Category / norwegian television

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Wolves Do Not Eat Popcorn

Skriften på veggen ((The Writing on the Wall) Stefan Faldbakken, 2010)
Svarte får ((Black Sheep) Stephan Apelgren, 2011)
Dødens drabanter ((Consorts of Death) Stephan Apelgren, 2011)
I mørket er alle ulver grå ((At Night All Wolves Are Grey) Alexander Eik, 2011)
De døde har det godt ((The Dead Have It Easy) Erik Richter Strand, 2011)
Kalde hjerter ((Cold Hearts), Trond Espen Seim, 2012)

The first series left me with a degree of trepidation – would Hamre be back or has the series jumped the shark. The answer is – spoiler – he is back and so it was worth watching. The friendship gets closer, to the extent that I was expecting him to be written out. No spoilers here. But there is a growing sympathy, especially as Veum gets closer to a new girlfriend Karin (Lene Nystrøm), who appears in a different guise in the novels.

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On the Screen All Wolves are Silver

Bitre blomster ((Bitter Flowers) Ulrik Imtiaz Rolfsen, 2007)
Tornerose ((Sleeping Beauty) Erik Richter Strand, 2008)
Din til døden ((Yours Until Death) Erik Richter Strand, 2008)
Falne engler ((Fallen Angels) Morten Tyldum, 2008)
Kvinnen i kjøleskapet ((The Woman In The Fridge) Alexander Eik, 2008)
Begravde hunder ((Buried Dogs) Alexander Eik, 2008)

I had been aware that Bergen’s only (fictional) private detective, Varg Veum, had leapt from the books to the big and direct-to-DVD screens. A little searching found a boxset of the twelve titles, some based on books that have been translated, some on the short story collection.

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Iced Blondes

Wisting (Directed by Trygve Allister Diesen and Katarina Launing, 2019)

I stumbled across Wisting a couple of months ago in the nether regions of iPlayer and downloaded the first episode a couple of months ago. I confess I’ve never seen The Bridge (soon to be a Radio 4 programme), nor Wallander, nor the original version of The Killing (but most of the American version). I did see Modus (possibly in reverse order) and Svartsjön (ultimately silly, but verging on the Todorovian fantastic, if I recall correctly), so my scandinoir experiences are thin (I think I gave up after the second film in The Girl with the Increasingly Passive Character trilogy). Continue reading →