Good movie but grossly overrated

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Casper, our main character earns a living by skillfully breaking into peoples homes and sell the stolen goods to the local receiver (Jamal). He doesn´t get any respect from Jamal and his men, he is humiliated and it seems that he doesn´t get fair prizes for the goods he has stolen. So one day he is approached by a stranger, that makes a proposition. You get the feeling that Casper senses danger, as well as we does for that matter, as he does not accept the proposition in the first place but later he changes his mind and then the real drama can begin.The stranger is a guy named Bjørn who is involved in organized crime. He has a brothel (this is usually Hells Angels in Denmark) and needs somebody to handle transport, security and economy and slowly, no, very fast as a matter of fact, is Casper in charge of these assignments. Casper wants to be involved but at the same time we get a very clear notion, that at a certain point he cannot pull out without problems. He is slowly losing control over his own life. When the old receiver sends out his guys to get Casper back into his old business a conflict of interests has started that can only be ended in one way...... Casper is together with his kid brother brought out into a forest and taught how to use a gun. By the instructions given you get a very, very clear notion that an execution is going to take place.It´s rare to watch social drama wherein everybody doesn´t stand out on some pathology scale. Casper and the rest of his family doesn´t stand out as sociopaths or having a drug/alcohol addiction. Casper is very affectionate towards his little sister and really seems resourceful here. The mother isn´t introduced much but there is nothing that stand out as suspicious. So the big question - why does Casper and his brother get involved in criminal activities? Well, the explanation cannot be found within the family so instead....? Its the simple fact of growing up in Northvest - or a ghetto for that matter. Its a society within the society governed by its own laws. The mother knows what is going on - suddenly he wears a Rolex watch and it is as if she wants to have a conversation about this but in the same moment gives up. Alone she cannot fight and win the battle to get Casper back on track. The pace of the story, the portrait of the characters and the description of the milieu in "nortvest" is put very well together in this movie. A small masterpiece..../Simon

Michael Noer's 'film 'Northwest' tells the story of a couple of petty criminals in Denmark, who make the mistake of getting into more serious crime than they had perhaps intended. The aesthetic is very similar to one of the sub-plots in the recent television series 'Follow the Money', although without that drama's ludicrous plot. The story is quite convincing, but what's absent is the air of redeeming tenderness that a director such as Ken Loach might have brought to this subject matter: the protagonists are not particularly likable even at the start of their unfortunate journey, not clearly nicer than those who threaten them. The ambiguity of the ending seems wrong as well, nothing is added (and something is missed) with the decision to end the story at what should be its point of climax.

Some people expect that Scandinavia has no problems; here you can see gangs and violence in Denmark. "Nordwest" is very entertaining movie about Danish underworld. Besides that, it is important to highlight the successful narrative strategy chosen by movie makers: exploring the contrasts. Throughout the movie, until the very end, the story alternates between family life and crime, poor and wealthy living, immigrants and white men, intimidation and fear, child innocence and bandit violence, preserving the brother and introducing him to the gang, defenseless prostitutes and mob warriors, noise and silence, fast pace and stillness. I strongly recommend this film. Some people complained about the end, but I think it was a great idea. Indeed, that's the difference between obvious formulas and the mastery of the cinema language.

A nice story of small gangsters trying to stay above water. The relationships in this and the characters are well drawn and avoid getting into too many cliché traps. The movie/script is well written too of course, but it is the actors who carry the weight. It's tough playing off each other and making the audience buy that.I doubt this will be your first venture into crime story foray, but if you have a knack for European style of showing things (read: not as fancy as a Hollywood Blockbuster would show them), you will really relish watching this. There is violence and there is many adult situations happening, so you should be fine with watching that. If that is the case, there is a more than decent movie to enjoy here