Jackpot

Jackpot begins with a hilarious recap of the main character's predicament by an interviewing detective in an interrogation room. He was found under a dead woman in a strip club decorated by corpses after a messy shoot-out, and found holding a shotgun as well.

Things get even funnier when in the brief flashback to the shoot-out three nondescript dudes venture to the club only to get blown away (by bullets I might add) and at this point you know what the exact shade of black the humour dripping off this film is.

Oscar (played by Kyrre Hellum) works at a dreary factory with ex-cons, life is normal. With the arrival of a new employee, he is dragged into taking part in a betting pool and in a convoluted way ends up winning the jackpot. Four men, one lottery ticket, you can see where this is heading. It doesn't take long until people start dying and limbs start flying.

Kyrre's deadpan nature combined with Henrik Mestad's analytical steely-eyed detective culminates in plenty of ice cold humour that is either a trademark of the Nesbo style, or Norwegian humour in general.

The film rolls along with gruesome misadventures of the four men whose not-quite-burgeoning friendship is destroyed with hammers, axes, nail guns and shopping bags.

With a length of 86 minutes, Jackpot is not long enough to have much substance, but makes up for it with funny dialogue, amusing twists, and violent escapades reminiscent of the best the 90's had to offer such as Fargo, Red Rock West, and A Simple Plan.