Producers of The Snowman, a film based on the eponymous book by Norwegian writer Jo Nesbø in 2017, seemed to have in mind the same success of Millennium: Men Who Did not Love Women, who was also based on a Nordic writer. However, the good result of the book The Snowman is very far from the big screen.
The film’s lack of quality appeared before even the audience could form their own opinion. Desperate for criticism, the director of the film, Tomas Alfredson, predicted a rejection of the film and said that the film is not complete because he did not have enough time to film everything in Norway, and discovered that there were other elements missing when editing process started. This type of hurried shooting is very reminiscent of what happens with television shows, where low budget and the need to present something fast make the result fall short of expectations.
The scenes seem to start in the middle and end before the end. So, in this work of suspense, it is no surprise then that the film displeases so much. The beautiful landscapes of Norway and a beautiful photograph can not hide the lack of structure and expectation in the film, which tells the story of a psychopath named Snowman and targets young mothers, an idea that could give shivers by itself , but that fails in the lack of structure of the plot.
However, it is not only the plot that discourages. The characters themselves are not good enough. If Harry Hole in the book is a dissolute detective, but full of emotional complexity – both his work and his love life – here the character (Michael Fassbender) seems to have problems only on the surface, making it almost annoying. Her new sidekick, Katrine Bratt (Rebecca Ferguson), never seems to have her story completely told. Some characters are still fun, like Rakel (Charlotte Gainsbourg), but they can not carry the entire movie.
Although the result of the film is not a surprise for the cinema (there have already been many films that have failed on the big screen), it seems that the failure here is surprisingly similar to those on television. Back in the day, TV copied successful films and made them into clichés and not much structure, but watched for lack of content. With the arrival of video streaming services like Netflix, and with the cheapening of many productions through less expensive film equipment, began to appear dozens of works directed to the television and the internet, good and bad.
No longer copying movies, movies began copying other serials, often only containing the most extravagant parts of them, and leaving aside any complexity in the narrative. Although not a series, Snowman seems to belong to this trend. With a style more concerned with showing beautiful images and bizarre deaths (also an arrangement of many current television programs), the film leaves aside any attempt to explain its scenes, only showing the details more clichés and shocking. Maybe it’s the first time a feature has been so much like those serials that were only watched as a hobby for lack of something better. The problem is: now, there is no one who wants to just spend time in the movies.
(article translated from the original version in portuguese, by Google Translate)