Film Review: The Hundred-year Old Man Who Climbed Out of The Window and Disappeared
With the violent deaths of several characters treated in an unnervingly light-hearted way, The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared should be an acquired taste.
THE HUNDRED-YEAROLD MAN WHO CLIMBED OUT THE WINDOW AND DISAPPEARED
Starring: Robert Gustafsson, Iwar Wiklander, David Wiberg,Mia Skäringer
Director: Felix Herngren
Categoryy: IIB (Swedish,English, Spanish and Russian)
With the violent deaths of several characters treated in an unnervingly light-hearted way, The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared should be an acquired taste. Yet, to judge by Jonas Jonasson's 2009 novel's appearance on bestseller lists across Europe and elsewhere, including Hong Kong, the darkly comic tale of a centenarian who has led a Forrest Gump-like life has broad appeal.
So it was just a matter of time before a film adaptation came along, and Felix Herngren's cinematic take on the tale was released on Christmas Day 2013 in Sweden, Denmark and Norway.
Fans of the book will flock to watch the film, but even those unfamiliar with Jonasson's tome will enjoy seeing comedian Robert Gustafsson as the white-haired but sprightly Allan Karlson, who decides on his 100th birthday to make good on his conviction that he's still too full of life to be dumped in an old folks' home.
After climbing out of the window of his ground floor room, Karlson heads to the local bus station, where he boards the next bus out of town with a suitcase belonging to a young thug (Simon Säppenen). Dropped off in a one house "town", Karlson is invited in by the home's owner, Julius (Iwar Wiklander), for what turns out to be several drinks.