The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared
So far, every Scandinavian comedy I have seen was great (“Adam’s Apples”, “Kraftidioten” and oh I loved “The Boss of it all”) yet at the same time I never seem to research them further. Amongst all of these, ironically, “The 100-Year-Old Man” was the weakest. I am not surprised that it’s based on a really popular book because it contains all the ingredients for a great comedy, but something was not convincing me and I am just not sure why. Perhaps it’s the fact that I rarely actually laughed or even thought “Oh boy that is so funny”. To me the film is just absurd, but not absurd with the extra little something that makes me think back at it and laugh. Sure, the film was extremely upbeat and it started off very strong. Pip and I watched the first 20 minutes of it or so, and we really wanted to continue. The premise was awesome, the main character likeable and we were amused by the explosions. After that, only the flashbacks were absurd in a funny way, the main story just made me go “Oh really?” Somehow the characters involved became less likeable (quibbling about money and generally being somewhat ignorant) and I am not even sure who or what I was rooting for anymore. I didn’t even care for that lukewarm love story thrown into it.
It was strange: Before I saw the film I had extremely high expectations, then I read that it got bad reviews and lowered them, then I saw the first part of the film and was ecstatic, and later I saw the rest and now I feel kind of meh about it. I can’t even explain why (nor do I really desire to), either the humor hits me or it doesn’t and sadly it just didn’t work for me with this one.