Scandinavian TV, film and literature has been a remarkable phenomenon over the past decade, with the wordwide success of 'The Killing', 'Let The Right One In' and 'The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo'. 'The Keeper of Lost Causes', based on an international bestseller written by Jussi Adler-Olsen, is a new Danish film in the same gritty noir crime thriller mould that many viewers have become accustomed to.
Nikolaj Lie Kaas plays Carl Mørck, an arrogant and cantankerous homocide detective who nobody wants to work with even though he's good at his job. After a botched raid puts himself and his partner in hospital, Carl is demoted to a desk job handling old cases which were never resolved. Carl's job was to check each file and report on each case, but to never go beyond this remit. His life might be a mess, but Carl never played by the rules so why should he start now? He chooses a curious missing persons case which was tagged as a suicide. He's ably assisted by the far more optimistic Assad (Fares Fares), and thus begins a peculiarly Nordic bromance dead set on fighting crime.
Director Mikkel Nørgaard spares no expense in showing us every crime thriller cliché available, saved not only by the two leads but the inventive means used by the captor for his victim. Far too many leaps of faith have to be taken to understand Carl's process of elimination, in what is a very straightforward thriller that lacks any real tension or plot twists. 'The Keeper of Lost Causes' often feels like a TV pilot, and the ending of the film surely means there is more to come. For anyone familiar with the Nordic Noir Wave with classic TV series such as 'The Killing', 'Wallander' and 'The Bridge', 'The Keeper of Lost Causes' will probably be a disappointment. For the rest, this film is a good introduction to a particular genre that the Scandinavians do so well.
Nikolaj Lie Kaas plays Carl Mørck, an arrogant and cantankerous homocide detective who nobody wants to work with even though he's good at his job. After a botched raid puts himself and his partner in hospital, Carl is demoted to a desk job handling old cases which were never resolved. Carl's job was to check each file and report on each case, but to never go beyond this remit. His life might be a mess, but Carl never played by the rules so why should he start now? He chooses a curious missing persons case which was tagged as a suicide. He's ably assisted by the far more optimistic Assad (Fares Fares), and thus begins a peculiarly Nordic bromance dead set on fighting crime.
Director Mikkel Nørgaard spares no expense in showing us every crime thriller cliché available, saved not only by the two leads but the inventive means used by the captor for his victim. Far too many leaps of faith have to be taken to understand Carl's process of elimination, in what is a very straightforward thriller that lacks any real tension or plot twists. 'The Keeper of Lost Causes' often feels like a TV pilot, and the ending of the film surely means there is more to come. For anyone familiar with the Nordic Noir Wave with classic TV series such as 'The Killing', 'Wallander' and 'The Bridge', 'The Keeper of Lost Causes' will probably be a disappointment. For the rest, this film is a good introduction to a particular genre that the Scandinavians do so well.