Invisible Heroes

Forget Argo, watch Invisible Heroes instead. This fantastic political drama is not a Hollywood-style production but a realistic, elegantly executed story. This political drama is set in Chile 1973 where a diplomat's son gets a job at the Finnish Embassy. Soon after, the Pinochet junta performs a coup d'etat and murders president Salvador Allende, after which the new charge d'affairs gets involved in the political turmoil in the way he had never expected. This is not an action thriller but a drama with a natural pace, with beautiful music, excellent production, carefully thought-out and well-crafted characters and superb acting. The drama is extremely intense - I had to watch all six episodes at one go. Highly recommended.

This is a hard core humane series, very much worth watching as character building in historical series are usually quite weak.

Finns are on the other hand very good at character building in serious productions, unlike their Swedish neighbors, who are better at making mainstream entertainment productions suited for easy watching.

So it's absolutely NOT an action series although it's made in the Nordics. The Chilenian history is familiar in Finland and these events are well represented in the series.

The Series is based on real events, which I was not aware of (well, I had some knowledge of the political events in Chile in 1973, but not of the role of the Finnish Embassy), but the depiction is largely as a ball into a single goal - it is known at present that Allende´s regime was not too progressive either, with several gross mistakes in several areas...

Anyway, the Finns and Chileans have jointly created an interesting work to follow, and the leading performances are good and the Spanish they speak sounds decent in my ears (true, when visible, Mikael Persbrandt as Harald Edelstam steals the show). In my opinion, the true events hold the run of events in a plausible manner, with leftist sympathies stressed not distractingly, but still is somehow lacked the depth as in e.g. Argo or some other films or series where there role of an embassy alternates under turbulent times.

I gave it 10 stars so that is pretty much an indication that I loved it. The very real events happened in my formative years and I watched them unfold not just on the news but also a work trip was cancelled because of the political turmoil Right from the start, the careful production design, colour grade and acting style of every cast member places the story exactly where it is supposed to be. The dialogue is realistic and husband and wife team Pelle and Sophia Heikkila carry the major load of the story. All characters are brilliant, even the popinjay styling of Ismael Huerta, on a power trip, which was par for the course of wannabe dictators who really have no clue. The casting was brilliant and all directors and writers have excelled. The music is stunning too, and I make mention here of the scene in the jail between the two guitarists - beautiful emotions in the acting and the music. Who knew that Chile and Finland could achieve such a brilliant series?! We hope that the team stays together and that they can provide more insight s into their worlds. I can't praise this series enough and highly recommend to everyone.