Netflix enters 'Scandi-crime' market with Swedish thriller

Netflix said Thursday it had ordered its first Swedish original series from the writer of worldwide hit "The Bridge," capitalizing on the huge global appetite for Scandinavian noir television.

Adapted from the international best-seller by novelist Malin Persson Giolito, "Quicksand" tells the story of a teenager on trial for murder after a mass school shooting in an affluent Stockholm suburb.

Published in 26 countries and voted Nordic Crime Novel of the year in 2016, the story has been adapted for TV by Camilla Ahlgren, the head writer on Danish-Swedish thriller "The Bridge," and will go into production in 2018.

"Malin Persson Giolito's novel Storst av Allt (Quicksand) is an original, fresh and suspenseful drama that we believe will make a fantastic Netflix series," producer Pontus Edgren said in a statement.

"We asked one of Scandinavia's most respected writers, Camilla Ahlgren, to work with us and she was equally thrilled."

Ahlgren said it would be "a great honor and challenge" to rework the thriller and love story about "guilt, responsibility, punishment and redemption" for TV.

The "Scandi-crime" genre -- sometimes known has "Nordic noir" -- has produced numerous global hit shows and movies in recent years, including "The Girl with Dragon Tattoo" and its sequels, "Borgen," "Wallander," and "The Killing."

"The Bridge" (2011) -- shown in over 100 countries and remade in both the US and in a British-French reworking called "The Tunnel" -- begins with the discovery of a dead body exactly on the center of the crossing over the Oresund Strait between Malmo and Copenhagen.

"Sweden has a tradition of great crime literature and series and we've been looking for something special in this area," said Erik Barmack, Netflix's vice president of international original series.

source: AFP