Based on the thirteenth-century "Saga of Gisli," The Outlaw follows its outlaw-hero's repeated tests by fate, and his attempt to conduct himself, in the Icelandic tradition, with a certain style in facing what he knows to be the inevitable. Rugged landscapes are important settings for the action; the film was shot largely in the picturesque West Icelandic valley of Hitardular, where replicas of Settlement Age homes were erected.
Reviews in Iceland of this film, which as not shown abroad, are "overwhelmingly favorable-to use an understatement as befits the classical text that lies behind the screenplay.... While the dialogue is predominantly modern Icelandic, numerous dramatic remarks come straight out of the classical text.... (One) utterance...(is) widely hailed as the most powerful metaphorical expression of fate in saga literature: ‘I would have heeded this warning if it had reached me sooner, but from this point all waters flow to Dyrafjordur' (a place in NW Iceland)." --News from Iceland