As part of the summer season, RTÉ2 is continuing its commitment to strong European drama with two high profile foreign language series: 1864 and The Saboteurs, both starting this week.
New Danish television drama 1864 is the most ambitious and expensive drama to date from Danish state broadcaster, DR, whose previous shows Borgen, The Killing and The Bridge have reached cult status worldwide; and six-part Norwegian WWII drama, The Saboteurs, a huge hit in its native Norway.
***DOUBLE BILL***
EPISODE 1 – 22.35
Brilliant German scientist and Nobel Prize winner Werner Heisenberg is accused by the new Nazi regime of being politically “unreliable”.
He is about to lose his University position, but when his mother appeals to the mother of SS leader Heinrich Himmler, he is allowed into Uranverein, the secret Nazi nuclear energy project. Heisenberg believes heavy water is needed to control the chain reaction. This component only exists at Norsk Hydro’s factory in Rjukan, Norway.
The Second World War has now broken out. As a former scientist at Rjukan, Norwegian professor and reserve officer Leif Tronstad suspects the German motive for their heavy water order. He tries to warn Hydro who ends up shipping the heavy water to France under dramatic circumstances. An elaborate decoy plan was initiated. The plane believed to have valuable cargo on board was forced down over Hamburg by German fighter planes. But in April 1940 Germany invades Norway and orders a doubling of the heavy water production. Tronstad escapes to England to warn the Allies about what he believes is an effort to build a German atom bomb.
EPISODE 2 – 23.30
Leif Tronstad establishes contact with the War Ministry and a plan to destroy the Hydro facilities at Rjukan is drawn up. A small team code named ‘Grouse’ will parachute over Norway to prepare for British commandos who will arrive in gliders. Tronstad hand-picks Knut Haukelid as the leader of ‘Grouse’. Haukelid is a daring man with no respect for authority. But just before departure Haukelid ends up in a self-inflicted accidental shooting and Claus Helberg, an indefatigable worker hailing from Rjukan now heads the mission.
Heisenberg travels to Copenhagen to meet his Danish mentor professor Niels Bohr – also a Nobel Prize winner.
Bohr implores him to stop working at the bomb. Heisenberg fails to understand why. He dives back into his work on the bomb. In Rjukan, the new managing director Erik Henriksen is confronted with sabotage of the heavy water production. He fires an innocent employee as a warning to others. Operation ‘Freshman’ takes off with 34 British commando soldiers, but over the Norwegian mountains they fly into a snowstorm.