DR Sales Boards Explosive Mads Brügger Series ‘The Black Swan’: ‘Like ‘The Sopranos’ in Real Life’ (EXCLUSIVE)
If the Panama Papers have become a byword for exposure of corruption and financial fraud around the world, “The Black Swan” (“Den Sorte Swane”) by Denmark’s own truth-seeking and Sundance winner Mads Brügger is poised to have a similar long-lasting effect on the Scandinavian country.
The true crime documentary series, just picked up by DR Sales for global distribution, will be introduced to world buyers on Feb. 17 at the European Film Market in Berlin. Meanwhile at home, it continues to be the most talked about documentary since its premiere on TV2 Denmark last May. To this day, more than 2.3 million Danes (out of a population of 6 million) have watched it, making it the second most-watched program of all time in Denmark. The four-part documentary has also scored the prestigious national Robert Award for best TV series, beating strong contenders including Thomas Vinterberg’s “Families Like Ours.”
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Cleverly summarised by DR Sales with the Shakespearian logline “something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” the show is pinned by Kim Christiansen, the shingle’s executive producer, in charge of documentaries and co-productions, as “kind of ‘The Sopranos’ in real life, where the underworld meets the upperworld, plotting their next big target. It’s an unprecedented unreal portrait of brutal reality,” he said.
The central character is Copenhagen-based corporate lawyer Amira Smajic. After over a decade of living a life built on lies, crime and fraud, the charismatic woman, nicknamed ‘The Ice Queen’ by the underworld, wants out. She contacts the high-profile journalist and filmmaker Mads Brügger, known for his thought-provoking performative investigative works, often infiltrating various environments, as he did in Sundance winners “The Red Chapel” “Cold Case Hammarskj?ld” and the series “The Mole.”
Smajic’s goal is to denounce the collusion between respectable Danish citizens and the criminal underworld. Brügger, who’s made a specialty of exposing corruption, human rights, and law-violating kingpins, sees an opportunity to question the myth of Denmark as the least corrupt country in the world, a welfare state supposedly built on trust. TV2 Denmark and the filmmaker’s long-time production partner Peter Engel of Wingman Media jump on board.
“Amira and I met in the late summer of 2022 in a sushi bar on the outskirts of Copenhagen,” Brügger tells Variety. Not long into our conversation, I understood I was in the presence of a truly unique person, someone with insight into the criminal underworld, but also the upper class of Danish society, important businessmen, lawyers, etc. As a source, that made her enormously interesting. What was also remarkable about her is that from the get-go, she was willing to divulge her own identity, face, voice and name. She told me: ‘I want to come clean.'”
Why this sudden change of heart, though, that would rock and endanger her life?
“She is a Bosnian refugee, and so was her father,” Brügger explains. “She felt that had he known of her criminal activities in a country that had welcomed her, given her citizenship, security and an education as a business lawyer, he would have been very angry at her. So she wanted to expose her knowledge of what’s going on in Denmark. That’s what she told me initially. We did our best to make sure she was fully aware of the foreseeable and non-foreseeable consequences, including the worst-case scenario.”
The Mole
The big question for Brügger and TV2’s journalistic team was how they could trust a criminal source. The answer came from Smajic, who offered to re-open her consultancy firm, which would be wired with hidden cameras. “We felt that was a brilliant idea, and agreed to use her as a mole instead of a source,” Brügger says. “It was then a matter of setting up her office, planning meticulously where the hidden cameras and microphones should be to transfer the recordings in real-time to a control room. A security setup was also applied in case things went south.”
Over six months, the office turned into a hub for nearly 20 hardcore criminals, bikers and gang members, as well as high-flying lawyers, businessmen and major contractors, all involved in tax fraud, disposal of contaminated soil, money laundering and sometimes even torture of informants. The undercover revelations in Amira’s office made her the ultimate “black swan,” a term used to describe an unpredictable event that changes the way we view the world.
Commenting on the criminals, in suits or not, who knock at Smajic’s door, Brügger says: “It’s an extraordinary gallery of characters, bordering archetypes. They offer a fascinating portrait of a multicultural society where religion, gender and ethnic codes don’t matter anymore. You see how all these people – men, women, Christians, Muslims, whatever their background – so cheerfully go about cheating, stealing and scamming the state. It’s been an eye-opener for Danish viewers.”
However, in an unexpected twist revealed later in the series, it appeared that Smajic had played a double game and kept up her criminal activities during filming, which broke an early agreement she had signed with TV2.
“This was an uncharted territory for me, and we had to play it very carefully with her as this was a very serious matter,” Brügger says. After obtaining her approval on rough cuts to secure the existing material, he and his team tried to confront her. At that point, she turned against them and tried to stop the series from being released.
“She took us twice to court, but both times, the judges rejected her claim, saying the content was of great importance to the Danish people. We were, therefore, allowed to publish, against Amira’s wish, and had to do so. Not publishing would have been more dangerous,” says Brügger, who praises the courage of TV2 news director Ulla Pors. “At the end of the day, it was her decision to press the button and go ahead with the release of this very explosive material. I really admire her for that.”
Following the series’ launch last May, several characters involved in financial crime lost their jobs or were placed under investigation. Smajic herself was sentenced to three months unconditional and 15 months conditional imprisonment for fraud and forgery. Ethical questions were then raised by commentators about the filmmaking team’s controversial use of hidden cameras, hiring of a criminal source, and partial use of information, as it appeared later on that Smajic had been a police informant, working for the National Unit for Special Crime (NSK) parallel to her TV2 assignment. “We didn’t explore this further in the show because Amira pledged us not to, for the sake of her security,” Brügger explains.
“I basically feel fine,” the director says of his own safety. “The one rule about security is not to talk about it. We are being taken care of so far, knock on wood!”
Ultimately, for Brügger, the series has proven that hardcore journalism and documentaries can change society and engage a wide audience-including the younger TikTok/YouTube generation.
“It’s made it possible for Danes to question what’s been drilled into their minds, that Denmark is corruption-free. Now they – and Scandinavians – do talk about corruption and financial crime. This is one of the most important achievements of ‘The Black Swan,'” he said, adding with his signature humor: “We’re also the ones who did a Danish version of “‘The Office!'”
“The Black Swan” was produced by Wingman Media, in association with Von M?rner for TV2 Denmark, NRK, SVT and RúV.
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