Black Crab

Watchable for its amazing sets/locations and good action scenes.

The actual story or plot eluded me unfortunately. Hence I couldn't understand the key protagonists intentions nor motivations. Completely unrelatable.

Sort of ok if you accept that. 😝

Black Crab: This SF/War film is no classic but is far better than what some critics say. Sweden is divided by a savage civil war, civilians are targeted. No explanation is given for the cause of the conflict. The war continues during a bleak winter, buildings are largely destroyed yet improbably still standing. Refugees are everywhere. So reminiscent of what's happening in Ukraine right now. Noomi Rapace is a conscripted soldier chosen for a special mission, she must join a group skating across ice behind enemy lines to deliver a package to an isolated facility. She constantly thinks of her missing daughter, snatched earlier in the war. Even before the mission begins she has a life and death struggle with feral bandits, intent on robbing her vehicle. The collapse of civilization is vividly captured. The terror of crossing the ice, thin at times, the riskk of falling through, coming across frozen bodies seemingly in their hundreds under the ice. A savage film made even more desolate by the realisation that anyone might be an enemy no matter how innocent they look. Helicopter gunships like birds of prey overhead. A good near future thriller with a few flaws and twists in its tail. Directed and Co-Written by Adam Berg. On Netflix. 7/10.

A bit of a different twist on the post apocalyptic war movie, grim and dark and full of crackling ice and brooding synth drones, with a distinctly Scandinavian flavour. Nice to see a film like this done reasonably well in a language other than English.

Unfortunately it gets mostly undone by the usual cheesy character motivations, as the only thing our selfish "hero" cares about is a family member, not so much about the fate of every other human on the planet. Which in itself would be annoying enough as it is, but it's even worse when it causes the whole first 90% of the movie to become pointless when we reach the final 10%.

I held off watching this until there were no better options due to the low ratings and reviews, so I didn't have high expectations for this Swede film. But wow was I ever impressed, especially when I found out this was Sweden's music-video maker Adam Berg's first full length feature film as writer and director.

The story was excellent and refreshingly non-Hollywoodish. Some critics felt lost with the timeline changes; they couldn't have been any better! Sure we all wanted some more details to the back-stories, but considering Berg's 114 min well-paced story had non stop edge-of-your-seat action and suspense, I can see how it'd be hard to add more in. I wanted much more story from this little gem and it easily would've held my attention even if it was 3+ hours long.

For that matter, Netflix should make this into a mini-series - it was that good! And it wasn't just a good story, but Berg's directing was perfect, and could easily shame some seasoned directors films that have come out lately. The cinematography was perfection, and the sets, locations and all visuals were stunning. Even the score - especially for an international B-type, film was spot on. All casting and performances were excellent, especially Noomi Rapace, who nailed her role.

Mad props and respect to Berg and Netflix for giving us this little gem. I can't wait to see what Berg comes up with next. So ignore the negative reviews, this is one of the best films for its genre I've seen in years. It's a well deserved 8/10 from me.

The production is decent, acting solid, some visuals are really nice, some moments strong, also the story of Black Crab did hold my attention, but for sure the movie misses here and there some momentum (action) and I would prefer some serious cutting to shorten the movie and cut out some unnecessary scenes or shorten them. Some reviewers complain about the missing of information about the war (who fights for what cause) but I guess this is intentional - does the foot solider ever know why they are fighting, what really the causes and agendas behind a war are? Anyway, watchable but with a better composed script Black Crab could have been a really good one.