Michael Noer is a busy man, Nordic Watchlist catch him mid flow of packing up his belongings due to an office move and then in a few days time he will attending the premier of his next feature film – Birthday Girl. Alex catches up with the director to discuss his upcoming film and also his work on excellent Prisoner which recently aired on BBC and in which he directed three of the episodes.

‘I am not getting fired or anything‘, the director jokes.

He points his camera out the window to show me the Nordisk Film offices.

Having got side-tracked on a little bit of the history of what has gone outside his window – some truly fascinating stories – we focus back firstly on Prisoner and the series success.

‘I would love to see if we can continue on with this story – I find that idea conceptually interesting‘, the director explains.

There were certainly some open ended moments in the series, a trail of bread crumbs leading to further narratives that could help shape. I think there will be many of us who would be thrilled to see those stories continued and what further ones could be brought in. We’ll all keep our fingers crossed.

I had first discovered Michael Noer’s films when I was diving into some of Roland Moeller’s films in the build up to seeing in Andrew Haigh’s North Water. It was here that I discovered Michael’s earlier films R: Hit First, Hit Hardest and his Papillon remake – before then digging around to watch Nordvest too but that took me a little while to find and I ended up having to get it on DVD.

‘I have all my DVDS‘, the director explains. ‘It is a sad time we are living in – the age of information? I think feel like is the age of everything getting lost‘.

One thing that stuck out to me upon viewing these films was how gritty they were and throwing Prisoner into the mix I wondered whether this was something that Michael enjoys as a subject matter in his work.

‘There is a two part answer to this question. My father was a police officer and you’d expect me to be focused on the police and all these kind of films but I didn’t have much contact with him for a number of years. So you take a film like North West which is a film about crime but also the power of lacking a father and having a positive father figure around‘

The director explains that he didn’t have the physique or stamina of a Roland Moeller character to fall into becoming a gang member but instead he found his own way of becoming an artist who tries to understand hierarchys and masculine hierarchy’s instead.

“You could say that with Prisoner, to me it was not interesting about men, I was more interested in physical power struggles and coming from a documentary background you’ll find it hard to kill someone in a documentary so I found it fascinating in doing that as a fictional series.

With R: Hit First, Hit Hardest Michael got to work with an upcoming Danish director – Tobias Lindholm; the pair co-directed the film. He had seen the potential of making a film based in a prison, even though it had been done a million times before but Tobias suggested an idea to Michael.

“He said ‘why don’t we use your interest in research and imagine it as a fictional film, then write it as a non-fiction’. That is how that film came to be, then North West, and the others that followed“.

Next up for Michael Noer is the release of his feature film Birthday Girl which will arrive in the UK on digital on demand from the 17th June with Signature Entertainment. The film flips things over a little bit by having its two leads being females – those roles being played by two incredibly talented Danish stars; Trine Dyholm (Queen of Hearts) and Flora Ofelia Hofmann Lindahl (Cry Wolf).

Those not familiar with the young actress should seek out her incredible performance in Cry Wolf (currently on Walter Presents in the UK) and also in Tea Lindeburg’s As In Heaven. In Birthday Girl the actress plays Trine’s daughter who are celebrating her 18th birthday by going on a cruise together along with her best friend. Things take a dark turn when the daughter is found on the deck of the ship with signs of a possible sexual attack triggering her mother to launch her own investigation into what has happened – Trine Dyholm becoming a force of nature to be reckoned with.

“I think Trine identified really nicely with Flora because like her she started her career really early on. That has good parts and bad parts – especially in these internet days – and that helped them really develop that mother nad daughter relationship in a fictional way“.

The film is co-written by Michael and Jesper Fink who also co-wrote Before the Frost. This time round Michael’s research took them on not one but two cruises to prepare writing and directing the film.

“I was checking some information and it said to check your travel insurance before you head off on a cruise in case you lose your luggage or something as there are no police onboard to report a theft or anything“, the director explains. “I found that not very interesting but then I clicked on this link for something when I went googling“

It was from his google search that the director discovered a website called International Cruise Line Victims – it only takes a minute or two visiting the website to really see where Michael got his inspiration from whilst also revealing something we were never really aware of at all. This makes watching the film all the more harrowing in its subject matter.

“All of a sudden everything went from zero to hundred – when you see a website like this I immediately felt I had to make a movie about this. It is crazy that these things happen and I hope more people become aware of it through the film because this kind of makes me really angry that this is happening“.

Both Michael and Jesper spoke to a couple of whistle-blowers to learn more about what has been happening on the cruises which didn’t go down too well with the cruise lines.

One thing that is interesting is the cinematography in the film – whereas in some of Noer’s previous work, it has been quite a gritty look but here our main characters are submerged in neon lights – reds, purples, and pinks.

“It was important to have colourful elements with this sound – it was something we experienced when we were on the cruises where there would be this voice trying to sell me a soda and do this or do that. There was always this discotheque music playing – we wanted it to feel like they were on some kind of discotheque in outer space. Cruising just isn’t the same as it used to be – it is much more for young people getting hammered!“

There was one thing Michael has forgotten to look up before coming up with the idea of the film; “I wished I had looked up how hard it is to shoot something on a cruise ship” he laughs.

Birthday Girl is a powerful and thrilling experience which is amplified by the pairing of the brilliant Trine Dyrholm and Flora Ofelia Hofmann Lindahl. We are big fans of Michael Noer’s work and it was great to see him continue that trend with another

Birthday Girl is released on Digital on Demand from the 17th June through Signature Entertainment