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[\/et_pb_fullwidth_post_title][\/et_pb_section][et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ specialty=”on” _builder_version=”3.5.1″ custom_margin=”||0px|” custom_padding=”||0px|” prev_background_color=”#000000″ next_background_color=”#000000″][et_pb_column type=”3_4″ specialty_columns=”3″][et_pb_row_inner admin_label=”Riga” _builder_version=”3.0.47″][et_pb_column_inner type=”4_4″ saved_specialty_column_type=”3_4″][et_pb_image src=”http:\/\/www.detect-project.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/What-is-EURONOIR.jpg” _builder_version=”3.5.1″ border_width_all=”12px” border_color_all=”#ffffff” box_shadow_style=”preset2″ custom_margin=”-140px|||”]<\/p>\n
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[\/et_pb_image][\/et_pb_column_inner][\/et_pb_row_inner][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_4″][et_pb_blurb title=”Euronoir on Twitter” _builder_version=”3.5.1″ header_font=”Roboto|300|||||||” header_text_color=”#476399″ header_font_size=”16px” body_font=”Roboto||||||||” body_text_color=”rgba(0,0,0,0.6)” body_font_size=”12px” border_width_top=”2px” border_color_top=”#dbbb03″ custom_padding=”10px||30px|”]<\/p>\n
Search #Euronoir2019 to follow the conference on Twitter<\/a>.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_blurb][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_section][et_pb_section bb_built=”1″ specialty=”on” _builder_version=”3.5.1″ custom_margin=”0px|||” custom_padding=”0px|||” prev_background_color=”#000000″ next_background_color=”#000000″][et_pb_column type=”3_4″ specialty_columns=”3″][et_pb_row_inner admin_label=”Riga” custom_padding=”0px||0px|” _builder_version=”3.5.1″ custom_margin=”||0px|”][et_pb_column_inner type=”4_4″ saved_specialty_column_type=”3_4″][et_pb_text _builder_version=”3.5.1″]<\/p>\n The third day of the Euronoir conference began with a keynote panel about Nordic Noir in its European Context. Professor Sue Turnbull form the University of Wollongong, Dr. Anna Estera Mrozewicz from the Adam Mickiewickz University in Poland and Professor emerita Gunhild Agger from Aalborg University presented their thoughts on three different case studies of Nordic\/Euronoir series, which introduce their audiences to foreign countries, pressing issues as well as to the shared history of the European continent.<\/p>\n Sue Turnbull started off the morning with \u201ca walk around Iceland\u201d, via the Icelandic TV drama Trapped<\/a>. This seems like a curious topic for a researcher working in Australia on TV shows like Miss Fisher\u2019s Murder Mysteries or Mystery Road., which make a big contribution to the value of the TV drama. However, Sue Turnbull showed that there is a lot of connection between Iceland and Australia \u2013 at least in terms of television. For both landscape is an important element and key to success with audiences abroad. Moreover, both Australia and Iceland are two relatively small TV markets, which means that they have to deal with constraints of funding and creative resources.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column_inner][\/et_pb_row_inner][et_pb_row_inner admin_label=”Riga” custom_padding=”0px|||” _builder_version=”3.5.1″][et_pb_column_inner type=”4_4″ saved_specialty_column_type=”3_4″][et_pb_text _builder_version=”3.5.1″]<\/p>\n \u201cIceland and Australia \u2013 two relatively small television markets\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n What brought Sue Turnbull to Iceland was a trip to the country advertised by Nordic Noir and Beyond<\/a>, inviting crime fans to explore Iceland in the footsteps of Trapped. The narrative of Trapped and its main character, Andri, were used as a starting point for guiding tourists across the island \u2013 including Andri\u2019s food tips. However, as much as she enjoyed her trip around the island, Sue also pointed to the problem of over-tourism<\/a>. After Croatia, Iceland has the second highest ratio of tourists to inhabitants. In 2017, more than 2.2 million people visited Iceland, which has a population of about 360,000.<\/p>\n In Iceland, Sue Turnbull talked to the people involved in film and television production, which helped her construct a timeline of Icelandic television series. Her timeline highlights that TV production in Iceland has sped up in the past 15 years, but still it is a small television market with only about one new domestic series per year. Sue reminded her audience: \u201cbecause the Icelandic audience is so small funding has always had to come from somewhere else\u201d for Icelandic television. Now, this funding also comes from streaming services like Netflix, which is co-producing<\/a> the upcoming Valhalla Murders.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”http:\/\/www.detect-project.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/dscf6013.jpg” show_in_lightbox=”on” _builder_version=”3.5.1″ box_shadow_style=”preset2″ custom_margin=”30px|||” ab_subject=”on” ab_subject_id=”1″]<\/p>\n <\/p>\n [\/et_pb_image][\/et_pb_column_inner][\/et_pb_row_inner][et_pb_row_inner admin_label=”Riga” custom_padding=”0px||0px|” _builder_version=”3.5.1″ custom_margin=”0px||0px|”][et_pb_column_inner type=”4_4″ saved_specialty_column_type=”3_4″][et_pb_text _builder_version=”3.5.1″]<\/p>\n \u201cThe problem for Iceland is \u2013 they haven\u2019t got much crime, so they have to invent it.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Another element of Iceland as a small TV nation is the fact that the group of creatives involved in Icelandic TV production is quite small. Sue Turnbull introduced her audience to three central figures in Icelandic TV: Margr\u00e9t Orn\u00f3lfsdottir, Baltasar Kormakur, the former the storyliner and the latter the director of Trapped, and David Oskar Olafsson, who founded the production company behind The Valhalla Murders. The next \u2018problem\u2019 of the small TV nation Sue pointed her audience to is: \u201cthey haven\u2019t got much crime, so they have to invent it.\u201d Sue reminded the audience thought that serial killers, again, something Iceland doesn\u2019t actually have: \u201cThe only one they had was executed in 1596.\u201d Finally, the creatives she spoke with were frustrated that what the international television market is interested in is only the Icelandic landscape, but the upcoming Valhalla Murders will take place in the city and it will also be the first crime drama with a serial killer.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”3.5.1″]<\/p>\n Wataha: \u201cA crime story has the power to transmit all kinds of values\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Anna Mrozewicz introduced the audience to the Polish TV series Wataha (The Border)<\/a>. The series is set at the border between Poland and Ukraine. The first two series were the most expensive TV series produced in Poland and the most watched on HBO Poland. Its third series on HBO Europe will launch soon. The series also travelled beyond Eastern Europe to the UK where it got favorable reviews<\/a>, praising the ways in which it addresses current issues in European politics and society. Wataha deals with issues such as migration and arms trafficking.<\/p>\n Combining tourist gaze, Nordic Noir and societal critique<\/strong><\/p>\n Anna Mrozewicz introduced her international audience to the difference between the mainstream (public and private channels) and the premium TV outlets (pay-TV and streaming) in Poland. The two differ not only in budget, but also in the way they explore characters and address social and political issues. She emphasized that Wataha would have been a very different series if it had been produced by one of the mainstream commercial channels, for example because the channel would not have invested in shooting the series on the actual location it is set in \u2013 the Bieszczady mountains<\/a> between Poland and Ukraine.<\/p>\n Pointing the opening of the series, Anna Mrozewicz showed the use of Nordic Noir aesthetics in the series. Looking at the changes between series one and two, she highlighted how the series developed from a national into a transnational and European show. Season two has the Ukrainian war as a background, but also evokes memories of World War II. A plotline about a brutal murder of refugees in Poland was told in a way that is reminiscent of the 1941 pogrom against Jews in Jedwabne. She concluded that the series combines a tourist gaze on the Bieszczady mountains with a vision that is \u201cdark and gloomy\u201d \u2013 reminiscent of Nordic Noir. Anna Mrozewicz summarized the importance of Wataha: \u201cIt reflects the dark underside of European society and our European community at large.\u201d<\/p>\n Gunhild Agger: \u201cThe dark history of Europe\u201d in the aftermath of 1968<\/strong><\/p>\n TV historian Gunhild Agger\u2019s talk took a look back into European (TV) history, focusing on how political crime in the aftermath of 1968 was represented on screen in Denmark, Germany and the UK. She explained that she was inspired to look at this period with the anniversaries of 1968 in 2008 and 2018. She highlighted that most of European film and television draws on the historical and contemporary conflicts in the region. Reviewing academic literature about historical film and TV drama, Gunhild Agger drew attention to the importance of remembrance through and around the media.<\/p>\n Her Danish example is Blekingegade<\/a> \u2013 The Left Wing Gang<\/em> (2009 on TV 2 Danmark), which is based on real events, politically-motivated crimes and robberies that unfolded in the 1980s in support of the PFLP. The central figure was Jan Weimann. The Left Wing Gang<\/em> is a series about the consequences of 1968 as a \u201cdark heritage of Europe\u201d, she explained. Gunhild Agger pointed out that the series was a game changer for TV 2. It featured high-profile actors such as Nicolaj Coster-Waldau and aimed at an international market, too, travelling to 48 countries. Subsequently, Gunhild Agger compared the Danish case to Der Baader Meinhof Komplex<\/a><\/em>, a German film from 2008, based on the crimes of the Rote Armee Fraktion (RAF), who not only committed bank robberies but also hostage-taking and murders. Gunhild Aggers third example is The Little Drummer Girl<\/a><\/em>, a series screened on the BBC in 2018, which is based on a novel by John Le Carr\u00e9 and tells the story of an actress recruited by Mossad to infiltrate a Palestinian terrorist group during the 1970s.<\/p>\n TV drama, \u201cthe canary down the mine\u201d of European society<\/strong><\/p>\n During the discussion, the panelists explored the idea that the cases they talked about are \u201cmodern fairy tales\u201d, dramas that do really important cultural work by exploring dark sides of European society and history. Sue Turnbull highlighted how crime drama is \u201clike the canary down the mine\u201d, dramas honing in on what is \u201cbugging\u201d their audience and the societies they live in. After the first morning panel, four parallel session focused on crime fiction from Hungary and Germany, on audience research about the popularity of Euronoir as well as on the production strategies of HBO and Netflix in Europe.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”3.5.1″]<\/p>\n Keynote by Robert Saunders on \u201cthe Political Culture(s) of European Crime Series: Place, Power, Identity\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n Robert Saunders\u2019 keynote addressed the topic \u201cthe Political Culture(s) of European Crime Series: Place, Power, Identity\u201d. In Europe today, Saunders is a Professor of history, politics and geography at Farmingdale State University of New York. He pointed his audience to the competing flows of geo-political cultures in today\u2019s society, such as elite vs. mass culture, conservative vs. progressive attitudes and identitarian vs. pluralist conceptions of identity. To introduce the audience to the topic he showed the opening sequence of the German-Austrian television series Pagan Peak<\/a>. In the scene, a group of Austrian Policemen open a truck in which migrants have been trafficked across the border \u2013 the migrants are found to be dead.<\/p>\n Starting with a definition of political culture, Robert Saunders pointed his audience to the complexity of the issue and its intersection with popular culture. In his talk, Saunders was interested in the intersection of Identity, Place and Power in Crime Drama series that explore geo-political themes. His research interest into this topic started out with US-crime series The Wire. In the series, the city of Baltimore is a central character, which underlines how intertwined the issues the series addresses are with the place.<\/p>\n \u201cTelevision now is very global and we take it with us wherever we go”<\/strong><\/p>\n Television today, as the papers in the conference have provided ample evidence for, acts as a catalyzer of border-crossing. Saunders emphasized: \u201cTelevision now is very global and we take it with us wherever we go. “The internationalization of content \u2013 Saunders highlights \u2013 is driven by online platforms”. Saunders himself was astonished how subtitled drama arrived in the USA on the back of streaming services. Saunders explained that he is interested in narratives that engage in world-building that impact cultural citizenship and promote civic agency. He looks at recent long-form drama from Europe which address elements of European identity and culture and engage with thematic elements that go beyond personal motivation for crimes committed. He illustrated this point with a clip from the third season of the French-British series The Tunnel<\/a>,<\/em> which shows a migrant boat being set on fire by a masked man.<\/p>\n Saunders developed a typology of crime series that explore themes of the \u201cvillainous corporation, \u201cmurderous neoliberalism\u201d, \u201cthe deadly border\u201d, \u201cthe dead other\u201d, \u201cglobalized gang violence\u201d and \u201cterrorism as crime drama\u201d, introducing his audience to a range of examples for these categories. Examples of the first category include the French-Swedish series Midnight Sun<\/a><\/em> and the Finnish series Deadwind<\/a><\/em>. Murderous neoliberalism is addressed in shows like Spanish Money Heist<\/a><\/em>, British Marcella<\/a><\/em> and the Icelandic Trapped, which Sue Turnbull has focused on in the morning.<\/p>\n Crime as reflection on the state of the nation is the topic Saunders is most interested in and told his audience that \u201cthis is really were Nordic Noir excels\u201d. His examples for this theme includes the Swedish-Danish The Bridge, Blue Eyes<\/a> from Sweden and Stella Bl\u00f3mkvist<\/a> from Iceland.<\/p>\nKeynote panel<\/strong><\/h2>\n