Nordic Noir ‘Wallander’ and ‘The Bridge’ Due May 27
Two stalwarts of Nordic Noir — the ongoing Swedish series “Wallander” and the hit television show “The Bridge” — will arrive on DVD on May 27 courtesy of MHz Home Entertainment as part of that company’s International Mystery Collection. Both “Wallandar” and “The Bridge” have been receiving international critical acclaim and have prompted British and American remakes.
Wallander (Season 3)
Krister Henriksson returns in a stunning performance as Detective Kurt Wallander from the best-selling crime series by Swedish author Henning Mankell. Wallander is Ystad’s veteran detective who’s finally learned to find respite from the job in the moments of grace that came from living on the beach with his dog, Jussi, or spending time with his granddaughter. He’s still on the outs at work, however: offbeat methods make him an irritant for management and his colleague, Martinsson, is angling for his position. But no one in the department has the uncanny sense of the criminal mind that he does. Whether it’s Cold War spies, pedophiles, human traffickers or kidnappers, Wallander knows when he’s being lied to and when the story hasn’t been fully told. Wallander is also trying to get a few things right with his daughter and fellow cop, Linda. He may have been an absentee father, but he’s a very present grandfather and a friend to her and her husband. He’s arrived at his life’s twilight clinging to the one thing he knows, which is how to do police work. In that, Wallander is a man at the top of his game. He’s also a man at the end of his game.
In Swedish with English Subtitles. Four-DVD set with five episodes. Cast: Krister Henriksson, Charlotta Jonsson, Douglas Johansson, Mats Bergman, Fredrik Gunnarsson. Extras: “Wallander’s World” featurette; interview with Krister Henriksson; trailers. 549 minutes. $69.95
“Episode 1: The Troubled Man”: Wallander has found a place in Linda’s family through his enthusiastic embrace of the roles of grandfather and occasional babysitter. When Linda’s father-in-law disappears, he’s drawn into a case that has its roots deep in the Cold War past.
“Episode 2: The Missing”: The mystery of a missing girl draws the entire Ystad police force into a frantic search. But when Wallander begins his own investigation, he sees frightening similarities to a case he had worked on 10 years earlier, which still hits him hard personally.
“Episode 3: The Betrayal”: A young woman reports her mother missing. Soon after, she’s found brutally murdered inside the family home. The primary suspect is the young woman’s father, a motivational speaker who was also in the middle of a nasty split with her mother.
“Episode 4: The Loss”: A young Moldovan woman is found dead at a construction site. When Wallander questions a respectable doctor a little too vigorously, he gets thrown off the case. That doesn’t stop him and he goes to Moldova for more information from her family.
“Episode 5: The Arsonist”: A convicted arsonist returns to his town after he’s served his prison term and is met with hostility from those who remember his crimes. He’s suspected when a kiosk in Ystad burns down and the owner is killed. Unconvinced, Kurt keeps investigating.
The Bridge – Season One
Created and written by Hans Rosenfeldt. “The Bridge” (Danish: Broen; Swedish: Bron) is a Scandinavian crime drama television series, co-produced and financed between Sweden and Denmark. The series aired in Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland and Iceland in 2013 and began airing in the United Kingdom on BBC Four in January 2014, and engendered an FX remake. The series begins when a woman is found murdered in the middle of the Oresund Bridge, right on the border between Sweden and Denmark. Police from both countries are called to the scene and what looks like one murder, turns out to be two. It’s a spectacular double murder: the bodies have been brutally cut in half at the waist and put together to form a single corpse. It’s also just the beginning of a wave of violence the likes of which no one has ever seen before. Both police forces find themselves in a race against the clock in a deadly showdown with a superior enemy, and no one will be the same when it’s over.
In Danish and Swedish with English Subtitles. Four-DVD set. Cast: Sofia Helin, Kim Bodnia, Dag Malmberg, Magnus Krepper, Iggy Malmborg. 580 minutes. $49.95
