Headhunters (2011)

Movie Info :

Headhunters stars the talented Aksel Hennie (Max Manus) as Roger, a charming scoundrel and Norway's most accomplished headhunter. Roger is living a life of luxury well beyond his means, and stealing art to subsidize his expensive lifestyle. When his beautiful gallery owner wife introduces him to a former mercenary in the possession of an extremely valuable painting, he decides to risk it all to get his hands on it, and in doing so discovers something which makes him a hunted man. Headhunters is based on Jo Nesbø's best-selling thriller from 2008.

Critics Rating and Audience Score :

Tomatometer

93%

Flixter Score

85%

IMDB

7.6

My Review :

"Headhunters" is a gripping Norwegian thriller that begins with an art robbery and evolves into a lot more. It is the sort of film that you may approach with skepticism but will quickly find yourself completely hooked. "Extreme" is the definitely the word to describe this film. There is a lot of blood and excrement, and the main character ends up being doused in it more often than you might expect. Outside of the slightly over-the-top violence and unpleasant outhouse scene, this film has a solid story with good acting by all of its leads. Aksel Hennie does a great job of capturing our empathy in spite of his character flaws. Realistically, both leads are bad guys but they easily establish who is the protagonist and antagonist. Nikolaj Coster-Waldau was really intense, and I actually found Julie Ølgaard to have the most impressive performance as Lotte. The twists are subtle, allowing a slightly altered perspective to surprise you rather than a shocking revelation. I wouldn't put "Headhunters" on my list of favorite thrillers, but it's definitely worth a watch if you're tired of the cookie cutter American rendition.