Neither the comedy nor the inherently lovable Hanks are dark enough to bring this remake of an odd redemption story to life
Seven years ago, a frankly peculiar, quirky dramedy-heartwarmer from Sweden appeared: A Man Called Ove, based on the bestselling novel by Fredrik Backman. It was about a grumpy old widower who snaps at everyone on his street – officiously enforcing the Neighbourhood-Watch-type rules about parking and recycling – and keeps on trying to take his own life. These attempts are continually thwarted when he spots some local outside his house breaking some bylaw and Ove can’t resist rushing out to remonstrate. But a nerdy, sweet-natured young couple move in next door and insist on befriending Ove, and their artless friendship relieves Ove’s repressed sadness and affords him redemption. Ove was played in the original by Rolf Lassgård (Wallander on Swedish TV) and now by Tom Hanks – renamed Otto – in this Hollywood remake from screenwriter David Magee and director Marc Forster. The goofy-friendly new neighbours are played by Mariana Treviño and Manuel Garcia-Rulfo.
Hanks’s performance amplifies and colourises the original curmudgeon, and his star-quality soups up the drama and makes a clearer sense of the backstory, yet the very fact of it being Hanks means that we never for a moment believe that he really is going to be that nasty (or that unhappy) for long. Soon, the lovable Hanks will surely reappear, and it duly does as the sad story of his late wife emerges in sucrose flashback – although she is always a bland cipher, not a convincing person. Finally, of course, Otto is going to be absolutely adorable. With his fierce short haircut and blank, open face he looks very familiar. Not grump, but Gump.
