‘The Quiet Ones’: An Electric Thriller About the Largest Heist in Danish History
Heist films may be a dime a dozen, but The Quiet Ones is a crisp $100 bill. Frederik Louis Hviid’s caper is a well-oiled machine, as precise and poised as its thieving protagonists, whose mission—inspired by the true story of Denmark’s all-time largest robbery—is to empty a cash handling firm of its enormous reserves. Indebted to everything from The Asphalt Jungle to Heat and yet bolstered by a distinctive style rooted in charged silence, this standout thriller invigorates its well-worn formula through meticulous stewardship and an excellent performance from headliner Gustav Dyekjær Giese as a boxer who attempts to realize his dreams of glory in the most daringly illicit manner imaginable.
Premiering on Sept. 6 at the Toronto International Film Festival, The Quiet Ones opens with a tranquil, blue-tinted panorama of Gothenburg, Sweden, at dawn in 2007. With unhurried grace that’s counterbalanced by Martin Dirkov’s ominous, ticking-clock score, Hviid (channeling Christopher Nolan-via-Michael Mann) gradually pans around to gaze down at an armored truck, at which point his camera relocates to inside that fortress on wheels, where the driver and her newbie colleague are chatting about this and that while doing their morning duties. Before they can leave, they’re surrounded by multiple vehicles out of which emerge armed assailants. Things go hellish fast, culminating in tragedy and failure for everyone involved, all of which is dramatized in the first of three dazzlingly extended and dexterous single takes from the backseat of a car.
A year later in Ballerup, Denmark, pugilist Kasper (Giese) tends to his daughter Sara (Dagmar Madicken Greve Halse), who wants to know when he’ll be champion. That’s a question Kasper can’t answer, since he’s on the comeback trail and—reassuring declarations be damned—he hasn’t convinced his trainer that his mind (and heart) are really in it. Nonetheless, Kasper is given another shot at an in-ring career, so when he’s informed by his brother-in-law that a Moroccan wants to meet with him, he ignores the invite. The second time he’s approached by this individual, he relents and learns that the guy is Slimani (Reda Kateb), one of the men responsible for the 2007 armored-truck fiasco. Slimani wants Kasper to help him rob one of the five cash handling firms that service Denmark. Unwilling to jeopardize his athletic opportunity, Kasper agrees to help plan the job but refuses to do the dirty work that might place him in harm’s way.