Sagafilm adapts Nordic detective novel

Icelandic production company Sagafilm has acquired the TV rights to an award-winning crime novel by Óskar Guðmundsson.

Sagafilm will adapt Hilma, which was published in 2015 and won the annual Icelandic literary award Blóðdropinn as the best Icelandic crime novel in 2016. It was also nominated for 2016’s Glass Key award as the best crime novel in the Nordics.

The story follows a female investigator after who wakes up in a hospital brutally beaten and scarred on her face after working undercover in a dangerous international criminal organisation.

Sagafilm CEO Hilmar Sigurdsson described the book as an “atmospheric, page-turning and brilliantly constructed thriller.”

The company recently made The Flatey Enigma, based on a novel by Viktor Arnar Ingólfsson, with Reykjavik Films and Sky Vision, as well as Stella Blómkvist, which is based on a book series by the pseudonymous author of the same name. The latter is distributed by Red Arrow Studios International.

The prodco is also about to begin shooting its next series, The Minister, in collaboration with RÚV in Iceland, NRK in Norway, SVT in Sweden, DR in Denmark and YLE in Finland.