Easy Money (Snabba cash), loosely based on the novel Livet Deluxe by lawyer and author Jens Lapidus, is a film that focuses on organized crime in the Swedish underground. Director Daniel Espinosa’s career took off after its release, and he has since been handed the opportunity to direct a film starring Denzel Washington, called Safe House. A couple of years following its Swedish premiere, Snabba cash even saw some international success, and when it was promoted by American filmmaker Martin Scorsese, it received a limited release in the US, with a UK release just around the corner. The movie’s star is Joel Kinnaman, who is now the lead star of AMC’s The Killing and will be playing the part of Robocop in the upcoming remake of the classic action movie.
"Snabba cash even saw some international success, and when it was promoted by American filmmaker Martin Scorsese, it received a limited release in the US."
Here, Kinnaman plays a young Swedish student named Johan Westlund, constantly referred to as "JW." He's from an average Swedish family, although he spends his weekends living as if he belonged to a rich one. He hangs around rich kids, spends money on drugs and expensive clothing, and lives a rare 21st century life of constant partying. Johan often struggles to finance this, so when he’s not studying or pretending to be rich, he drives a cab. His boss is of Arabian descent, and one day he offers to pay Johan extra money if he does something highly risky. Before he knows it, Johan is deep inside the underground crime world of Stockholm, while at the same time struggling to keep up his high-class life of partying. Johan, his boss, and other co-workers set up a drug organization, and soon things become more chaotic as the Serbian mafia declares war against Johan’s Arabic employers.
As Johan experiences different lifestyles in Stockholm, the contrast is clear. The rich brats spend endless amounts of money on partying, and behave and speak in a unique way. They tell stories of friends meeting Bill Gates and constantly squeeze English words into the conversation. There is no danger, only comfort and pretentiousness. When Johan talks to his underground friends, however, there is a more down-to-earth approach to speech. Curse words are thrown around regularly, coloring these characters’ bad standard of life. This is the case when Johan is talking to his friend Jorge, an Hispanic fugitive who is struggling to make ends meet with his sister and mother, while Johan’s rich friends don’t have a care in the world.
"This movie is a vital look at Sweden’s organized crime and at the rich life of some of the country’s youth."
Interestingly, Johan is the only pure Swedish character in the underground crime world. The others may be Swedish citizens, but they’re originally from countries poisoned by war or poverty, such as Serbia, Iraq, and Chile. This is not something strictly fictional, as the immigration question has become a hot topic in Sweden. In 2010, a xenophobic political party made its way through Sweden’s political structure, gathering many votes during elections. While it’s not in a position of control, it remains a big deal. Immigration in and of itself has helped the country a lot, especially in the restaurant business, but organized crime is one of its downsides, and in the bigger cities, immigrants live in ghetto-like neighborhoods without much hope of getting out.
The film is not spoken purely in Swedish. Naturally, many foreign characters speak their own language while talking to others of the same ethnic background. There are shades, here, of how the Swedish language has changed with immigration. Words such as “jalla” (hurry up) are originally from Arabic and can now be found in the official Swedish dictionary. Many curse words are also randomly thrown around during the film, and though they’re not originally Swedish, one can hear them on the streets just like they appear in Espinosa’s Snabba cash. This movie is a vital look at Sweden’s organized crime and at the rich life of some of the country’s youth, and it makes important points about Sweden’s language and criminal culture.
