Snapphanar

This is a poor series when it comes to the script. The filming is OK, but the dialogue is really just a waste of time. The characters are just repeating themselves and talking about what to do instead of actually doing it (but perhaps that's pretty accurate when it comes to portraying swedes?).

I can't see why there should be a problem to create a great story on the subject, with all the necessary ingredients. It seems no time at all was spent on doing research. I do NOT want Sweden to go down the road of "nevermind historical correctness, just give the audience a story" when it comes to movies based on actual historic events or periods of time.

The potential was there, but this production blew it.

Good acting, good story, but poor in a historical perspective. The movie set in the time period of Scanian war between Swedes and Danes tells the story of a man who's family is murdered by the Swedes. The main character joins a band of Scanian freedom fighters to seek revenge on the people murdering his family. Places and events are totally fictional which made me a bit disappointed. Maybe I was hoping for a Scanian version of Braveheart/The patriot etc. The name Snapphane, which was used as a pejorative term by the Swedes to describe the pro-Danish rebels,is used by everyone in the movie. Had the people behind the mini series done a better research to make it historical correct I would have giving it a higher vote. Acting and parts of the story is worth 7/10 votes, historically 1/10 so my final vote will be a 4 out of 10. I hope the mini series become an inspiration for others to make more movies in the same genre.

Sorry, must have missed it as a mini. You do mean mini as a min-series on TV don't you? I only saw it as a 2h40m movie of DVD and it was superb. I have alway envisioned Snapphanar as the ultimate freedom-fighters even though I'm a Swede to the death. This movie puts my priorities to shame when you see what atrocities the Swedish army condoned to get the job done, the job being showing the farmers of Skåne what would happen if they supported the Danish army and the Swedes would win the war war. To all you non-swedes, this movie is a cross between The Patriot and Sleepy Hollow, aka Time Well Spent. Of course there is no Gibson or Depp in this one, and it's in a foreign language, but hey!, you might enjoy it anyway =)

But alas, mind you, this could have been a very good movie..

What this film suffers from, and so many other Swedish contemporary films, are the lack of individuality. The glances towards Hollywood are obvious especially in the editing and the cliché's in manuscript. The script is the biggest flaw here. The historical angle (even though a bit resculpted) works fine, but the dialog is absolutely horrible. And as mentioned the cliché's and straight forward plot could have (and has been) stolen from many American adventurefilms. The camera work are very good, the mis-en-scene works fine as well even though the budget was low. Some of the wholeness and flow is disrupted and destroyed from the editing, especially in the fighting scenes. It seems that sometimes the producer has stepped in and said "Too little action here boys, fix that!" The result is just bad version of Matrix crosscutting. Sound works fine as well, works fine on surround. The music tends to be a bit repetitive though. The last twenty minutes plays the same "tick-tock" inspired music that has been in every Swedish TV- production since times beginning. (A pedagogical way to show the viewer that time is of essence. Feel free to get stressed.)

All in all it works as a film made for TV. There are some good actors here but they often get nowhere with their twodimensional characters and lousy dialog.

Biggest plus: A daring try to make film out of Swedish history. Biggest minus: The scriptwriter should be flogged.

4/10

This is by far one of Swedens best efforts ever in the historical epic genre. It looks excellent and expensive, thanks to the effort of the superb cinematographer and Stein/Mårlind. In addition to the highly accomplished look of the film, the story is also fast-paced and holds together to the end, the acting is uniformly excellent as well. I admit to being somewhat biased in my review, as I have been connected to the production as a composer/arranger, alongside the main composer. I have written the orchestral arrangements and composed some additional horror/ambient music cues which has been put to great use and adds a nice flavour to the overall score, I think. Fun that another commenter noticed the music. Sadly, many people couldn't just accept this on its own terms, as a fun action film, and just saw the historical inaccuracies. Funny that many people enjoy western films although they seldom have anything to do with reality.