Best selling thriller writer Jo Nesbo’s books have been made into a couple of films before but The Snowman is the first English language attempt to introduce her troubled cop Harry Hole to cinema audiences.
Harry, played by Michael Fassbender, is estranged from his girlfriend and son and is struggling with an alcohol addiction. A new colleague, Katrina Bratt (Rebecca Ferguson) is investigating a missing persons case. Harry teams up with her and it soon becomes a murder investigation.
There is a lot I enjoyed in this example of one of my favourite genres. The main story is a decent whodunnit with the requisite number of red herrings and the performances of the two leads are good enough for me to have wanted to see them investigate more cases together. Tomas Alfredson captures the beautiful but hostile Swedish scenery really well and ensures the story moves at a good pace.
Unfortunately, the film has its flaws too. A superb set of actors gathered to play supporting characters such as Toby Jones, Chloe Sevigny, Anne Reid, JK Simmons and Charlotte Gainsbourg are both given very little to do and also appear in some unnecessary sub plots. A decision to kill off a main character has the desired shock value but means that the person-in-peril ending did not have the required impact. Finally, there is a bizarre (dubbed?) performance from Val Kilmer that was totally out-of-place.
Despite those problems this is a good procedural that will stand up to multiple viewings.
Rating: 7 out of 10