Headhunters (2011)

August 19, 2017 2:54 PM

Headhunters (Hodejegerne), a fantastic action thriller film, based on the 2008 novel of the same name by Norwegian Jo Nesbø. Aksel Hennie portrays the successful but insecure corporate recruiter Roger Brown who lives a double life as an art thief to fund his lavish lifestyle. He finds out that one of his job prospects is in possession of a valuable painting and sets out to steal it.

The film is the highest-grossing Norwegian film of all time.

posted by growabrain (8 comments total)

Oh, hey, we saw this because my SO has been a Nikolaj Coster Waldau fangirl (her words) since New Amsterdam.

And I remember almost nothing about it, except it's pretty tense.
posted by under_petticoat_rule at 5:30 PM on August 19, 2017

Oh, there's a lot of stuff I remember, but I can't tell any of it because HYUUUUUUGE SPOILERS. I'll wait until other people watch it.
posted by rednikki at 9:00 AM on August 20, 2017

It's pretty good in the thriller-with-nonsensical-plot category. There's 36 min of exposition and then it's 1 hour of non-stop action, quite violent and gory, with poor Roger getting in all sorts of deep, deep shit (he's called Brown for a reason I guess), and a lot of very very silly dark comedy (overweight twin policemen as airbags, toilet paper tubes as snorkels...). The material would be perfect for the Coen brothers of Fargo / Burn after reading / The Big Lebowski / Blood Simple / Raising Arizona: the main character is supposedly successful but acts/looks like the kind of sad sack often found in the Coens' movies. Still, I can't decide if it's meant seriously or if it's just deadpan Norwegian humour. Neither the plot nor NCW's character make any sense: perhaps it's a parody of those extra convoluted plots that have been plaguing the thriller genre since The Big Sleep. I did prefer Kraftidioten, perhaps because it embraced its dark comedy roots more openly.
posted by elgilito at 11:45 AM on August 20, 2017 [2 favorites]

Thank you elgiliti, I'll check out Kraftidioten.

By the way, this may be a good place to mention: To see m/any movie nowadays, Google "NameOfMovie watch online", and you'll find streaming services that have it. As long as you don't click on the bad pop-ups, usually you're fine.
posted by growabrain at 12:57 PM on August 20, 2017

So I saw 'kraftidioten' (which means 'an idiot') and I enjoyed it a lot. I loved Bruno Ganz as the Serbian godfather, and it reminded me very much of the winter of 1973 I spent in a Norwegian farm.

Here is the Wikipedia list of Norwegian films - I'm going to dig in.
posted by growabrain at 10:44 PM on August 20, 2017

If it can beat this scene from Troll Hunters:

"Are you Christian? They can smell Christian blood!"
"I'm Muslim! Am I safe when we sneak up on them?"
(taking the notion very seriously)"... I have no idea."

Troll Hunters may have been Swedish rather than Norwegian, tho. Teh Goobles is failing me tonite.
posted by Slap*Happy at 10:48 PM on August 20, 2017

I enjoyed this much more than I expected - it is very much a Norwegian take on a Coen Bros movie. The movie is responsible for getting me to read the books of Jo Nesbo.
posted by hoodrich at 12:58 PM on August 21, 2017 [1 favorite]

I prefer Headhunters over Kraftidioten. Not that there's anything wrong with Kraftidioten but Headhunters has more of everything (action, comedy, drama). Totally over the top but that's how I like it.
posted by Kosmob0t at 1:38 AM on August 23, 2017 [1 favorite]