JOHAN FALK-SERIES PART 8 : OPERATION NÄKTERGAL ( OPERATION NIGHTINGALE) THE FALKOLOGY CONTINUES

Previously on Johan falk:

"Next time on Johan Falk-series: part 8: The one with the russian title I never can remember. "

Now:
Shit. Sometimes I  mix the titles up. This and  Organizatsija Karayan. (I had to look that title up and check my spelling for every damn word).  Operation Näktergal  is also one I kind of regard as a lesser  entry in the series. But later events in the series makes this a pivotal chapter in the Johan Falk-saga, And therefore even more important to examine in the interest of Falkology.

Plot talking:

This story centres around human trafficking and prostitutes from the Baltic countries. One of the GSI members, Lasse (Henric Norlén) gets a shot at doing what Johan has been doing for a while; being a handler for an informant. It all goues tits up in the end, which set in motion  a spiral of events unbeknownst to neither GSI or the audience for that matter. 

A lot of the stuff that comes back I will deal with more scrutiny when we come to Lockdown, the next to the very last film. But that is still a helluva long  way to go.

What this movie specifically deals with are personal connections to the individuals stuck in an impossibly dangerous situation. But also extreme unprofessionalism as Lasse falls in love with the female informant Hanna (Anja Antonowicz) , and the tragic events that follows.  She dies, and Lasse sets up a situation which leads to his revenge. More unprofessional and not so great policing at work here. A bunch of GSI cockups. But at this point, who is surprised?

Jibber jabber:

So, the big thing here is that this movie is central to the events that takes place in the third series. It sets up the motivation behind some of the stuff and frankly I think it might be better to wait until Lockdown to fully delve into those aspects. What I instead want to focus on  here is the relationship between Lasse and Hanna .

Lasse has had some dating issues on account of being a cop. He is just too damn frank about it and his collegues questions his judgement on it. "Why do you keep telling the birds you´re a cop,man?" Now being a handler to the polish girl Hanna, she knows he is a cop and probably wont hold it aginst him if he is being nice to her. But he may be too nice to her and ends up getting a bit too close to her. Johan is usually the one we see handling the informant, now that Lasse gets a chance he blows it big time by falling in love with her. Dumbshit. Both Lasse and Johan. Dumbshits. Here is how they both are;


Interestingly, Sophie who is the new temporary leader for GSI, who Johan has a lot of problem taking orders from, doesn´t want Lasse to be a handler as he has no previous experience. But Johan chose to disobey and pick Lasse anyway.  Stubborn asshole. His reluctance of taking orders from Sophie is something that has been portrayed in a couple of films now that Patrik has parentleave.

As Lasse is the focus of the story  it puts former supercop Falk in a situation in which he has to choose how to deal with a sensitive situation that could seriously damage a fellow police officers career. And you could make a case that Johan is to blame for the whole mess as he never saw the bigger picture if he just did what Sophie ordered him to do in the first place.


I like how the first movies Falk was this invincible badass supercop. But now that he is put in a different world he becomes this flawed human being incapable of dealing with the world he now inhabits. He usually have been in full control, but from the first series and one he makes some choices that clearly is not made by some omniscient protagonist that saves the day. At the end he confesses that he may have  made the wrong decision. A decision that was never his to make as he was not in charge, but Sophie was. Here we can see Johans one-man army tactics from previous movies, but here it failed flat as he is maybe out of his league when it comes to this type of police work. I don´t know. But he should have listened to Sophie. God help us if Johan Falk makes Chief rank....

A recurring motif in the series seem to be about failure to get the bad guy. Once again, the bad guy  gets killed, and it becomes a snag in a way. Like in National Target. Which is something I like. Shit not going as planned

There is also some shenanigans with Johan convincing Anja to leave his clandestine operations alone. If I were her, I would have gotten sick of getting all that shit from him by now and tell him to go fuck himself.

(Small personal rant with some more foul language):

I just can´t stand that asshole who orders "beer". Just beer. For him it does not matter as long as it is beer. As a beer lover I can´t defend that ignorant shit. He probably wouldn´t care if it´s Kopparbergs Special brew ( a Swedish  beer  with 10 % alcohol that taste like horses ass)  Oh yeah, No surprise he is the bad guy of this piece. A sleazy scrawny ass cheap knock off-Viggo Mortensen lookalike  kind of motherfucker. 

"Hallo, I am russian asshole who does not care for beer.
Also I am sleazy. Please do not have sex with me"

(end of rant)

This is my favourite part. Lasse and Hanna both have polish backstory. Hanna is raised catholic, not Lasse however as he is raised in Sweden. There is a connection between these two that is pretty sweet, as they have completely different upbringings that sets them apart.  Different religious backgrounds and beliefs. Lasse doesn´t believe in this heaven and hell mumbo jumbo and gets shit in return from Hanna; " So you don´t believe in anything?" To which Lasse responds " I believe in crime and punishment".  The dance continues and Hanna counters with " An eye for an eye? That is very Old Testament"   After that Lasse  has a hard time convincing anyone else but himself. Lasse sees punishment, she sees redemption for what she has done. Good scene. The policeman´s narrow view of crime, never taking in account the persons behind it. Not always bad guy, but humans with reasons behind their actions.

Interesting how the cop seem less sure of himself than she does. That makes you think. Look at these shots.

Hanna seem to be the first woman Lasse truly connect with for some reason, which make this interesting.

The death of  Hanna makes Lasse  take matters into his own hands and sets up the bad guy who killed her just to get revenge, when GSI is clearly after bigger fish. Wow, this organization really does fuck up in more ways than one. This is like CTU in 24. More bombs goes off than  prevented. But here it´s even worse. How many trials have been held of the perpetrators? Few to none. They are usually getting shot and killed by forces that are being supported by the same type of crime fighting "abilities" of GSI. In the end, yes they do save the day, but Jesus Christ do they have this weird way of messing things up needlessly. What a bunch of boobs. 

There are some scenes with Frank Wagner, but it seem more like filler as plot device and nothing that drives anything forward in his personal story I feel. Don´t get me wrong, I love to see Kinnaman. But there is a reason I never can remember whether he was in some of these. Especially this one and Leo Gaut as Wagner is so very little part of the stories. In the end of this one Wagner calls out Johan on being callously treated and used. As he is being in the last act of this film, putting him in jepoardy in a gunfight caused by Lasse. So there is that at least.

"I coulda gat shot"

I can´t  say I like this one as much as some of the best in the series. I do really  like the stuff between Lasse and Hanna and their story and ramifications the events in this one will later have. But as important as it is in the Johan Falk-saga  as lacking it is in action so I don´t think I can recommend it enough as a stand alone must see movie. But as I stated it works as part of a bigger story, sort of. But I´ll get to that in Lockdown. 

I think my poor writing on this one reflects my view on it. Like Lasse I don´t believe in God. But, like Hanna I believe in redemption and  hopefully I will redeem myself  in the future. In later studies of Falkology.

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Next time on Johan Falk: Yup, all that fine clandestine police work comes up to the surface  and shit starts to stir up and a lot of ugly history of GSI is being revealed.*sarcastically applauding GSI* Also more Frank Wagner