Cold Case/Hammarskjöld
Where: Scandinavia House: The Nordic Center in America
58 Park Ave.
212-779-3587 Price: $12 ($7 ASF Members)
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In 1961, United Nations secretary-general Dag Hammarskjöld’s plane mysteriously crashed, killing Hammarskjöld and most of the crew. Because Hammarskjöld was then a major advocate for Congo’s independence — against the wishes of European mining companies and other powerful entities — it’s since been understood that the “crash” was in fact an assassination. With the case still unsolved 50-plus years later, Danish journalist, filmmaker, and provocateur Mads Brügger (The Red Chapel, The Ambassador) leads us down an investigative rabbit hole to unearth the truth. Accompanied by Swedish aid worker and investigator Goran Bjorkdahl, as well as a host of co-conspirators, Brügger tirelessly pursues a winding trail of clues, turning up more mysteries than revelations. But after scores of false starts, dead ends, and elusive interviews, he and Bjorkdahl begin to sniff out something more monumental than anything they’d initially imagined.
In his signature agitprop style, Brügger becomes both filmmaker and subject, challenging the very nature of truth by “performing” the role of truth seeker. And when Brügger uncovers a critical secret that could send shockwaves around the world, it becomes clear that absurdity and irony may be the best ingredients to confront the truly sinister.
Brügger’s 2018 film The Saint Bernard Syndicate also screens this fall at Scandinavia House on October 4.