Review #712: 'Headhunters' (2011)

Headhunters is one in a long line of recent sophisticated Scandinavian noirs, offering a more thoughtful alternative to some of Hollywood's more mainstream thrillers. Based on the novel Hodejegerne by Jo Nesbo, Headhunters is high on the chase but low on plot, which is sad given the network of corporate sleaze that seems so high on possibilities during the film's opening scenes. It's set-pieces are streaked with wickedness and black comedy, but as they go on and on, and its lead character is dunking himself in human waste to escape an angry dog or surviving a fifty-foot drop off a cliff, it pushes its plausibility to, well, implausible levels.

Aksel Hennie plays Roger Brown, a smug, vertically-challenged corporate headhunter that moonlights as an art thief to fund the lavish lifestyle he believes his supermodel wife (Synnove Macody Lund) wants. He is approached by former military tracker Clas Greve (Games of Thrones' Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), who wants to be chosen by Brown to be the new CEO of Pathfinder, a technologies company. Hennie discovers that Greve has an ultra-rare Rubens painting, and steals it, only to find his wife's mobile phone in Greve's home. After stalling on the job offer, Brown finds himself being hunted by Greve and betrayed by those he believed cared about him.

With his preening demeanour and pale eyes, director Morten Tyldum is asking a lot for the audience to be rooting for Roger Brown's survival. Clas Greve is the one-dimensional bad guy - sneering, chiselled, glowing with self-satisfaction - but there were times I found myself cheering him on. Tyldum wisely portrays Brown's suffering with a tongue locked in cheek, and the situation he finds himself in are suitably amusing, even when they are particularly gruesome. But when his redemption finally comes, it's in favour of an extended collection of set-pieces and little resembling plot, glossing over what could have been a smart corporate thriller.


Directed by: Morten Tyldum
Starring: Aksel Hennie, Synnøve Macody Lund, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Eivind Sander
Country: Norway/Germany

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie