– I have never experienced such great interest in roles from our top actors, says director Erik Poppe. This week, the world’s first feature film about Vidkun Quisling starts filming. In the film, the audience will get an intense insight into Quisling’s life from his arrest at peace in May 1945, until his execution on 24 October of the same year. Director Erik Poppe has a budget of 90 million kroner to portray Vidkun Quisling. – A story I have wanted to tell for a long time, he says. Photo: Paradox During this period, a psychological and claustrophobic battle about truth, lies, faith and doubt raged in Quisling’s cell and head. From “A quite nice man” to Quisling – My mandate as a shoe player is to give everything, with skin and hair, blood and tears. That’s what Gard B. Eidsvold wrote in an email to news about his main role as the officer, minister and humanitarian worker who became Hitler’s puppet leader in Norway during the war. In the 20s, Vidkun Quisling (back to right) worked with emergency aid work in Eastern Europe. Fridtjof Nansen sits in the middle. Photo: The National Library He is known from, among others, the films “The Hunt for the Christmas Star”, “Doctor Proktor’s fart powder” and “A quite nice man”. In the film “Quisling”, however, he will be interpreted as a rather different man – a man sentenced to death for murder, theft and treason. My parents fought during the war – he becomes Quisling – I am humble and ready, but that does not mean that I do not have personal challenges linked to this, says Eidsvold. Gard B. Eidsvold brings over 30 years of experience as a shoemaker to the role of Vidkun Quisling. Here as Doctor Proctor. Photo: Erik Aavatsmark / Filmweb During the war, his parents fought against the occupation. Eidsvold will bring this piece of family history into the role. – The war has seen its claws in me through my parents. They are with me like a light in this task, he writes. Without forgiving Quisling, Eidsvold will try to understand in order to pass on lessons from history. About who I am, and who I became. From terrorist to priest Anders Danielsen Lie takes on the second lead role as Quisling’s soulmate in prison, priest Peder Olsen. Anders Danielsen Lie stares at Utøya in the role of the terrorist Anders Behring Breivik in the film “22 July”. In “Quisling” he is on the right side of the law as the priest and soul-searcher Peder Olsen. Photo: Screenshot: Netflix The goal is to put history in a perspective that is experienced as relevant for everyone living today. – I am very happy to be part of this project. I hope I can create a story that gives a truthful portrait of the Quisling enigma, Lie writes to news. Diary note gives insight into Quisling and leaders today Poppe believes that getting close to the Norwegian authoritarian leader is important and relevant at a time when developments in the world are moving in an anti-democratic direction. – For a long time I wanted to let go of this story, says Poppe about the film, which will be the third in a row after “Kongens no” and “Utøya 22. juli” in the trilogy “A fragile democracy”. In connection with the development, the team behind the film has relied heavily on professional historians and, not least, hitherto little-known source material in order to tell the story as historically correct as possible. Could he understand that he had made a mistake about his life’s mission? One should be able to become wiser about that question in “Quisling”. Photo: Riksarkivet – We will bring to life the man who grew up in our midst and meant the right things, but who went on to betray everything we stand for, says Poppe. And to do that, they have tried to get into Quisling’s head through the diary notes of his soulmate. The note depicts a desperate struggle to save life and to make amends, and to face where he was pushed to the breaking point in Olsen’s search for answers and self-reflection. – The big question I raise is whether he realized what he had done, and if so how he took it, says Poppe. In the cinema, you won’t get an answer to that until autumn 2024.
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These two will play the main roles in the film “Quisling” – news Culture and entertainment
