 |
“The Good Nurse” is the English-language debut of the filmmaker Tobias Lindholm, who had been leery of Hollywood: “I was basically afraid of losing myself or whatever vision I had in the hunt for something that I didn’t really understand.” |
The true-crime thriller "The Good Nurse" is ultimately an indictment of American systems: hospitals that covered up the crimes of Charles Cullen, a nurse who admitted to killing 29 patients and may have killed dozens more as he secretly changed jobs; and the complicated requirements of employment and health insurance benefits that prevented Amy Loughren, a fellow nurse who eventually assisted in bringing Cullen to justice.
The movie "The Good Nurse," which is based on a nonfiction book by Charles Graeber, also wouldn't exist without another American system: Hollywood. It will be available to view on Netflix on Wednesday. It stars two Academy Award winners: Jessica Chastain as Loughren and Eddie Redmayne as Cullen.
Although many viewers may already be familiar with Tobias Lindholm's work, this is the Danish screenwriter and director's debut English-language movie, and "The Good Nurse" has the potential to reach his largest American audience to date.
At age 45, he has seen several of his movies and TV shows successfully enter the American market without compromising their own aesthetic sensibility. These include the procedural miniseries "The Investigation," which he wrote and directed, the life-affirming drama "Another Round," which he co-authored with the series' director Thomas Vinterberg, and the political TV series "Borgen," for which he wrote.
 |
Eddie Redmayne and Jessica Chastain in the true-crime thriller. |
Lindholm has always had a wary gaze toward Hollywood since he believes that it is where some of his contemporaries went astray. During a recent video interview, Lindholm stated, "I had seen a lot of wonderful fellow Scandinavian filmmakers disappear in the American studio system and not end up creating the picture they intended to produce." He was speaking from his office in Copenhagen.
However, Lindholm claimed that he intrinsically associated with what he saw to be American cinema, where individuals are characterized by their occupations. That is why all of your stories include presidents, law enforcement officials, sheriffs, cowboys, and detectives, he claimed. Comparatively speaking, he remarked that European cinema is "concerned with psychology and caught up in emotions."
The American movie "The Good Nurse," according to Lindholm, was the ideal representation of his own approach to storytelling. "Good storytelling should be about 50% identification and 50% interest," he said.
Before enrolling in the National Film School of Denmark, Lindholm spent his early 20s pursuing activities like skateboarding and graffiti. He was fascinated by American cultural exports like jazz and hip-hop as a child.
There, he made connections with people who would later work with him, including Caroline Blanco, his future wife, and fellow "Borgen" writer Jeppe Gjervig Gram. Before graduating, Vinterberg, a co-founder of the Dogme 95 film movement, asked Lindholm to assist him in writing "Submarino," a 2010 social realism film. "R, "The prison drama which Lindholm co-wrote and co-directed with Michael Noer, was also released that year. Both films received recognition on a global scale.
 |
Mads Mikkelsen in “Another Round,” which Lindholm wrote with the director Thomas Vinterberg. |
 |
Americans may have seen Lindholm’s work in the series “Borgen.” |
His list of accomplishments quickly expanded to include "Borgen" and the script for the 2012 drama "The Hunt," another project with Vinterberg. A War, a 2015 drama about Danish soldiers in Afghanistan, and "A Hijacking," a 2012 thriller about a cargo ship hijacked by pirates in the Indian Ocean, were also written and directed by Lindholm.
Lindholm said that part of the reason for his persistent production was a desire to seize what he believed to be a finite number of possibilities. He said, "I've always had so much anxiety, so I'm constantly terrified that with everything I do, they'll ultimately know I'm a phony." There were monetary incentives as well; Lindholm claimed, "I suddenly made money for the first time in my life, and I neglected to pay taxes." "So, in actuality, that was a godsend."
In Lindholm's writing, which frequently focuses on people in well-known professions who have been put in incredibly uncomfortable situations, certain motifs were already starting to emerge.
The actress Pilou Asbaek, who has been in numerous of Lindholm's film and television projects, commented "It's always a person and a system." "The system anticipates you to act in a particular manner. Within the system, you have the option of making the right or wrong choice. You will suffer long-lasting effects from it.
Even while Lindholm said that his reputation as a filmmaker was expanding, he wasn't necessarily trying to turn it into a Hollywood career. He said, "I was terrified of it. I was reluctant because, in essence, I was terrified of losing myself or whatever vision I had while searching for something that I didn't fully comprehend.
But around six years ago, David Fincher and Charlize Theron contacted Lindholm about directing two episodes of "Mindhunter," the Netflix serial killer investigation series on which they served as executive producers. This prompted the hesitancy to start dissipating. Additionally, he was allowed to see Fincher direct previous episodes, which Lindholm described as "the best film school for me."
He said, "That gave me the guts to go for the American dream.
Lindholm saw the screenplay for "The Good Nurse," written by Krysty Wilson-Cairns (a co-screenwriter on "1917" and "Last Night in Soho"), on his way to the United States to work on "Mindhunter," and decided he wanted to helm it.
According to Lindholm, "The Good Nurse" was more concerned with dramatizing the quiet fortitude of Loughren than the horrifying misdeeds of Cullen, who injected victims with lethal amounts of medications, in a genre that is frequently criticized as exploitative and voyeuristic.
There's no question who the villains are in these tales, he remarked. "There needs to be a solid reason for us to allow ourselves to create stories from that nothingness, from that enormous, empty black hole. The brightness in that narrative that we were looking for was Amy the nurse and her struggle.
Chastain, whose performance in "Zero Dark Thirty" Lindholm had appreciated, concurred that it was uncommon to find a true-crime screenplay that did not feel like a celebration of violence. She said that in this movie, "it isn't violence that ends violence, it's compassion — it's treating someone as a human being and not as a monster. It truly is fetishized so much and portrayed as power."
She and Redmayne joined up for "The Good Nurse" because they wanted to work with Lindholm. Before the April 2021 start of filming, the actors spent two weeks receiving nursing training and another two weeks rehearsing.
On the actor's first day of filming, Redmayne said that he was astonished by Lindholm's command of the camera: a protracted, slow zoom-in showing Cullen impassively watching a group of medical professionals attempts to resuscitate a dying patient.
It would end up being the movie's opening frame. After we finished that and Redmayne viewed that take, he remarked, "I instantly understood the spirit of the picture." "I knew his fingerprints were all over it," you said.
 |
Watching David Fincher's work on “Mindhunter,” Lindholm said, “gave me courage enough to pursue an American dream.” |
The actors expressed their admiration for Lindholm's choice at a later point in the production. When they were about to begin filming a scene in which Chastain would be printing private information from a hospital computer, she would be looking over her shoulder for Redmayne when she would be startled by him. The director immediately called the cut and then decided to remove the scene from the final cut. Lindholm had determined that it was overly idealistic and complicated.
Redmayne remembered, "I was like, Tobias, why don't we just shoot it so you have it, in case you need it," as producers rushed onto the set. And he responded, "No, this is the one scene in the movie that isn't based on actual events. Come home." I was simply really impressed.
Chastain claimed Lindholm's quick evaluation gave her confidence as well. That's what I yearned for as an actress, she said. "I'm looking for a movie captain. And when a filmmaker possesses it, I feel secure.
Following "The Good Nurse," Lindholm and "Succession" actor Jeremy Strong are working on a miniseries that will chronicle the lives of numerous people who were exposed to poisonous debris after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York. The series' working title is "The Best of Us."
Strong emphasized that the endeavor had involved months of meticulous planning, which included examining previous studies and journalism, reading personal experiences, and consulting with those who had lived through the aftermath. Strong stated, "He's not someone who's going to just walk into it. This is obviously a very delicate and important matter." He has the same view that every right to tell a tale must be earned, and certain rights are difficult to get.
The counsel his wife gave him a few months ago, according to Lindholm, helps him when the weight of the subject threatens to overwhelm him. The epidemic and his work on "The Investigation," which dramatizes the efforts to solve a chilling real-life murder, were both causing him to feel particularly burdened at the time. She remarked that as a filmmaker, your sole duty is to ensure that there is hope—always inject optimism into the narratives.
He said, "We're making a difference in our lives, and that's worth something if we can inspire you to feel like you belong to this planet and that there are ways out of the darkness."
Click here for more trending news
You can also follow us on our Twitter page
You can also follow us on our Tumblr page
You can also follow us on our Pinterest page