Something to watch tonight: Tuesday 19 September

A Man Called Ove (Holm, 2015) is a 99c digital rental from Apple

Back on 4 September, I recommended the Tom Hanks vehicle A Man Called Otto which had just landed at Neon and Prime Video and, in the comments on that post, reader JJW of Victoria, Australia (I think) “demanded” that I review the original Swedish film A Man Called Ove which came out in 2015.

Both films are based on the same bestselling novel (published by Fredrik Backman in 2012 and itself based on a series of blog posts) and the Hanks version is clearly indebted to the Swedish movie as much as the novel.

The premise: Ove is an incorrigible grump, a widower taking out his frustrations on his long suffering neighbours. Everyone is else is “an idiot” but for some reason he is tolerated by the community.

A family with young children moves in across the road and despite his considerable misanthrope, Ove discovers there might be a little bit more to life than rage and grief.

Ove is a darker and deeper version of the story. Perhaps it is the Hanks factor at work – Rolf Lassgård as Ove is less familiar than the twinkly good guy persona Hanks has become known for. But the back story – revealed in extended flashbacks – is much more tragic and the actor playing the young Ove (Filip Berg) is stronger than inexperienced Truman Hanks

¹

in Otto.

I should point out that the warnings regarding suicide themes are even more pertinent here as the attempts at self harm are treated more seriously than in the Hanks film.

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A Man Called Ove is available – presumably for a short time – as a 99c digital rental from Apple.

1. Truman’s only screen performance credits to date are in films that star his father, Tom.