Kenneth Branagh: Masterpiece Mystery, Wallander, Series III, final episode, 'BEFORE THE FROST' SUNDAY

Watch Wallander: Before the Frost Preview on PBS. See more from Masterpiece.

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Kenneth Branagh: WALLANDER - THE DOGS OF RIGA On Masterpiece Mystery

Watch Wallander: The Dogs of Riga Preview on PBS. See more from Masterpiece.

Kenneth Branagh talks about Wallander

Swedish cop Kurt Wallander returns with a fragile new hope, the same old demons, and a murder investigation that takes him far from home...and to the very heart of it. Kenneth Branagh stars in Wallander, Series III, An Event in Autumn, Sunday, Sept. 9, 2012, at 9pm ET/CT on MASTERPIECE Mystery!

 

Watch Wallander 3: Kenneth Branagh on the Intensity of Wallander on PBS. See more from Masterpiece.

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Branagh injects humanity into ‘Wallander III’ on PBS By Katherine Tulich / Special to The Washington Post (THE BULLETIN)

By Katherine Tulich

“Masterpiece Mystery:

Wallander III" Sept. 9, 16 and 23, 9 p.m., PBS

In the first episode of the new Wallander series, Kenneth Branagh made sure he wrote the word “smile" on his script. “I figured it was the one opportunity in three films that I get to do it, so I better remember how to move my muscles upwards," the actor says with a laugh as he mugs a strained smile.

For anyone familiar with the Swedish noir detective from Henning Mankell’s moody and contemplative crime thrillers, the central character Kurt Wallander does very little smiling. A solitary figure with a dogged and singular determination, the seemingly perennially depressed small-town cop solves grisly crimes in a grimly beautiful Swedish countryside. Through nine books, he has become a beloved figure, and while there have been Swedish film and TV interpretations of Mankell’s books, it’s British actor Branagh who has memorably imprinted the character worldwide through a limited television series, the third of which premiers Sept. 9 as part of Masterpiece Mystery on PBS stations.

“There is great affection towards the character," says Branagh as he sips a cup of hot English breakfast tea on a balcony overlooking the pool at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Los Angeles after a long day of interviews. “There is no machismo swagger about him.. He has this open-wound quality, and he takes all of these crimes personally. He has a sense of quiet but intense moral outrage. He’s appalled and surprised when people commit these terrible acts of cruelty, and he has an empathy for the victim that is almost dangerous to him."


READ MORE: http://www.bendbulletin.com/article/20120902/NEWS0107/209020357/

Kenneth Branagh Talks WALLANDER Season 3, JACK RYAN, His Desire to Make an IMAX 3D Shakespeare Film and More by Christina Radish (COLLIDER)

Actor Kenneth Branagh returns as Inspector Kurt Wallander, the moody Swedish detective created by mystery writer Henning Mankell, for three new 90-minute Wallander stories on Masterpiece Mystery! on PBS, starting September 9th.  In Season 3, the depressed but fascinating cop tries to improve his disposition, while contending with torture killings, dashed romance, homicidal do-gooders and a resentful grown-up daughter.

During this recent exclusive interview with Collider, Kenneth Branagh talked about what he thinks makes Kurt Wallander one of the most popular detectives in the world, what fans can expect from this third series of movies, how having a woman in his life and some colleague changes at work affect the character, and that he’s hoping to do a fourth series of three films next year.  He also talked about the new Jack Ryan film – an origin story that allows the audience to understand how Jack Ryan (played by Chris Pine) develops into a CIA analyst – which he is both directing and playing the villain in, said that he expects to shoot from the beginning of September until Christmas, and that he thinks it’s unlikely he will shoot in either IMAX or 3D, but that he would like to do an IMAX 3D Shakespeare film.


Collider:  What do you think it is that’s made Kurt Wallander one of the most popular and fascinating detectives in the world?

KENNETH BRANAGH:  (Author) Henning Mankell told me that when he gave Wallander diabetes in the books, the sales went up.  People enjoy, somehow, this precarious thrill at seeing someone who is so raw in their dealings with life and, in his particular case, the job that he does and its extremity, in terms of its darkness, and the unrelenting nature of his preoccupation.  He’s very dogged in the pursuit of a crime.  He’s very compulsive and obsessive about that.  He doesn’t let it go.

READ THE REST OF THE INTERVIEW HERE: http://collider.com/kenneth-branagh-wallander-jack-ryan-interview/188653/

Kenneth Branagh: A scene from Wallander, coming in September 9 to Masterpiece Mystery

Watch A Scene from Wallander: An Event in Autumn on PBS. See more from Masterpiece.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/watch/wallander_eventinautumn_scene.html

Kenneth Branagh: Wallander is Midsomer Murders with a dose of Swedish misery TV review: Wallander's The Fifth Woman, with all its grey skies and relentless scowls, was a nudge back to reality after all the pomp and circumstance of the Olympics. (METRO)

By Keith Watson - 13th August, 2012

An elderly poet impaled on fence spikes, followed by the disappearance of a flower collector – it sounds like the typical ingredients of a Midsomer Murder cock-and-bull tale. But where the country folk treat savage murder with a sardonic twist of the lips, over in Sweden it gets the full-on misery treatment.

No apologies for returning to Wallander (BBC4), the only viable alternative to ball-chucking, pike positions and ribbon rippling this weekend. The only gold Rolf Lassgård (the original TV version of Henning Mankell’s detective) would nab is in the Walrus Lookalike competition.

He grumps his way through cases like a bear with a sore toe – and he was just what was needed after the adrenaline spikes and heart-rate roller coasters that have turned my sofa into a sweaty wreck these past two weeks.


Read more:http://www.metro.co.uk/tv/reviews/908142-wallander-is-midsomer-murders-with-a-dose-of-swedish-misery

Sir Ken's Swede success: Despite being the star of hit TV detective series Wallander, just-knighted Kenneth Branagh insists he's still plain Ken By RICHARD BARBER PUBLISHED: 18:00 EST, 28 June 2012 | UPDATED: 16:31 EST, 29 June 2012 (MAIL ON LINE)

You have to wonder what the dour Swedish TV detective Kurt Wallander would make of it all. A knighthood for Kenneth Branagh?

The very thought of the honour, which was announced earlier this month, is enough to bring on one of Wallander’s deep, brooding pauses.

He’d settle back in his iconic leather chair and stare into the Baltic sunset while the machinery of his mind – as trusty and as plodding as his Volvo – cranked into action and analysed every possible permutation of response.


Branagh, 51, who has played Wallander for four years, thinks he knows precisely what his alter ego’s reaction would be. His face lights up in a distinctly un-Wallanderish smile. ‘Of course, the Swedes have a royal family of their own,’ he says, ‘but Kurt’s pretty much a dyed-in-the-wool republican, so I don’t think he’d have any truck with titles.’


The reaction of the author of the best-selling Wallander stories, the avowedly left-wing Henning Mankell, is much the same as his creation’s would be, says Branagh. ‘But he’s got a terrific sense of humour so he’s been very funny about it, which is exactly what I’d have expected. He’s been ribbing me about it ever since the news came out. Fair game, as far as I’m concerned.’

Mankell, 64, chooses his words as carefully as Wallander would. ‘The Swedish people are very happy for him,’ he says diplomatically. ‘Their view seems to be, “You may beat us at soccer but we’re partly responsible for Branagh’s knighthood.” He’s very well liked and they approve of the way he plays Wallander.’





Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2166409/Sir-Kens-Swede-success-Despite-star-hit-TV-detective-series-Wallander-just-knighted-Kenneth-Branagh-insists-hes-plain-Ken.html#ixzz1zEjcH2ny

Sir Kenneth Branagh's struggle with 'bleak' Wallander Share By WENN.com (HOLLYWOOD)

The director/actor plays police Inspector Kurt Wallander in the hit crime drama, adapted from the Swedish novelist Henning Mankell's books.

The upcoming third season follows Branagh's character as he investigates the deaths of young prostitutes, and the Brit admits he felt the need to talk to Mankell before shooting the difficult scenes.

He says, "I wanted to know how he was when he was writing this sort of stuff for months on end. He said he had to stop writing some books because it got too much. I asked if people thought he went too far sometimes - because the next episode is fairly extreme.

"But he said nothing he has written goes anywhere near the extremes of his research in terms of human trafficking, paedophilia and the appalling things people do...


READ MORE: http://www.hollywood.com/news/Sir_Kenneth_Branaghs_struggle_with_bleak_Wallander/31703593

Kenneth Branagh: Stepping out in Olivier's shoes (THE AGE)

Stuart Husband February 25, 2012

KENNETH Branagh is approaching the status of, if not a British national treasure, then at least an heirloom whose value is appreciating.

A large part of the reason for this is his casting as Kurt Wallander, Henning Mankell's rumpled, melancholy Swedish detective. He's filming his third season of what has been an Australian television summer staple and we're sitting in the house he rents on the Swedish coast during filming, a capacious, onion-domed affair that, he says, as he feeds a wood-burner, used to be a meeting house for alcoholics.

Ystad, the town Wallander calls home, is a few kilometres down the road and Branagh's house looks over the pristine waters of the Baltic; a perfect spot for the ruminative cast of mind that comes with playing Wallander but which, since turning 50 in December, seems also to be Branagh's default setting.

''It's definitely the age where a kind of mental stocktaking kicks in,'' he says, taking a sip of tea. In person, Branagh is slighter than he appears onscreen but his voice has a commanding presence, something he exploits to the full in his new film My Week with Marilyn, an Oscar contender at next week's awards.

In a direct engagement with his past, the one-time new Olivier plays the old Olivier in a comedy that follows the on-set battles between Sir Laurence and Marilyn Monroe (played to the sexy-sassy-vulnerable hilt by Michelle Williams) during the making of the 1957 confection The Prince and the Showgirl.

The film is based on a memoir by Colin Clark who, despite his lowly status on set, became Monroe's confidant as the clash between her method style and Olivier's theatrical technique risked derailing the production. Branagh, all crisp lisp and camp grandstanding, plays it like screwball comedy, while suggesting Olivier's fear of being outmoded by the wave of naturalistic acting of which Monroe was a harbinger.

But did he have concerns about rekindling the Olivier thing? ''I suppose I did but in the end what it came down to was, is it a good part? And will it be fun?'' he says. ''One thing that struck me about the screenplay was that, in our world today, not many people have actually seen a Monroe film. She's just an iconic figure, like Chaplin, that you can summon in three strokes of a pen. And Olivier is even further removed.

''I came into the business 30 years ago, when he was still alive and still the world's greatest actor. My generation was very aware of his work and part of the excitement of doing this was to draw attention to him. The film captures him at a watershed moment; after it wrapped, he went and did John Osborne's The Entertainer at the Royal Court, which transformed him from a stuffed shirt to something renewed and relevant, which he was very keen to be.''

Read further:  http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/movies/stepping-out-in-oliviers-shoes-20120224-1tsks.html

Kenneth Branagh would like to make another Wallander

Kenneth Branagh has said he'd like to make another Wallander - but it's all up to the viewers.

The actor, who has just been Oscar-nominated for his role in My Week With Marilyn, has proved a hit as the maverick Swedish detective in the BBC One drama, which is set to return for a third series.

He admitted that he'd love to do a fourth series, but added that the character had been away for a while, so he could "assume nothing".

"The audience will decide!," he said.


http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5jomQR-nf1jusNlx9Sq8hDIg2aNuQ?docId=N0151641327588511011A

Kenneth Branagh: Titan of stage, screen, tube

BIFAs 2011/The Variety Award: Kenneth Branagh

By Adam Dawtrey

Jaimie Alexander discusses a scene with director Kenneth Branagh on the set of 'Thor,' the director’s first blockbuster after years in charge of lower-key projects.

'Wallander'

Kenneth Branagh has had, in his own words, "a hell of a year," one of the busiest and most productive in a 30-year career packed with remarkable achievements.

 

The Variety Award winner, who will be honored at the British Independent Film Awards, was the surprise choice to direct Marvel's "Thor," his first Hollywood blockbuster, which went on to gross $449 million worldwide -- by far his biggest commercial hit.

Then he played Blighty's theatrical knight Laurence Olivier, a man to whom Branagh was often compared in his youth, opposite Michelle Williams as Marilyn Monroe in the Weinstein Co.'s "My Week With Marilyn." Next he returned to his hometown of Belfast to appear on stage with comedian Rob Brydon in an acclaimed production of Francis Veber's French farce "The Painkiller."

Finally, he flew off to the wilds of northern Sweden, where he's shooting the third season of "Wallander," the BAFTA-winning BBC TV series based on Henning Mankell's detective novels, in which Branagh both stars and serves as exec producer.

"It's been a lot of work," says Branagh, who turned 50 last December. "I'm taking a moment to thank my lucky stars that I'm fit and well and enjoying myself so much."

It's not exactly a comeback, because he's never been away. But having devoted much of the past decade to directing a string of passion projects that didn't spark with audiences, and having stepped away from major screen acting roles to do so, Branagh is clearly relishing being back in the limelight.

That started with 2008's first series of "Wallander," which reconnected him with his fans worldwide.

"It's very pleasing, gratifying and rewarding to realize the impact that a series like 'Wallander' has in many countries," he says. "Frankly, when you leave the game to go behind the scenes as a director and a producer for a long time, that takes you away from the hustle and bustle of the marketplace as an actor."

Then, in an inspired leap of lateral thinking, Marvel offered him the chance to prove that his skills as a populist storyteller stretched beyond the upscale adaptations of Shakespeare that made his original reputation.

"I have been led by my passion for individual projects," he says. "But there's no question that having put my heart, body and soul into 'As You Like It,' 'The Magic Flute' and 'Sleuth,' and finding that the world wasn't that interested, there was definitely a sense with 'Thor' that this time I'd like to put heart, body and soul into a movie people would want to go and see."

He leapt at the chance to be involved in a big vfx movie, to handle a huge crew and to work in Hollywood. "Across 20 years of making films, I hadn't spent a significant amount of time in that community, and I wanted to do that," he says.

"Of all the American comics, 'Thor' was the only one I was really familiar with from my childhood, and it intrigued me, maybe because it was a bit more European, with those Viking helmets and its basis in Norse myth. The scale was exciting, and I did love the character and the story. It had depth and gravity in addition to being an entertaining ride."

His approach, he says, was "to bring to it a sense of fun, but also to take the process of making it as seriously as I would doing Shakespeare."

He describes the whole experience as " a joy" and says he only turned down "Thor 2" due to timing. "I certainly wouldn't rule out a return to Marvel; we had an excellent collaboration," he says.

He has a couple of other directing gigs in development, but his immediate priority is to feed his renewed appetite for film acting following "My Week With Marilyn."

"I'm very excited about doing more acting on film," he says. "Harvey Weinstein is keeping me very busy promoting the 'Marilyn' movie, which I'm delighted to do. I'm hoping that it may just nudge a few people in the direction of offering me more film roles."

Branagh believes he has stretched as an actor over the past decade. Partly through tough stage roles in David Mamet's "Edmond" and Chekhov's "Ivanov," he has moved away from the heightened Shakespearean style toward something more raw and personal.

"Playing Wallander onscreen was something of a watershed," he says. "I felt more exposed as an actor. It takes a while to become comfortable with being uncomfortable, and to enjoy it. But I feel now I'm a little braver, more ready to leap into the unknown."

This combination of experience and appetite made him feel ready to take on Olivier. He was drawn by the fact he was surrounded by long-term collaborators, including producer David Parfitt and director Simon Curtis, who offered him the chance to shape the role according to his own deep knowledge of Olivier's career and character.

Now he's raring for the next challenge.

"This is a very interesting time for me," he says. "I don't just want to work for its own sake, but to focus on quality, to strike while the iron's hot creatively. I feel very lit up with the joy of what I'm doing."

The vote

Kenneth Branagh to helm Henning Mankell's "Italian Shoes" picture

Variety

Yellow Bird steps out with 'Italian Shoes'

Kenneth Branagh to helm Left Bank project

By Diana Lodderhose

 

LONDON -- Swedish shingle Yellow Bird, the outfit behind the original "Millennium" movie trilogy, is in development with Andy Harries' Left Bank Pictures to make a feature pic of Henning Mankell's "Italian Shoes," set to be helmed by Kenneth Branagh.

 

Yellow Bird producer Marianne Gray, whose shingle spawned the Swedish-language version of "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" and the other two titles in the "Millennium" series, confirmed the news to Variety on Wednesday.

"Italian Shoes," based on the tome by Swedish crime scribe Mankell and adapted by Richard Cottan, follows the tale of an elderly man -- a former surgeon -- who is reunited with an old flame whom he had abandoned many years ago.

When he discovers she is dying of cancer, she asks him to fulfil a promise that he made to her nearly 40 years ago -- to take her to a pool in the middle of the northern forests where he had spent a day with his father when he was young.

Mankell, Yellow Bird and Left Bank previously worked together on the English-language adaptation of crime-thriller series "Wallander" for the BBC.

Left Bank received £32,375 ($50,197) in development funding for "Italian Shoes" in June from the British Film Institute.

The project is a good fit for Yellow Bird as the company's philosophy is largely to find content from books and series of books for film and television.

The outfit, which retains a first-look deal on Mankell's books, also hopes to make a feature pic based on his World War I-set tome "Depths."

Gray also said that Yellow Bird was in talks for a U.S version of Norwegian scribe Jo Nesbo's new TV series "Occupied."

The shingle recently made a feature version of the author's tome "Headhunters" for the big screen, which is being adapted into a U.S. version by Summit Entertainment.

Gray, who was in Blighty to deliver the keynote speech at Film London's fifth Production Finance Market, spoke to an audience in London's Tower Bridge Hilton Hotel about the shingle's activity in the marketplace, including its co-production pacts.

Gray said that increasing financial and creative opportunities in the European marketplace is resulting in a huge eagerness from U.S. industryites to want to work with Europeans.

"They are telling me international is the new DVD," she told Variety. "It's hard times everywhere with the global economy, and I think people really understand now that projects have to be successful outside of the U.S. and not just in the U.S. in order to survive and be profitable.

"I think when you work in the U.S. it's hard to understand how it works in other markets and how different it is. But I think that people are more open also to working in Europe and actually setting projects in Europe."

Film London's Production Film Market, which takes place Oct. 19-20, will see more than 60 producers present projects with almost $338 million of production value.

Of the 57 financiers attending, there are leading private equity firms, financiers, sales companies, distributors and TV execs.