In less than a week, the mini-series Vengeances has already climbed to third place in the top 10 Netflix series. But is this story about a widow seeking revenge taken from a true story?
We told you about it two days ago, the Austro-German mini-series Vengeances immediately found its audience as soon as it was released on Netflix. This chilling thriller follows Blum (Anna Maria Mühe), a woman who runs her small undertaker’s business at a ski resort. Her life is devastated after the brutal death of her husband Mark, who died in a road accident. An apparent case of hit-and-run.
As she tries to mourn, she discovers a whole chain of secrets and lies linked to the death of her husband. She then embarks on a dangerous investigation, but following a fairly realistic narrative. Hence the question: is this series inspired by a true story?
And the answer is no! No way. It is actually an adaptation of the novel of the same name by the Austrian writer Bernhard Aichner. The book was published in 2014 and translated into several languages, including French. revenge is one of the most acclaimed works of the author, who made it into a trilogy of novels.
In his book, the author explores death and how it affects humans. He therefore did an internship in a funeral home and explained in an interview published by Editions de l’Archipel that this experience had helped to reduce his fear of mortality. Although the process at the funeral home initially seemed scary and unnatural, Aichner quickly got used to it. Her internship contributed to Blum’s portrayal in the book, particularly her varied emotions and reactions to the deaths around her.
netflix Anna Maria Mühe as Blum
Another dominant theme of the book and the series is evil. The writer explores the concept of evil in every person through Blum’s story. He explains that the idea that evil resides within all of us is frightening and intriguing and can often take over at any time.
This is foregrounded in the story through its emphasis on religious subtext and the choices certain characters make in the face of adversity. Therefore, the story becomes morally convoluted and grounded in reality as we understand the motivations behind the crimes committed by multiple characters.
Vengeances is adapted for television by Barbara Stepansky, Benito Mueller and Wolfgang Mueller-Senn. While the Netflix series mostly follows the plot of the book, it makes some cosmetic changes to the original work. In the book, Blum’s funeral home is in Innsbruck, but the series places it in the mountains of Tyrol. Similarly, Blum has two daughters in the novel, while in the series she has a daughter and a son.
These changes do not affect the overall narrative, making the series a fairly faithful adaptation of Aichner’s novel. In the end, Vengeances is indeed a fictional story that examines a human being’s relationship with death but with a good touch of realism in its approach to these subjects.