A dystopian medical thriller in a short format for young viewers. 12 girls are trapped in a mansion, but why are they there, and is it for real? (Please note, this review may contain spoilers.) Scandinavian public broadcasters are required by law to offer programming for children and teens, including drama series. This is something…
Nordic mythology is rich, old and popular but has only served as foundation for Nordic fantasy movies to a limited extent. Border is the Swedish arthouse fantasy that takes troll mythology to another level. And that is not surprising, since the book that the film is based on was written by John Ajvide Lindqvist, author…
A ghost slashes students in this Danish teen horror that touches on Nordic social issues in a merger of two successful genres that were not common in Scandinavia at the time it was made. As we have seen, for example when Norwegian horror movies started to take off in the early 00s, small countries don’t…
They save female-driven revenge movies is the hottest in exploitation cinema these days. Sweden’s most recent genre entry Sargad is part of that trend. Written by and starring Sarah Giercksky, Sargad (a Swedish word meaning hurt, damaged, broken) tells the story of what happens when Elina, her younger sister and mother spends a few days…
Jo Nesbø is one of Norway’s biggest literary exports, world famous for his Harry Hole crime novels. On the side he is also a children’s book author, and two feature films have been adapted from his Doctor Proctor series. This is the first one. Having sold more than 30 million crime novels in over 40…
Does it live up to its gory hype? Lyst is Severin Eskeland’s second feature film, a rape-revenge psychological horror-thriller where alcohol, pills, blood and self destruction is fatally mixed. Lisa Rostorp is a famous novelist, living on her own somewhere in Norway. She has sold millions of books, appeared on national talkshows and are in…
Possibly Norway’s first haunted house movie, The House has many things laid before its feet and picks some of them up. After having directed music videos, shorts, underground cult films and worked as a prop guy on mainstream movies and TV, Reinert Kiil has now “grown up” with his first theatrical directorial feature, the ghost…
If your teacher gets fired for making violent movies during the weekends, would you not be curious about those movies? Svart Snø is a politically incorrect black comedy that pisses on the establishment, and then some. Set in the days between Christmas and New Years Eve, the story is told in a series of reverse…
Low budget film making is sometimes a creative field, but for some it is a necessity and it doesn’t always hit the target. This movie, from the creators of Dead Snow and Kill Buljo, was probably more fun to make than it is to watch. Following the story structure of Blair Witch Project, Kurt Josef Wagle og…
We have had surges of slashers, floods of mythology movies and torrents of indie horrors. Now the scene is set for The wave, but will it drown in competition with Hollywood? Touted as being the first disaster movie to come out of Scandinavia, Roar Uthaug’s The wave splashed its way through Norwegian cinemas with great success…
In this rare adventure, science and fantasy is crossed and action is mixed with thrills to create an exciting ride for the entire family. From the director of Cold Prey 3 comes this family oriented fantasy adventure, based on an original script by John Kåre Raake. Not a popular franchise, not a previously known game,…
After years of production and massive internet hype, the Swedish short film Kung Fury finally hit audiences with all its martial arts, Nazis, Vikings, dinosaurs and of course David Hasselhoff. Written and directed by David Sandberg, Kung Fury is the 30-minute sensational over-the-top retro-cheesy 1980s throwback actioner that is an hommage to everything that was…
Nobody quite expected that the last movie to star Brasse Brännström would be a rape-revenge story in which the beloved children’s TV actor played a pimp, trafficking a 15 year old girl for money. When Lars Erik “Brasse” Brännström died unexpectedly in August 2014, parts of the childhood of hundreds of thousands of Swedes died…
One of the most celebrated and critically acclaimed Nordic horror movies ever is the Swedish Let the right one in, based on John Ajvide Lindqvist’s book and directed by Tomas Alfredsson. Let the right one in is not just a celebrated and acclaimed film, it is also one of the very few Nordic horror films…
Norway continues to innovate on the exploitation front, this time with the first fully filled nazisploitation feature, complete with naked goodies and robosoldiers. Granted, Dead Snow parts 1 and 2 had nazis and gore in them, but they were not “nazisploitation” films. That’s why it is still fun to observe exploitation newbies like Norway because…
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