We don’t like Brown, but we do understand him, and we accept his honesty about himself. It’s a fine line to walk, and Hennie and the script do a fine job. The fact that the script and the character are candid about his flaws helps us to warm to him, even as he proves a completely shifty and untrustworthy (and surprisingly cowardly) protagonist. Aksel Hennie plays Roger Brown, and manages to make him oddly relatable, even if he is completely shallow and transparent. Still, most second jobs don’t involved the theft of antique and intensely valuable works of art that are ferried out of the country and sold for hugesums of money. The film works best as a grim black comedy, following the trials and tribulations of a sleazy recruitment officer who supports his lifestyle by taking a second job. (And even then, there’s a considerable divide between Norway and Sweden.) I have to admit, making the comparison feels just a bit lazy, as Headhunters is definitely a very different movie experience – and I mean that in a good way. However, that’s about all that connects these two pieces of entertainment, save geography.
The adaptation itself is brought to the screen by the same company, Yellow Bird. Even before the movie entered development, the author found himself fighting off comparisons to Stieg Larsson, the author of that iconic series. It’s difficult to read anything about the film that doesn’t make some sort of reference to the break-out Scandinavian film franchise of the past decade, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.
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