is burning. When his father and brothers come home, everything they own is a pile of smoking black wood. Espen swears he heard a troll outside. His father just stares at him. In the ashes, he finds the only picture they ever had of Espen's mother. burned beyond saving.

Perr mutters what everybody in the village already calls espen the ash lad. Then a group of soldiers rides up led by Prince Frederick. He's looking for the princess. A girl with long brown hair on a beautiful horse. Espen goes pale. Frederick grabs him and demands to know what he's seen.

Perr laughs and says not to listen to him. Espen thinks he saw a troll last night, so he believes the old song. Frederick sneers about the princess being taken by a troll. Then he tells them the king has made a promise and he says it like the prize is already his. Whoever finds Princess Kristen will marry her and get half the kingdom and that will be him.

Once they're married, he says he'll make sure she learns her place. Her and pal decide to go after the princess, too. If they find her, they can rebuild the farm. Espen asks what he should do. His dad's answer is short. He's on his own now. Espen begs to stay and help, but his father says if he really wants to help, he'll go away and never come back.

Espen picks up his little bag and walks off down the road alone. He looks back once. His father has already turned away. He follows his brothers into the forest, keeping a safe distance behind. Along the way, he picks up all kinds of junk. A broken mirror, an old box, anything that looks like it might come in handy one day.

Perr and pal think he's crazy. Then they hear someone calling for help. Her and pal walk right past because they have no time to stop. But Espen goes to look. It's an old woman with her long nose stuck in the trunk of a tree. She explains she was chopping wood and her nose got jammed in the crack.

She's been stuck there for days with nothing to eat. Espen frees her with her own axe and gives her his only potato. When he tells her he's looking for the princess, the old woman cackles. The mountain king has taken her, just like the song said. Espen asks if that isn't just a fairy tale.

There's always some truth in every fairy tale, she says. Then she tells him that only one sword in the world can cut through the mountain king's skin. It was lost long ago in a terrible swamp, and there's something evil living there. Because he was kind to her, she gives him an old map.

It can show him the way to anywhere he wants to go, but he has to ask it nicely. Back at the castle, the king is pacing the halls, sure that a gang of robbers has his daughter. The queen keeps talking about the troll, and the king says it's an old myth. Then his soldiers return. They found the princess's horse, or what was left of it, in a valley near the mountains, and they found something else, a tooth bigger than a man's hand, the tooth of the mountain king.

In the forest, Perr and Pal are starving. Then, out of nowhere, there's a basket of golden apples lying in the moss. They eat one then another. Suddenly, a group of beautiful young women steps out of the trees and asks if they like their apples. Where they come from, there are more apples than anyone could ever eat.

Would the boys like to come along? Perr and pal don't think twice. The women lead them into a hidden hall inside the hill full of roast meat, berries, and cakes. The brothers eat until they can barely move and say they never want to leave. When Espen finds them, he doesn't trust any of it.

Then he notices a long cow's tail sticking out from under one of the dresses. These aren't girls at all. They're Huldra, forest spirits who trap travelers forever. Espen tells his brothers the apples were witchcraft and they have to get out now. Herrer is furious. First, Espen burned down the farm.

And now he wants to drag them away from all this food. Then the Huldra see their leaving and their pretty faces turn into twisted, hideous monsters. The brothers scream and run for their lives with the Huldra chasing them all the way out of the hill. Afterwards, Pal thanks Espen for saving them.

Perr asks why, if trolls really exist, nobody has ever seen one. Espen explains that trolls turn to stone in the sunlight so they only come out at night. Then Pear asks if dragons and unicorns are real, too. And Espen says not to be silly. A horse with a horn on its head is ridiculous.

The brothers stop at a village in. Her orders three big mugs of cider, three bowls of sweet porridge, and three cinnamon buns. Guess who's sitting at the next table? Prince Frederick loudly telling the inkeeper his wine smells like a cowborn and sweaty socks. Espen asks the map very politely where the sword is.

A line of light crawls across the paper and stops at a swamp up in the mountains. Frederick sits down at their table. All smiles. He says he and the princess are madly in love and he'll pay a fortune to anyone who can help him find her. He pours a bag of gold on the table. That's enough to rebuild their farm and more.

Perr tells Espin to give him the map. Espen refuses. Perr orders him again. Espen still says no. Frederick's men draw their swords. Mugs fly. Benches tip over and the whole inn turns into one big brawl. The brothers escape out the back and Frederick's soldiers chase them through the village.

They crash through market stalls, trample a vegetable garden, and blame each other for it, and finally hide until the soldiers ride past. But Frederick finds them at the edge of a river and points a crossbow at them. At this distance, he says, even he can't miss. Perr begs Espen to give him the map.

Espen hands it over. And the moment Frederick looks down, the three brothers jump off the cliff into the river. When they drag themselves out of the water, Pear explodes. Why didn't Espen just take the money? They could have gone home. The princess isn't their problem. Does he really think she'd ever marry a farm boy like him?

Perr says that every time Espen skips his chores, the others have to do twice the work. Then he says something that cuts deep. Their family would be much better off if Espen weren't part of it. The two brothers roll around in the mud, punching each other until Pal finally pulls them apart.

Espen walks off and sits alone by the river. Then Espen pulls something out of his shirt. It's the real map. He gave Frederick, a fake one. Pal points out that Espen saved them from the prince and found the map in the first place. Meanwhile, deep inside the mountain, Kristen stands before the mountain king.

She tells the giant troll she knows what the old songs say. But before anything happens, she needs a proper dress. She's buying herself time. The swamp is just as creepy as the old woman said. Fog, dead trees, black water. Espen suddenly disappears. Then Frederick's soldiers burst out of the fog and grab Pear and Pal.

They want to know where the third brother is. Per tells them he hit a rock when they fell into the river. He's dead, but Espen has dived deep into the dark water where something lies glowing in the mud. He swims up, gasping, and holds it high. He found the sword. Her and Pal are tied up in Frederick's camp.

Pal tells his brother to relax. These soldiers have no idea who they're dealing with. He calls a guard closer, as if he has a secret to tell him, then kicks him as hard as he can. It doesn't help much. Later, as the soldiers get ready to move on, Frederick asks if anyone needs a bathroom break because he doesn't want to stop in 5 minutes.

Then, a huge bear walks out of the trees. The soldiers panic. One of them wants to shoot it, and another reminds him he never hits anything. But this is a very strange bear. It walks on two legs and wobbles. It's Espen wearing the old bear skin he found, and he scares off half of Frederick's men.

Frederick has worked out that Espen gave him a fake map, but he takes the real one now and asks it very politely to show him the way to the mountain king's hall. Frederick tells his servant Christian his plan. He'll marry Kristen, but if she defies him again, well, tragic hunting accidents have happened to royals before. Espen frees his brothers, and Pere has to admit it was a brilliant rescue.

That night around a small campfire, Pal stares into the flames and asks what their father is doing right now. Suddenly, three trolls stomp out of the dark forest. The brothers and Frederick's soldiers end up fighting the monsters side by side. They trap one troll under falling rocks, and Frederick promises his men a big bonus if they keep fighting.

But the trolls are too strong, and soon everyone is running in every direction. When a troll corners Frederick, he thanks Christian for his many years of loyal service. Then he shoves his own servant at the troll and runs away to save himself. In the chaos, Pere gets hurt. He tells Espen that all of this is his fault.

He knows he complains about him all the time. Espen daydreams constantly and can't hammer a nail without knocking the whole house down. But there's something special about him. He sees things nobody else sees, and he does things that seem impossible. In just a few days, P has watched him fight a prince, use a magic map, and outsmart forest spirits.

Out here, he says, "This is Espen's world, so he should just tell him what to do." Deep inside the mountain, Frederick finds Kristen first. He calls her his beloved and says he's come to rescue her. She tells him he's doing a pretty bad job. Then pal stumbles in and he tells Kristen the truth.

Frederick [snorts] only wants the throne and he plans to get rid of her after the wedding. Frederick calls him a lying thief, but Kristen believes Paul. Paul tells her he lives on a farm with his father and brothers. When he mentions Espen, Kristen asks if he means a red-haired boy, irritatingly cheerful and braver than he knows.

That's him, Pal says. And Espen told him she's a really bad rider. One of the things was an empty glass jar. He fills it with glowing bugs and suddenly he has a lamp. Inside the mountain is a giant maze of tunnels. They find one of Pal's shoes lying on the ground. Espen ties a string to a rock at the entrance and unrolls it behind them so they won't get lost.

Then he hears someone calling his name. It's Pal with Kristen. Kristen takes one look at Espen and starts laughing. It's the boy she knocked off the bridge. Frederick, meanwhile, is stuck dangling from a rope over a pit and begging someone to pull him up. Then the ground starts to shake.

The mountain king is coming back. Everyone runs for the exit and climbs up the steep mountainside with the giant troll right behind them. Espen yells at them to keep going up. up there. The sun will hit them first, but the troll grabs the rocks around them and Pear falls. He lies on the ground and doesn't move.

Espen steps out in front of the monster holding the magic sword and shouts that it's him the troll wants. [screaming] The mountain king reaches for him with an enormous hand. And right then, the sun peaks over the ridge. The troll freezes. His skin cracks and turns gray, and in seconds, the mountain king is nothing but a giant pile of stone.

The Ash Lad In the Hall of the Mountain King (2017) Ending Explained

Herrer opens his eyes. He's alive. On the way back, Frederick gets lost in the forest and meets the old woman with the long nose. He calls her an ugly old hag and demands directions to the castle. She points him down a path. It leads straight to a family of hungry trolls. Let's just say Frederick won't be bothering anyone anymore.

At the castle, Kristen runs into her parents' arms. Then she introduces her new friends and one in particular. If it weren't for Espen, she wouldn't be here. The king says he promised the rescuer her hand and half the kingdom. But Espen says ruling a kingdom sounds like way too much responsibility for a simple farm boy.

All he asks for is enough money to save his family's farm. Perr immediately asks if that means the job of king is still open. The king laughs and tells everyone there won't be any wedding. Not today and not tomorrow. From now on, Kristen can marry whoever she wants. Whenever she wants.

The three brothers walk home where their father is still living in the ruins of the farm. They show him the reward. Her and pal tell him it wasn't them. It was Espen they just helped. Their father looks at Espen and says his mother would have been so proud of him. He says he didn't mean the things he said.

He was just angry. And Espen doesn't have to carry the name Ash Lad anymore. Espen smiles. He's gotten used to it. He thinks he'll keep it. A few days later, as the brothers rebuild the farm, Kristen rides up on her horse. Espen points out that she still hasn't gotten any better at riding.

She asks if he's getting on or not. Espen climbs up behind the princess who has stolen his heart, and the two of them ride off together into the forest. And the Ash lad, the boy everyone laughed at, is now the hero the whole kingdom will sing songs about.