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Category Archives: Crime fiction and film from Scandinavia
Dishing up Pulp Curry in a new way: why I am starting a Substack newsletter
After much thought I have decided that to experiment with moving the focus of my blogging from this site to a new Pulp Curry Substack newsletter.
Why am I doing this?
The first post on this website appeared on July 2010 (about the incredibly underrated 1979 Australian heist film, Money Movers – you can read the post here). I’ve been writing on the site with varying frequency ever since (579 posts in all), and for the most part have enjoyed it immensely.
But for the last 12 or so months I just haven’t been feeling it – or getting the hits to make it seem worthwhile – and have started to wonder whether it’s worth continuing with the effort. Posting on a website has been starting to feel like the equivalent of trying to read a broadsheet newspaper in a crowded tram carriage, unwieldy and inconvenient.
And, thinking about it, I suspect the blog format is starting to get a bit stale for me and is actually now a brake on my posting more regularly.
I know that I’m no Robinson Crusoe in this regard. The majority of the blogs I used to follow have gradually fallen by the wayside, as people have moved on, grown weary of the effort, found other interests, adopted other means to get their message out, or, in some cases (gulp), died.… Read more
Posted in 1960s American crime films, 1970s American crime films, 1980s American crime films, 1990s American crime films, Adrian McKinty, Albert Dekker, Andre De Toth, Angela Savage, Angie Dickinson, Anthony Zerbe, Asian noir, Australian crime fiction, Australian crime film, Australian noir, Australian popular culture, Australian pulp fiction, Australian television history, Ava Gardner, Beat culture, Belmont Tower Books, Ben Wheatley, Billie Whitelaw, Black pulp fiction, Blaxsploitation, Book cover design, Book Reviews, British crime cinema, British pulp fiction, Bryan Brown, Burt Lancaster, Carter Brown, Charles Durning, Charles Willeford, Chester Himes, Christopher G Moore, Christopher Lee, Cinema culture, Claude Atkins, Coronet Books, Crawford Productions, Crime Factory, Crime Factory Publications, Crime fiction, Crime fiction and film from Africa, Crime fiction and film from Cambodia, Crime fiction and film from China, Crime fiction and film from India, Crime fiction and film from Indonesia, Crime fiction and film from Japan, Crime fiction and film from Laos, Crime fiction and film from Latin and Central America, Crime fiction and film from Malaysia, Crime fiction and film from New Zealand, Crime fiction and film from Scandinavia, Crime fiction and film from Singapore, Crime fiction and film from South Korea, Crime fiction and film from Thailand, Crime fiction and film from the Philippines, Crime Fiction and film set in Vietnam, Crime film, Dangerous Visions and New Worlds Radical Science Fiction 1950 to 1985, David Goodis, David Peace, David Whish-Wilson, Derek Raymond, Diana Dors, Dirk Bogarde, Don Siegel, Don Winslow, Donald Westlake aka Richard Stark, Dystopian cinema, Ernest Borgnine, Eurocrime, Fawcett Gold Medal Books, Femme fatale, Fernando Di Leo, Filipino genre films, Film Noir, Forgotten Melbourne, French cinema, French crime fiction, Garry Disher, Gene Hackman, George V Higgins, Georges Simenon, Ghost Money, Giallo cinema, Gil Brewer, Girl Gangs, Biker Boys and Real Cool Cats: Pulp Fiction & Youth Culture, 1950-1980, Gloria Grahame, Gold Star Publications, Gregory Peck, Gunshine State, Heist films, Horror, Horwitz Publications, Humphrey Bogart, Ian Fleming, Interviews, Ira Levin, James Caan, James Crumley, James Ellroy, James Hadley Chase, James Woods, Jim Brown, Jim Thompson, Joel Edgerton, John Frankenheimer, Joseph Losey, Karen Black, Kerry Greenwood, Kinji Fukasaku, Larry Kent, Lee Marvin, Leigh Redhead, Lindy Cameron, M Emmet Walsh, Mad Max, Mafia, Malla Nunn, Martin Limon, Megan Abbott, Melbourne International Film Festival, Melbourne Writers Festival, Men's Adventure Magazines, Michael Caine, Michael Fassbender, Mickey Spillane, Monarch Books, Ned Kelly Awards, Neo Noir, New English Library, Newton Thornburg, Noir Con, Noir fiction, Non-crime reviews, Oren Moverman, Orphan Road, Ozsploitation, Pan Books, Parker, Paul Newman, Peter Boyle, Peter Strickland, Peter Yates, Poliziotteschi, Pulp fiction, Pulp fiction in the 70s and 80s, Pulp fiction set in Asia, Pulp Friday, Pulp paperback cover art, Qui Xiaolong, Raymond Chandler, Richard Burton, Richard Conte, Robert Aldrich, Robert Mitchum, Robert Ryan, Robert Stone, Rock Hudson, Roger Smith, Rollerball, Rosaleen Norton, Roy Scheider, Rural noir, Sam Levene, Sam Peckinpah, Samuel Fuller, Science fiction and fantasy, Scripts Publications, Sidney Lumet, Sidney Poitier, Simon Harvester, Snowtown, Snubnose Press, Spies, Stanley Baker, Sterling Hayden, Steve McQueen, Sticking it the the Man Revolution and Counter Culture in Pulp and Popular Fiction 1950 1980, Stuart Rosenberg, Tandem Books, Tart noir, Tartan Noir, Ted Lewis, Toni Johnson Woods, True crime, Vicki Hendricks, Victor Mature, Vintage mug shots, Vintage pulp paperback covers, Wallace Stroby, War film, Westerns, William Friedkin, Woody Strode, Yakuza films, Yaphet Kotto
MIFF progress report #3: A Touch of Sin and Call Girl
The third and final part of my report back from the 2013 Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF) looks at the Chinese film A Touch of Sin and Call Girl, a Swedish neo noir set in the early seventies.
First up, Call Girl. Apparently based on actual events, this 2012 thriller was one of the real surprises for me at MIFF.
Sweden is in election mode and it is seven days before the nation goes to the polls. It’s a universe away from Iris and her best friend Sonja, two young juvenile delinquents sent to live in a home for troubled youths.
The home has virtually zero supervision and the young people seem free to come and go at all hours of the day and night. Remember this is Sweden in the early seventies, an ultra permissive, self proclaimed social democratic paradise where the authorities are thinking about decriminalizing certain types of incest and the cops crack jokes about capitalism.
Tthrough a series of unfortunate interactions the two girls find themselves drawn into the orbit of a procurer for the sex trade called Dagmar and her creepy sidekick and lover, Roy.
Dagmar runs a call girl operation. Not just any call girl racket. Her clients include senior civil servants, politicians (including the Minister of Justice) and police.… Read more
Posted in Crime fiction and film from China, Crime fiction and film from Scandinavia, Crime film, Melbourne International Film Festival, Neo Noir
Tagged A Touch of Sin (2013), Call Girls (2012). Melbourne International Film Festival 2013, Jia Zhunghe, Mikael Marcimain, Swedish neo noir cinema, Tinker Tailor Solider Spy (2011)
Crime time at the 2013 Melbourne International Film Festival
The Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF) approaches and, and as was the case in 2012, the good people at MIFF HQ have been good enough to give me media accreditation to cover some of the crime films on the program.
When I started to write this piece on my crime cinema picks for MIFF 2013, I realised nearly all my choices were films set outside of the Anglo world. This is in line with my usual practice of viewing films that I think are unlikely to get a mainstream release here. But it also reflects my growing interest in how developing or countries from the global South view and define crime cinema and crime and noir narratives.
Grigis
One of my favourites from MIFF 2011 was the Congalese film Viva Riva, the story of a small-time gangster who returns from neighbouring Angola with a truckload of stolen petrol he hopes to sell Kinshasa at top dollar. I’m hoping that Grigis, a 2011 France/Chad coproduction is as good.
Directed by French-Chadian Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, it focuses on a young physically handicapped Chadian man who earns a living as a photographer and dancer in nightclubs, but yearns to make enough money to pay Mimi, one of the hostesses in the bar he works in, to marry him.… Read more
Posted in Crime fiction and film from Africa, Crime fiction and film from China, Crime fiction and film from Scandinavia, Melbourne International Film Festival
Tagged A Quiet Place in the Country (1968), A Touch of Sin (2013), Call Girl (2012), Death For Sale (2011), Gangs of Wasseypur, Grigis (2011), Italian Giallo cinema, Jia Zhunghe, Joshua Oppenheimer, Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, Melbourne International Film Festival, Monsoon Shoot Out (2013), The Act of Killing (2012), The Pyjama Girl Case (1977)
Headhunters and Laughing Policemen
Such is the speed with which Hollywood is keen to co-opt Scandinavian crime fiction, that even before the movie version of Jo Nesbo’s Headhunters hit Australian cinemas, a US remake was in the works.
I’m curious what exactly the remake could do differently, given that Headhunters already feels so much like a mainstream American thriller.
By that I mean it is slick, fast paced and requires viewers to suspend their disbelief to an increasing degree as the plot unfolds.
I make no bones about my lack of knowledge of Scandinavian crime fiction and film, but it seems to me the only really Nordic qualities Headhunters has are some pretty creepy characters, the huge level of graphic violence and a lot of Ikea-like interior design.
Not that the film doesnlt have its merits.
Could you submerge yourself in a pit human shit or take another human life to escape someone trying to find and kill you? Those are just two of the situations faced by the main character in Headhunters, Roger Brown (Askel Hennie).
Brown is Norway’s most successful corporate headhunter. He’s got a thing about being short (five and a half feet) and a problem maintaining the lavish lifestyle expected by his taller, impossibly blonde trophy wife, Diana.
To make ends meet Brown moonlights as an art thief.… Read more
Posted in 1960s American crime films, 1970s American crime films, Anthony Zerbe, Crime fiction, Crime fiction and film from Scandinavia, Stuart Rosenberg
Tagged Anthony Zebe, Askel Hennie, Bruce Dern, Game of Thrones, Headhunters (2011), Jo Nesbo, Martin Block, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Per Wahloo and Maj Sjowall, Pocket Money (1973) Cool Hand Luke (1969), Stuart Rosenburg, The Laughing Policeman (1973), Walter Matthau, WUSA (1972)