The Snowman

This movie once again confirms that transferring a quality book onto the big screen is not so easy. At first glance, everything seemed pretty good. The cast with the lead Michael Fassbender is great. The man in the director’s seat is adequately Nordic. What else could you ask for? If only the screenplay was a bit more logical. This way I pretty much  watched this film without much interest, even though there was a number of really interesting actors. For example, Val Kilmer, whom I have not seen for a thousand years and I will not need to see him for another thousand years. Or J. K. Simmons, who was possibly just a decoration in the movie as I cannot recall him doing anything at all. Well, he actually did do something, he was taking creepy pictures of women on his phone and consequently the screenwriter did not even explain why. And that was the same with everything, the schmuck. It is crazy that the main character Harry Hole, played by Michael Fassbender, seems like he just had a lobotomy, so it feels like he isn’t investigating at all, plus, what is even worse, you way too often realize that he does not speak at all. The cynical bastard Hole, whom all the people who’ve read the book love for the endless bullshit he says, utters at maximum two sentences in a row in the film. How could that make me like him? And the investigation? Just tell me, all of you who haven’t read the book, what was Val Kilmer doing there at all? Or why were the murders committed? Was it obvious from that conclusion? I didn’t feel that way. Overall, a terribly badly filmed crime film that was meant to tell the best story of Harry Hole and, in my opinion, killed the whole series. I haven’t been as pissed off for a long time as I was in the case of this movie. One of the worst crime movies I’ve ever seen. If it weren’t for the beautiful Norwegian locations, I would have left the cinema in the middle of the screening like the Czech film critic Mirka Spáčilová. (12/10/2017)

Poor in terms of story, in terms of form – brilliant. Paradoxically, everybody was worried about all sorts of things, just not a faulty story, especially when it’s filmed according to the Norwegian crime-writer king, Jo Nesba. Alfredson’s realistic approach with wonderful, long shots of seriously snowy landscape warms the heart. The same applies to modern investigation techniques, which aren’t given much room in this movie, because when something starts happening that might be of interest, it cuts to another place – the screenplay diverges from the book. That’s where the problem lies. Fassbender is excellent – a guy a bit off the rails, but still in form, but on the point of giving everything up – is a perfect Hole. On the other, the second most famous name on the poster, Kilmer, comes across as almost charming. Otherwise, the cast is a delight, although they don’t get the chance to show they stuff on screen, which is another reason why lots of scenes seem just to fizzle out. A movie full of contradiction which most likely won’t lead to a series. (15/10/2017)

Some spoilers: Inspired by Douglas and Gilmour93's unconventional defenses of the film, where the director himself admitted that it had no beginning, middle, or end because there was ultimately nothing to use to piece the film together, I also picked up the thrown gauntlet of alternative readings of this jumbled mess and came up with the idea that actually the only thing in the film that's real is the last scene. The rest is a glimpse into a perspective on Detective Harry Hole's past, warped by years of alcoholism and exhaustion, that superimposes disjointed, surreal scenes of his previous cases and burned-out relationships on top of each other. Right when he can just barely reach specific occurrences in his memory, he disappears right before he can touch them under the ice of an irreparably damaged mind. Postmodernism lives even if it doesn't want to, and old Lynch is somewhere in the back, nodding approvingly over his cigarette. PS: it still looks better than a lot of other adaptations of Nordic mysteries, though, and Alfredson's handling of space, camera work, and (wherever the wind keeps him from tripping over his own feet) dynamics is exemplary. But unfortunately, you simply can't turn a concentration camp into a bouncy castle by simply redoing a few barbed wires. (03/01/2018)

The book The Snowman marked a certain turning point, during which the series began to be uncomfortably suggestive and the murderous scenes became so precise and terrifying that one would look over their shoulder at home, wondering if something bad was waiting for them in the corner. At the same time, it was the most cinematic installment of the series so far, offering a great thriller. However, my fear that the main guide to Oslo in winter could fail in motion picture format was confirmed. Harry Hole, the hero of my favorite crime series, has already experienced, endured, and drunk quite a lot at this point in his life and career. His depressive substrate is soaked with losses and dismal periods in both adulthood and childhood. The film presents us with Harry, who is just a drinker, and it is not clear whether it is due to his breakup or simply because he does not currently have anything to dig into at work. Both reasons seem quite trivial, so it is good that the first snow comes and with it the murders that everyone who has heard of Jon Nesbø's books eagerly awaits. This sets the stage for the investigation carousel, which nonetheless seems almost ridiculous. The main characters ask a few questions, spend a lot of time examining the background of the Winter Games in Norway, and try to unravel the past of several anonymously acting characters. The problem is that the suggestiveness has disappeared from the adaptation. Murders either happen off-screen or are completely uninteresting. The present and past storylines do not intersect in the end; on the contrary (and this is a criticism I cannot forgive), the trio of screenwriters decides to openly deviate from the original, turning a crucial subplot into a dragging dead end. Moreover, I still remember how while reading, I thought I had the identity of the killer clear, but the author surprised me every time and played out the plot so far that three different characters could have been the culprit, and the twist in each case seemed similarly unquestionable. However, the film shoots down both incorrect theories and prematurely labels them as false, confusing the viewer perfectly and making some of the false clues almost insulting in retrospect. At this point, my initial disappointment is not far from anger, and I only give it a second star out of mercy because Charlotte Gainsbourg seems to have stepped out of my imagination as "my" Rachel, and because of the sad realization that in different hands, Michael Fassbender could truly be the perfect Harry. Nonetheless, I pray that the escalation towards an even more intense The Leopard hinted at in the finale does not come to pass. (23/10/2017)

What a disaster. I have no idea why the creators decided to introduce Harry Hole to the audience through an adaptation of the sixth part of the book series. I don't know what someone who has never read the series can take away from the film, as it contains a lot of references to the previous storyline which isn’t part of the film. The film itself didn't make much sense to me, regardless of having read the books. The filmmakers made such a mess of the original story that I’m not sure why the murders were so complicated, and most of all, why J.K. Simmons agreed to take part in it. (07/03/2018)