Hard
Sex sells in this series from HBO Brazil. Sofia is a committed housewife whose life is shattered when her husband dies suddenly and she inherits a pornographic film company called SofiX. At first, she just wants to dump the problem. However, when she fails to get a job as a lawyer and risks losing her home, she has no other way out. She decides to take over the business, on the condition they make more artistic and tasteful movies. But things get a little complicated when she starts falling for porn star Marcello. This stylish, funny and salacious show is an adaptation of the French comedy of the same name and it’s loads of fun.
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Who's who in the world of 'Hard'
Halt and Catch Fire
It’s all about computer love and computer games. as ‘the best show that nobody watched’ to be ‘filed next to Mad Men’, Halt and Catch Fire takes us to 1980s Texas at the dawn of the personal computing boom. Joe, Gordon and Cameron are a visionary, a computer engineer and a prodigy respectively whose innovations threaten the corporate behemoths of the time. Greed and ego won’t be the only challenges to their undertaking as they walk down risky but enticing new paths. Also featuring green type on black computer screens and a ripper soundtrack, add this to your watchlist.
Made in Italy
Walk walk fashion baby. Prepare yourself for some fashion envy in Made in Italy, set against the backdrop of 1970s Milan and the revolution of Italian fashion. At its core this is a coming-of-age story at a time when the country was going through social change, protests, feminism and a burst of creativity. We see this world through the eyes of budding journalist Irene Mastrangelo who unexpectedly lands a job at fashion magazine Appeal. Think of it like an Italian 70s Devil Wears Prada. Each episode focuses on a giant of Italian fashion design, so you’ll see familiar names like Missoni, Armani, Prada, Versace, Fiorucci and with a sneaky trip to Rome, Valentino. This show is a love letter to the pioneers of Italian fashion and the city of Milan.
Thinkistan
From fashion and the 70s in Italy to advertising and the 90s in Mumbai. This comedy drama follows a battle between two friends, small-towner Amit and city-slicker Hema, two young copywriters who join Mumbai’s hottest ad agency, MTMC. While Hema gets all the attention with his poetry and English-speaking skills, Amit struggles to get credit for his modest Hindi-rooted ideas. Big personalities, short skirts, seductive women, infectious workplaces and the glitz of show business. Can their friendship survive the dirty business of advertising? It’s North v South, Hindi v English and much more.
Witch Hunt
Inspired by true stories of whistle-blowers in Norway, fighting for justice and taking huge risks, these people often become targeted themselves – the systems that are meant to protect them can let them down, leaving them alone and unsupported with tremendous stress and fear.
Peer Eggen, a major finance and business man, is positioning himself for an important acquisition, all while a troublesome tax case is on its way to court. Meanwhile, an invoice from an unknown Dutch company lands on the desk of Ida Waage, chief accountant at the influential law firm Biermann & Gude. The amount is modest, but seemingly lacks basis, and Ida discovers the invoice is part of a money laundering operation on behalf of B&G’s biggest client, Peer Eggen. She alerts the board, but instead of going after the ones responsible, they turn on her with harassment and fabricated accusations.
Follow the Money
Feel like another Scandi financial thriller? Follow the Money starts with the discovery of a corpse near a wind farm, but the investigation soon shifts gear from the murder mystery to the dealings of environmentally friendly energy company, Energreen. Entering the boardrooms and banks of the corrupt world of economic crime, the series centres on four lives that become entwined as the rich, poor, greedy and fraudulent go to any lengths to realise their dreams. This slow-burn thriller has plenty of twists and turns plus some familiar faces if you’ve watched other Nordic Noirs and it is created by one of the co-writers of (so you know it’s going to be good).
Bad Banks
It’s still all about the money, money, money. The addictive German series Bad Banks looks at the male-dominated banking world from a female’s perspective, and who knew this world could be so fast-paced and thrilling to watch? Jana (Paula Beer) is a talented investment banker, wrongly fired from Crédit International in Luxembourg, but offered a job at the prestigious Deutsche Invest in Frankfurt. Leaving her family behind she impresses with her talent and ambition, but is also unknowingly being manipulated by her old boss. Full of drama, greed, lies and cocaine (of course, this is high finance) this series asks how far would you go to succeed?
Exit
No romance without finance. Based on shocking true stories from the exclusive world of Oslo’s high finance, this Norwegian drama follows four friends who seem to have it all. The men are driven by narcissism and getting whatever and whoever they want. At their private party pad, they escape the boredom of their lives with hedonism and reckless partying.
From successful writer/director Øystein Karlsen (Dag, One Night), the series boasts an award-winning cast from the stage and screen, many of whom will be familiar to SBS viewers, including Simon J. Berger (Conspiracy of Silence), Pål Sverre Hagen (Valkyrien), Tobias Santelmann (The Last Kingdom), Jon Øigarden (Mammon), Ine Marie Wilmann (Sonja: The White Swan) and Agnes Kittelsen (Happy, Happy).
Blinded
Mo money mo problems. Like Norway’s Exit, Sweden’s Blinded is set in the world of high finance, and pits together young journalist Bea Farkas and bank director Peder Rooth. As part of her investigation into how it’s possible for Scandinavia’s most profitable specialised bank to be posting extremely low credit losses, Bea is questioning Peder. Complicating matters, the pair tangle themselves up in a highly unprofessional and extra-marital affair. When Bea receives an anonymous tip that Peder is hiding something, the stakes are suddenly raised very high. Bad Banks meets Succession, Blinded is also one for fans of and .
Joint Venture
Let’s step away from finance and music puns and into a fictitious future in São Paulo, Brazil where marijuana has just been legalised. Now, small-time dealer Biriba must decide whether to make his business official in a quickly saturated market, or stay on the wrong side of the law dealing harder more dangerous drugs for much bigger pay. Changing from one world to another is more difficult than he imagined, and to make matters worse, certain people from his past aren’t too happy with his decision.
Produced by HBO Latin America this series explores the grey area between what is criminal and what is legal, diving into the social and economic consequences drug trafficking can have on not only a person, but their country as well.
