Stieg Larsson's Millennium Trilogy paved the way for what has been dubbed in the United States the "Scandinavian Crime Wave." Following the posthumous publishing of Larsson's novels, following his death in 2004, the books quickly became best sellers, in spite of the harsh and near-unbearable – but fascinating – subject matter of all three stories. At the heart of the trilogy are the disgraced journalist Mikael Blomkvist and the tattooed hacker Lisbeth Salander, who together create a captivating odd couple. The movie rights were unsurprisingly picked up and the trilogy was adapted for Swedish audiences by Niels Arden Oplev. Michael Nyqvist starred as Blomkvist and Noomi Rapace as Salander. Two years later, the American adaptation dropped with a "Dragon Tattoo" directed by David Fincher and starring Daniel Craig and Rooney Mara.
While we wait for the second piece of the trilogy Stateside, another Scandinavian adaptation has quietly come down the pipeline, moving through theaters in limited release and hitting American DVD earlier this month. The film? "Easy Money," the Swedish thriller based on Jens Lapidus' 2006 novel. The movie adaptation stars Joel Kinnaman ("The Killing" and the upcoming "RoboCop" revamp) as a poor college student who gets mixed up in the dark underworld of drug dealing to earn money and keep a high status among his peers at school. Lapidus is set to release a sequel to Easy Money this summer.
Two years ago, an American remake was reported to be in the works, with Zac Efron attached to star in the role originated by Kinnaman. Though it has yet to materialize, the film was supposed to be a stepping stone for Efron to shed his teen heartthrob image. While updating this for an American audience, it seems uncertain as to whether the filmmakers would keep the film set in Sweden. In the American version of Larsson's work, the Scandinavian backdrop is essential. In the case of "Easy Money," it could easily translate into an American setting.
In another case of Americanizing Scandinavian culture, Martin Scorsese announced in 2011 that he'd be directing Jo Nesbo's thriller The Snowman. The project is currently low- to no-radar, as Scorsese went to work on "The Wolf of Wall Street" and has several other projects lined up. The Snowman is right up Scorsese's alley, though, so here's hoping he gets back to it.
The tricky thing about bringing foreign fiction to the big screen for American audiences is that what worked elsewhere isn't destined to work Stateside. In the case of what will (hopefully) be the full Millennium Trilogy adaptation, the stories carried so well over to American audiences, providing exciting and thrilling plots. The thrill of the dark undercurrent of Swedish culture was something American viewers and readers hadn't seen before. Thriller fans ate it up across the country. If that's any indication at all, the Scandinavian crime wave phenomenon will thrive, whether or not things get lost in translation on its way to our screens.
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