C.lark – miniseries available on Netflix – tells the life of Clark Olofsson (Bill Skarsgård)), the most famous robber that Sweden has ever had. Who is? He is the man around whom the definition of was born Stockholm syndrome. Coined by a psychiatrist after the famous robbery in Norrmalmstorg(precisely in Stockholm), in which the hostages empathized with robbers.
The series – consisting of six episodes – is a funny tale about the life of a man out of the ordinary, with a doomed fate, who never earned a penny working, whose world was based on nonsense.women, banks to be emptied and parties. Mix of sentimental novel e pulp, mockumentary e crime, and a retro aesthetic from video clip.
Clark: the first episodes
It all starts in black and white in the 1947 in a small town in Sweden when Mrs. Olofsson is about to give birth Clark (name given in honor of Clark Gable).
And, to give you an idea of what awaits you in the series Jonas Åkerlund– director of videos for Madonna, Britney Spears, Lady Gaga, Beyoncé (among many artists) – the mother in childbirth position and smoking a cigarette yells at the midwife: “Get this shit out of me“, While Clark from the inside addresses the spectator saying:”Let’s start the showthe world awaits me, and this is my first escape ». Let the show begin.
To get to the famous robbery of Norrmalmstorg, we pass from childhood in the 1950s, marked by a violent fatherfrom the first thefts of bicycles And cigarettes (“At 10 I was earning more than my parents”) and from the first few times behind bars. And also and since that time, in 1965, when Clark, with a group of friends, sneaked into the summer villa of the Swedish Prime Minister Tage Erlander.
We then proceed with the first escape (in addition to the one mentioned above, another 17 will follow: a kind of world record) and with transport to the rich Madou (Isabelle Grill) and the motherwith Clark pretends to be a student of Harvard: “They are a queen and a princess who misses the king.” And right here is the king who ends up in bed with both of us, in the same night, and of course he also takes advantage of it for steal jewelry.
Clark, a cartoon character
Clark has the ability to rob and pretend somebody else. Even once arrested and ended up in prison for killing a policeman, however, by the hand of his friend Gunnerpretends to want to marry the newfound Madou. But he will never show up at his engagement party, he prefers to fly to the Canaries and have a good time with the Spanish Ursula. From that moment begins the spasmodic hunt for Commissioner Tommy Lindstroma kind of Swedish Zenigata obsessed with Olofsson.
With Clark it’s like being at the amusement park. Its vicissitudes are on the verge of unlikely, as indeed is his fictional autobiography, on which the miniseries is based. From the beginning it seems to almost witness the story conceived for a comic book where is it the incredible mixes with the crediblefiction to reality.
Bill Skarsgård. (Netflix)
Clark? A narcissist who fascinates women
Most of the second episode focuses on conditions of prisons in Sweden: Olofsson becomes the editor of the newspaper of his prison: by complaining about the conditions of prisoners, he will be able to obtain more rights for all in Swedish prisons. He convinces 2,500 inmates to go on hunger strike, and what does he do? Eat in secret.
Nothing is by chance and in favor of others for Clarkis a narcissist who plans every move: in fact he runs away for the umpteenth time, in Beirut, with his beloved (?) Maria, who believes that her man is fighting for the freedom of the weakest.
Bill Skarsgård and Hanna Björn. (Netflix)
How was the Stockholm syndrome?
The term was coined by the psychiatrist and criminologist Swedish Nils Bejerot after the bank robbery of 23 August 1973 at Norrmalmstorg. Jan-Erik Olsson enters the Stockholm bank, hits one of the two policemen who have intervened and in exchange for the release of the hostages asks for the intervention of Clark Olofsson. Plus three million Swedish kronor, guns and a Ford Mustang to escape.
Bill Skarsgård. (Netflix)
Olofsson enters that bank and the incredible happens: the hostages they weren’t terrified by criminals, towards them they developed positive feelings. It took six days to get out of that place: the hostages kept demanding good treatment for the robbersthe. That absurd attitude becomes the basis of the study of Stockholm syndrome.
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