Black Crab
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Black Crab
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A Lot or a Little?
The parents' guide to what's in this movie.
What Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that the Swedish apocalyptic thriller Black Crab has a lot of violence and some language. People are injured or killed in a variety of manners (stabbed, shot, strangled, hung, and by suicide, explosion, beating, and drowning), and their injuries are shown close-up. Dead bodies are also seen on many occasions, and other death scenes are described in detail, like a mass grave where bodies were getting eaten by rats, or a city where 3,500 people were said to have been killed. A woman gets frostbite and has to have her toes amputated. An army has biological weapons. A mother has to watch her daughter get dragged away at gunpoint, and her pursuit of her child motivates her perseverance and courage on a death-defying mission. The soldiers carry pills, including morphine (which one person takes when injured) and cyanide. Language in the English subtitles includes "f--k," "s--t," "bulls--t," "ass," "piss," and "stupid."
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What's the Story?
Caroline (Noomi Rapace) is violently separated from her daughter at the start of BLACK CRAB. Flash forward, and Caroline is being taken to a military headquarters surrounded by a post-apocalyptic background of poverty and ruin. There she's told she will be joining a secret mission with five other soldiers, including Nylund (Jakob Oftebro), Granvik (Erik Enge), Malik (Dar Salim), Karimi (Aradalan Esmaili), and Forsberg (Aliette Opheim), to skate across a frozen archipelago and deliver a set of canisters that could put an end to the war. The trip will be fraught with danger and death as the soldiers have no idea what awaits them on the ice or on the other side. But Caroline is spurred on by the possibility she may see her daughter again.
Is It Any Good?
This Swedish thriller is an example of an action film that would have benefitted from more story, and it could leave viewers as cold as its icy Nordic atmosphere. Black Crab dunks viewers into a bleak, ashen world with no back story or explanation of how things got so bad. Rapace, Oftebro, Salim, and other actors aren't given enough backstory to bring their characters fully to life, though their talent still comes alive on screen. A final vision of a mother's underwater embrace of her missing daughter is stirring.
There are some gorgeous aerial and distance shots of the skaters on the ice and a depiction of the aurora borealis, attractive nature that contrasts starkly with the violent context. There's also one short-lived light moment of conversation at the near one-hour mark of the film, meaning the tension is pretty constant.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the world depicted in Black Crab. How would you describe it? What does "post-apocalyptic" mean?
What motivates Caroline's perseverance and courage? How do these qualities serve her well?
Why do the soldiers feel they shouldn't deliver the canisters once they're aware of their contents? Why does Caroline feel differently at first?
Movie Details
- On DVD or streaming: March 18, 2022
- Cast: Noomi Rapace, Jakob Oftebro, Dar Salim
- Director: Adam Berg
- Studio: Netflix
- Genre: Thriller
- Character Strengths: Courage, Perseverance
- Run time: 114 minutes
- MPAA rating: NR
- Last updated: March 18, 2022
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