Skenbart: En film om tåg

First of all - I hardly ever watch Swedish movies, and this is actually the second time in my life I watch a Swedish movie on cinema! Therefor, I believe it's one of the best Swedish movies ever! The combination of thrill and humour is OUTSTANDING, and sometimes you don't even know if you should be terrified or just laugh! The plot is about this man, a writer who wants to go to Germany after World War II and help the Germans to start over. On the way to Germany, he is trying to help his friends on the train, which is however a bad idea. What a clumsy jerk! And poor Robert Gustafsson - the wounded soldier - always get in the way ... OUCH!!! But he still got his great mood. A positive guy. Robert Gustafsson have done some less great movies the last years or so, and this is really a relief. He is great in this movie. After all - this is one of the best Swedish movies ever, and Peter Dalle has made an excellent job! Congratulations!

Outside Sweden you are not expected have seen this movie. Happy you. The cast includes several actors that are important part of modern the Swedish movie history. And still..

Seems like Peter Dalle only had a an idea lasting for about 20 minutes. Robert Gustafson is totally misused in this movie, trying to copy a younger Gösta Ekman. Ekman, by the way, is the only actor fulfilling the expectations.

Credit that can be given is for the photo, splendid idea using black and white. Music is OK.

But over-all it's a waste of god actors and the time of the audience.

`Skenbart' is one of the funniest movies to not only to come from Peter Dalle but from the Swedish cinema industry itself. It is a movie made in black and white to get something of the atmosphere from the days before Christmas in December 1945, which it does very well. Almost the whole plot takes place on a train, non-stop to Berlin. On the train is a mix of homosexuals, nuns, deported refugees, murderers, alcoholics and the failure literature critic 'Gunnar' played by the, in Sweden, famous actor Gustav Hammarsten. The leading role 'Gunnar' is the type of person that, although his intentions are for the best, seems to drag everyone near him, in a extremely funny way, into disaster and to a living hell, especially for a from the Finnish war, homecoming, wounded soldier played by the extremely funny comedian Robert Gustafsson. On the train is also a doctor, who cheats on his wife, with his mistress. They have together planned to murder the doctors wife that is also travelling with the same train without any knowledge about her husbands intentions. Will the wife of the doctor elude the plans to murder her and will everyone else survive the unlucky fellow 'Gunnar'?

In December 1945 a train leaves the central station of Stockholm for Berlin. There aren't much left when it arrives. Not of the train and not of some passengers.

This is a black comedy directed by Peter Dalle and acted like they used to act in the 40s and also photographed (in b/w) like they used to during that period. The actors must have had lots of fun making it. They aren't much of characters, like they weren't in the 40s, but the story is well narrated and everybody has timing.

A deadly black and deadly funny film. See it, if you didn't think the Swedes were capable of humour.

This solid black and white slapstick comedy with a dark (but hopelessly contrived) plot is a true crowd pleaser that will have you howling with laughter (as well as rolling your eyes with disbelief).

It's the old psychopath on a train story but that is of no big importance as the thriller portion of the film almost seems to be merely a counterweight to the antics of the great comedian Robert Gustafsson. His hapless, nearly incurably optimistic soldier invokes both compassion and schadenfreude in a fashion that almost rivals Chevy Chase.

The thing about the film that appealed to me the most, however, is that wedged between the improbable and the hilarious are the accurately portrayed everyday joys and nuisances of train travel. They add a most welcome sense of realism and recognition.

This thriller comedy has admittedly borrowed most of its "suspense" from Hitchcock and should, in my opinion, only be watched for its comedy value (which is high indeed). Besides Gustafsson, Lars Amble's solid performance as a delightfully cynical misogynist is worth the price of admission alone.

Heartily recommend.